The cook had quietly gone to his galley, and then acted as steward as well, so that while the boats were still miles away, we had the best breakfast we had been provided with for many days. And, after this, quite ready for our enemies, and well furnished with weapons, we waited their coming.
I obtained a glass from the captain’s cabin, my principal officer telling me to keep it as long as I liked, on condition that I kept reporting to him the state of affairs on deck.
“Everyone is very kind,” he said sadly; “but I spend a great many anxious hours here, longing to hear how things are going on, and if it were not for Miss Denning, my position would be ten times worse.”
I hurried out with the glass, focussed it on the boats, and watched the men for long enough. The forces had been equalised by four men being sent out of Jarette’s boat to take the places of the men who had returned to their allegiance, and, as I watched them, I could see that as they slaved away at the oars, their leader kept jumping up with a pistol in his hand, to throw himself about wildly, stamping, gesticulating, and pointing to the ship, as if he were urging the crews on.
I was not the only one who used a glass, for there was nothing to do now but wait for the coming attack; and as I had been watching for some time with the glass on the rail, one eye shut, and the other close to the glass, I suddenly ceased, for my right eye felt dazzled by the glare of the sun, and I found that Mr Frewen was close beside me.
“Well, Dale,” he said, “who will get tired first—these scoundrels of attacking us, or we of trying to beat them off?”
“They will,” I said decisively, as I closed my glass and tucked it under my arm. “We’ve got nothing to do but wait; they’ve got to row miles in this hot sun, and then they have to fight afterwards. They can’t help having the worst of it.”
“Yes; they have the worst of it,” he said, smiling.
“And it strikes me they’d be very glad to— Hurray! here’s the wind again.”
For the surface of the sea was dappled with dark patches, and long before the boats could reach us, we were sailing gently away, certainly twice as fast as their crews could row.