Webster’s voice rang out cheerily; and soon the long line was paying out in the foaming track. A bare-legged and brawny-armed tar, taking the line over his shoulder, staggered forward with it when its swift race had been checked by the minute hand, and Webster himself put his weight into the work, seeing which, Frank went down to help, for it’s no child’s play towing in the line from the grasp of the rushing waters.
“Twenty-three, sir,” sang out Webster; “and no bad speed, too, in the open,” he added to Frank.
In a few minutes the space between the two ships had greatly lessened, and the name of the cruiser could be picked out on her bows.
“Do you see that, Miss Laura? there’s no doubt she’s after us.”
“I see no change in her, Captain.”
“She has shifted her course in answer to our increased speed, and instead of being stem on, you can now see almost the length of her broadside.”
“She’s got her bow chaser cleared, sir,” said Webster, in a tone of pleasurable excitement.
A grand and formidable object the warship appeared now, sending before her terrible bows a white avalanche of water, her white decks lined with men, and the dark muzzles of her guns threatening destruction. And no less deadly in aspect, though on a lesser scale, was the low and swifter craft sullenly plunging on like some stealthy panther retreating, snarling and half reluctant, before the advance of a royal tiger.
“It is strange she does not signal,” muttered the Captain, “unless she means to speak us.”
The cruiser was so near now that every man on board the port side could be distinctly seen, and it was clear that where the two lines met the ships would be within less than a cable’s length.