“Sailing as honest seamen,” responded the Englishman, who had recovered his equilibrium in a measure, and in whose eyes glared a fierce light of mad hatred, as he returned Conyngham’s steadfast look.
“Lie number three. But we won’t go on. I’ll tell you what you said. When you saw that we were outpointing that cutter, you said that when she was near enough to hail, you would take your knife and cut away the sheets, and that McCarthy here would let go the jib-halyards, and that you would then——” he paused suddenly. “Open your shirt,” he ordered.
The men’s faces were white and terrified. Higgins fumbled weakly at his breast and then, all at once, collapsed forward on the deck. He had fainted dead away.
Acting on Conyngham’s orders, Mr. Jarvis bent over the prostrate man and drew forth and displayed, to the astonished eyes of all, a small British Union Jack.
The crew fell to murmuring. Captain Conyngham was all smiles again. He waited until Higgins had been revived by a dash of cold water. Then he spoke to the two frightened and now trembling men.
“Your conduct shall be reported,” he said, “to Messrs. Lester and Flackman, secret agents of the British Crown. They should not employ such joltheads. Now below with these rascals. Put them in irons, Mr. Jarvis.”
In charge of the first mate and the boatswain, the two prisoners were marched below. The captain resumed his hurried pacing of the quarter-deck, and the crew suddenly jumped at his order to shorten sail, for the wind had increased and was blowing in unsteady puffs.
During the early hours of the night it blew half a gale, but died away in the early morning hours, and at daybreak the Peggy found herself jumping uneasily in the rough water with her sails flapping idly against the masts. All about her was a thick opaque white haze. One of the Channel mists had suddenly swept down from the north. It was almost impossible to see even the length of the deck.
The lookout forward, who had been peering over the bows, came stumbling aft to where the first mate, whose watch it was, stood by the wheel.
“There’s a vessel close off our bow, sir; listen, and you can hear her! She can’t be more than a pistol-shot away.”