"Why, what danger can there be?" the others asked. "We have agreed they cannot attack us by the channel."
"No, they cannot attack us from the channel, but they can attack us from somewhere else now they know we are here. They will find some place where they can land and take us in rear."
An exclamation of dismay broke from the other captains.
"Sapriste! I never thought of that. Of course they can. I have never examined the coast on the other side, but there must be places where they could land."
"No doubt there are; and you may be quite sure that is the course they will adopt. These English are slow, but they are not fools; and I will bet ten to one that is the next move they will be up to. If you like I will take a score of my men and cross the island this afternoon, and to-morrow will examine the whole line of shore. If there are only one or two places they can land at we may be able to defend them; but if there are four or five places far apart our force won't be sufficient to hold them all, for they could land two hundred and fifty men from those two ships, perhaps a hundred more."
"That is the best thing to be done, Vipon. Of course you will send us word across directly you see how the land lies. If we find that they can land in a good many places, there will be nothing for us to do but try and make a bolt for it. Keeping close in under the cliffs at night we may manage to give them the slip, or in any case one if not two of us may get away. Better that than to run the risk of being all caught like rats in a trap here."
An hour afterward the captain of the Belle Marie started for the other side of the island with twenty picked men, carrying with them their arms, axes, and two days' provisions. The rest of the crews were employed during the day in filling up the three vessels with the most valuable portion of the booty in the storehouses, care being taken not to fill the vessels so deeply as would interfere seriously with their sailing powers. An arrangement had been made between the captains that the Belle Marie should transfer her cargo to the first vessel worth sending to France that she captured, receiving as her share one-third of its value if it reached port safely.
The captain of the Belle Marie was well content with this arrangement, for the storehouses contained the spoils of upward of twenty ships, and his share would therefore be a considerable one, and he would only have to carry the cargo till he fell in with an English merchantman. All speculation as to the British schooner's whereabouts was put an end to the next morning, by a message from Captain Vipon saying she had been discovered lying close in under the cliffs at the back of the island, and that her boats were already examining the shore. An hour later the captain himself arrived.
"It is as I feared," he said when he joined the other captains; "there are three bays about two miles apart and at all of these a landing could be easily effected. The land slopes gradually down to the edge of the sea. They might land at any of them, and of course the guns of the schooner would cover the landing if we opposed it."
"Still we might beat them back," one of the others said. "We can muster about three hundred men between us, and they are not likely to land more than that."