"Are you in earnest, Van Houten, or dreaming? If your news is true, there is not a moment to be lost. We must have the horses and trap round at once and drive inland or to Batavia. The town can successfully resist."
"I should certainly advise Elise to retire at once to a station a mile or two away. There will be a battle fought here. Two hundred soldiers and forty or fifty planters, with six guns, halted a mile away. They will be here in an hour's time, and will give the Malays a reception that they do not dream of. As soon as the fight begins, their ships will be attacked by two merchantmen and a flotilla of boats manned by every available man in Batavia, with the exception of the governor himself and a small garrison, who will remain in the fort to protect the town should the pirates change their plans. Captain Smidt is in command of the flotilla, Colonel Stern is with the troops."
"This is startling news indeed," the planter said after a moment's silence. "You say they will not attack till eleven. I will have the horses put in at once. I will take Elise to my neighbour Rogen, whose house is three miles inland. I shall be back again in plenty of time to take my part in the affair. Or, no—you shall drive her there, Van Houten. I dare say that you would like to do so."
"Thank you, sir!"
"But can I not stay here?"
"No, dear," her father said decisively; "you might be hit by a chance shot, and I don't want to be in a state of anxiety about you while I have other things to do."
He rang the bell standing on the table. A servant entered. "In the first place, go and tell Domingo to put the horses into the carriage at once and to bring it round to the door, then bring in glasses and a bottle of Rhine wine."
Ten minutes later Van Houten started with Elise, the native driving. On the way he gave her a sketch of all that had happened since he went away, and told her of the plans of the "Sea Tiger". The girl shuddered.
"From what a fate have you saved me!" she murmured; "but it would not have been so, for I would have killed myself."
"I do not think that he would have given you much opportunity for doing that. He said that he would take good care that no weapon should be put in your way. However, thank God that his schemes have been thwarted by his own folly in torturing me by telling me of his intentions! You need have no fear of the results of this fight; taken wholly by surprise as they will be, and bewildered by the attack on their ships, we are certain to defeat them on land, and I trust that we shall capture all their ships; and the lesson will be so terrible that it will be a long time before any other is likely to follow the 'Sea Tiger's' example."