"Monsieur le capitaine will bring two guests to supper," said one.
"Peste!" growled a second, the fattest of all, by whom, as Jack now saw, a cook's white cap lay, "he will keep us up late. Monsieur le capitaine is so particular. A supper fit for Bonaparte is not good enough for him. The kitchen fire will have to be made up. Go and see to it, Jules."
The man addressed scraped his plate and drank his wine before lazily rising to do the cook's bidding. Jack flew back with the speed of a hare, and before the man had pushed back his chair the adventurer was several feet up the chimney, grasping his precious spoil, the poker and the chopper.
CHAPTER XI
A BREAK FOR FREEDOM
"By Jove!" thought Jack with a chuckle as he scrambled out of the chimney, "won't there be a rumpus when the cook misses his poker! Luckily, he'll never think it has gone aloft!"
It was a very sooty object that descended, after pausing to make sure that all was safe, into the prisoners' room. Jack was immediately surrounded by a group of the Fury's men, so eager to hear what had happened that they raised their voices and provoked an angry reprimand from the sentry at the door.
"Silence, you donkeys!" whispered Jack.
"Avast your jabber!" said Babbage, scowling upon Turley. "Me and Mr. Hardy have got to lay the course for this little venture."
After this the men behaved more discreetly, and left Jack alone with Babbage.