“Commercial code pennant,” said he; and then he read out the flags beneath it.
“Run down and fetch up the signal-book,” said I.
He did so; we turned up the signal, and read, “Come under my lee; I wish to speak you.”
“Thank ’ee!” ejaculated Bob, “not if we can help it, Mister Johnson. I reckon ’twould be about the most onprofitable conwersation as ever the crew of this here cutter took a part in. We’ve got our own wholesome planks to walk, aboard here, when we wants any of that sort of exercise; and though there’s not much to boast of in the way of room, I dare say there’s more of that than we’d find on the plank you’d, give us for a parade ground. Seems to me, Hal, as we’re bringing him nearer abeam than he was a while ago; ain’t it so?”
“You are right, Bob,” I replied, glancing at the compass; “he is more than a point farther aft than he was a quarter of an hour ago; but is it not possible that we are giving ourselves needless uneasiness? That craft certainly has a look of the Albatross; but we are not sure that it is her after all.”
“D’ye notice his main-topmast-staysail, Harry?” returned he; “cut like a trysail, and set on a stay that leads down just clear of his fore-top and into the slings of his fore-yard. How many vessels will ye see with a sail shaped like that? Yet I noticed that his was, the other day. And there’s the red ribbon round him too; in fact, it’s the Albatross all over,” concluded he, with the glass once more at his eye.
It was but too evident that Bob was right. I had been hoping that the general resemblance of the brig in sight to the Albatross was purely accidental; but she was now within less than three miles of us; and, even without the aid of the telescope, certain features, if I may so term them, were recognisable, which identified her beyond all question as the pirate-brig.
“What shall we do about answering his signal, Bob?” said I.
“Let it fly as it is, unanswered,” he replied composedly. “Look where we’re dropping him to; in another quarter of an hour we shall have him fairly on our lee-beam, and that too out of gun-shot, unless, as is most likely the case, he’s got a long gun; but if he has, we’re a small mark to fire at, and we’ll soon slip out of range even of that.”
It was by this time perfectly manifest that whatever he might be able to do in a breeze, he had no chance with us in a light air like the present; and I entertained strong hopes of being able to slip past him unscathed, when I felt sanguine of our ability to get fairly away from him in a chase dead to windward.