"Very well," he said. "One of the guards will see him to his hotel. It is necessary for him to go now."
"Ye can tell him I'm ready," Watson replied, and added in a low voice as he passed Grahame: "Get away to sea as soon as she floats!"
He went off with his escort and the official said something aside to the remaining guard, who saluted and told the others to follow him. The crowd had scattered, and nobody interfered with the party on their way to the harbor.
"I will wait until I see you go on board," the guard said when they reached the beach. "You will be called upon some time to-morrow."
"They'd have been wiser if they had begun their investigations now," Grahame remarked as they launched the dinghy. "She'll be afloat in half an hour. Do you feel up to running the engine, Mack? If not, Walthew must do the best he can."
"I could take her oot if I was drunk and I'm far frae that," Macallister declared. "Looks as if ye had no' allooed for the steadiness o' the Scottish head. Noo, there's Watson, and I'll no' say he was quite sober, but he could spoil yon dago's game. Maybe ye're beginning to understand why he would sleep ashore. They think ye canna' get away withoot him."
"I see that," said Grahame. "Better send your fireman to collect your tools when Miguel looses the stern mooring. And try to restrain your feelings if things are not quite right below. It's important that we should get away quietly."
They reached the Enchantress, and preparations for departure were silently begun.
They must first slip past the watching fort, and then elude the foreign gunboat. They knew the consequences if they were caught.