I had scarcely taken three strokes, when the boatswain's voice exclaimed, over the cutter's quarter,—
"Shorten sail—a boat, a boat—man overboard!"
"Pipe away, the crew of the dingy," added the quartermaster.
"A deserter!" roared Mr. Cranky, with one of his terrible oaths; "come back, you rascally porpus—heave to, or it will prove the worse for you! Fire, sentry—fire, and send him to Davy Jones or the devil, with an ounce of lead in his skull for ballast!"
In terror I looked back, and saw a marine (but not Joyce, who unfortunately had been posted forward), in the act of levelling his musket at me. There was a flash as he fired, and I heard the ball strike the water, from which it sent up a spout near me. With a tact, for which, under all the circumstances, I give myself no small credit, lest another of these blue pills might follow, I uttered a loud cry as if struck by the shot, and dashed about in the water, as if disabled and sinking.
"There, d—n you, take that whoever you are, and go down to feed the fishes," I heard the old savage Cranky cry, with a triumphant laugh, as the cutter passed slowly and solemnly, like a tall and shadowy spectre, into the gathering mist, and disappeared, leaving nothing astern but her white wake and me.
CHAPTER XIX.
THE SANDRIDGE LIGHT.
Sturdily I swam in the direction in which I had last seen the beacon—I say last, for to one so low in the water as a swimmer, every wave interrupts the vision, and more than once I had to make a kind of leap like a flying fish, to ascertain whether or not I was proceeding in the right course.
I had soon for my guide the triple lines of light which shone from the three lamps of the beacon; and with joy and growing hope I perceived the distance to lessen between us more rapidly than I could have expected. The reason of this was, that the rising tide, and every long roller that chafed and boiled over the ridge of sand on which the beacon stood, impelled me towards it and the shore, which lay about two miles beyond my harbour of refuge.