"Aye, around midnight," said Ben.
CHAPTER II
FIRST BLOOD TO THE SMUGGLERS
At half an hour after midnight, the Glenbow rounded Saltern Head and drawing in close to the land dropped her anchor about ten minutes' row from Saltern Quay. The wind had dropped, and the sea under the shelter of the land was quite calm. The town was hidden from sight in the darkness, which was more than ordinarily intense owing to the clouded sky and the lack of a moon. Ashore, the light on the quay blinked its warning, and two or three other late lights showed where the town lay asleep.
A raucous blast of the ship's siren woke echoes between the surrounding hills, but did not seemingly awake the people who lay sleeping between them. Dare, leaning eagerly over the rail with his gaze fixed shorewards, thought ruefully that such a sleepy town was not likely to yield much in the shape of adventure. He had not much time to dwell on that, however. Soon Ben, who had been collecting the luggage and seeing it safely stowed in the boat, which had just been lowered, came up, and they both went to the ship's ladder. A few minutes later they were being rowed ashore.
As the boat shot between the quays jutting out from the harbour, Dare searched the blackness in vain for the gleam of a friendly light.
"Doesn't look as if father has come to meet us," he said to Ben. That worthy merely grunted.
The boat was rowed towards some steps at the foot of the quay on the town side, and they disembarked without further speech. Their luggage was taken out of the boat and placed on the quay by the boat's crew, which then went swinging off into the darkness, leaving Ben and Dare to make their way through the town as best they could.
"Here's a to-do," then grumbled Ben. "No one to meet us and it pitch dark and we not knowin' the road or the house."
"The best thing we can do is to follow the boat's crew," suggested Dare. "It's likely the post office is not far from the Customs."