"Look," said the Captain, pointing to the sky behind them, which was now illumined by a broad scarlet glare.
"What is that?"
"One of the ships on fire."
"Then I am better off where I am."
"Did you doubt it?"
"I was beginning to.… How much farther must we ride?"
"Two leagues."
Tristram groaned, and they set off again, but more slowly, for the road now was paved with bricks instead of the loose sand over which they had travelled hitherto, and moreover it ran, without fence or parapet, along the top of a formidable dyke, the black waters of which far beneath him caused Tristram the most painful apprehension. Captain Salt, guessing this, slackened the pace to a walk. The glare still reddened the sky behind: but either the firing had ceased or they had passed beyond sound of it. At any rate, they heard only the water lapping in the dykes and the wind that howled over the wastes around.
Tristram had long since lost his hat, and his nose was bleeding from a sharp blow against his horse's neck. He was trying to stanch the flow when the chimes of a clock pealed down the wind from somewhere ahead and upon his right. His father halted again, and after scanning the gloom for a minute uttered again the three calls that were like the wailing of a gull.
Again the signal was answered, this time from their left, and the spark of a lantern appeared. "Dismount, my son," said the Captain, setting the example and leading his horse by the bridle towards the light; "we leave our horses here."