The mate shook his head.
"Not if the wind freshens, sir, as I think it will. I should say we had best haul our wind, and make for one of the Spanish ports. We might get into Santander."
"Yes, that would be our best chance.
"All hands 'bout ship!"
The vessel's head was brought up into the wind, and payed off on the other tack, heading south--the frigate being, now, on her weather quarter. This course took the brig within a mile and a half of the lugger, which fired a few harmless shots at her. When she had passed beyond the range of her guns, she shaped her course southeast by east for Santander, the frigate being now dead astern. The men were then piped to dinner.
"Is she likely to catch us, sir?" Bob asked, as they sat down to table.
"I hope not, lad. I don't think she will, unless the wind freshens a good deal. If it did, she would come up hand over hand.
"I take it she is twelve miles off, now. It is four bells, and she has only got five hours' daylight, at most. However fast she is, she ought not to gain a knot and a half an hour, in this breeze and, if we are five or six miles ahead when it gets dark, we can change our course. There is no moon."
They were not long below.
"The lugger is under sail again, sir," the second mate, who was on duty, said as they gained the deck.