“Whether they fire or not, we must get through. Couldn’t we open fire, too?”
Captain Pardoe laughed.
“We must depend on our heels, Miss Laura. If it came to knocks, the guardship would blow us out of the water.”
“How annoying!” was the truly feminine reply—a reply so inappropriate that even Frank smiled, while Captain Pardoe chuckled audibly.
“Understand, Captain,” she continued imperiously, “I will not be captured, nor the ship, not if they have to blow it up.”
“Ah, see that?”
A shaft of light shot into the sky, then dropped to the water and swept swiftly from right to left.
“It’s the search-light. The guardship is looking for us. Mr Webster, step down to the engineer and tell him we’ll want every pound of steam he can give us when I signal him. We must get twenty-seven knots out of her.”
“Twenty-seven knots,” thought Frank. “What ship can this be?” The cabin seemed to grow unbearable as his excitement increased, and if danger was to be encountered his place was by the side of this girl whom Fate had thrown in his path.
Again the shaft of light, broadening from its base, shot out into the darkness, and swept the water to its outermost fringe, where the gleam mingled with the black night, reaching a few lengths ahead, where it outlined a bare pole on the bank.