“Oh, I don’t mean that, sir!” cried the lad. “It’s the lugger we first came upon off that African river.”
“What!” cried the lieutenant. “Impossible! Run close in, Mr Roberts.” And the men pulled the cutter close alongside the swift-looking boat with its raking masts and lowered lug sails.
“Humph!” said the lieutenant. “The same build, the same rig, the same coloured canvas. Well, really, Mr Murray, it is a strange resemblance.”
“I’m almost sure it is the same boat, sir,” cried Murray.
“That’s as good as saying that the Yankee who tricked us so has sailed right across the Atlantic with the slaving schooner, and we have had the luck to follow in her track, and caught up to her.”
“Yes, sir; I don’t think there’s any doubt of it,” cried Murray.
“Then, if you are right, Mr Murray, the slaving schooner will be somewhere close at hand.”
“Yes, sir; I hope so,” replied Murray. “I am ready to hope so, my lad, but I say it is impossible. That was a lugger, and this is a lugger, and of course there is a certain amount of resemblance in the rig; but you are jumping at conclusions just because this is similar.”
“I think not, sir. I took so much notice of the boat; but look here, sir, Tom May was with me when I went forward to speak to the Yankee, and he would know.—Here, May, isn’t that the lugger the American planter was on when we brought her to?”
The sailor stared hard at the vessel hanging by a line fastened to what seemed to be a cocoanut tree.