When again they came on deck, the ships were off the Eden mouth, and the waves of St. Andrew's stormy bay were rolling their crests away to windward. As the light breeze swept over them, they were tinted with a thousand prismatic hues by the broad white summer moon, which rose in her clearest beauty from the German Sea. Falconer's thoughts were then of Sybilla, whom he loved so well and perhaps so vainly; and abandoning himself to the fondest reveries, he brooded deeply over his passion amid the majestic silence of the sea that swept around him, and the distant land, whose headlands jutted into that shining mirror in bold but hazy outlines.
Barton loved Euphemia Drummond not a whit less than the captain of arquebussiers loved her younger sister; but with the secure feeling of a fiancé, for the present he dismissed her fair image from his breast, and gave full play to those high hopes of fully avenging his gallant father on the very men who had slain him, and whose ships he knew were on those moonlit waters, which he was incessantly scanning with eagerness and impatience, but with his unaided eyes alone: for telescopes were not invented for nearly a hundred and twenty years after.
The old admiral, who burned to punish the slayers of his venerable friend and messmate, more than to avenge the temporary disgrace—if disgrace it was—cast by the Howards upon the rising prowess of the Scottish mariners, shared all the impatience of Barton, and together they trod up and down the weather side of the poop, frequently hailing Cuddie, who was still perched at the crosstree, to be assured that he kept a proper look-out.
The night stole on; the moon began to sink; the frigates were still going free with the wind upon the quarter; Fifeness, with the dangerous Carr-rock, arose on the starboard-bow, and the old admiral, who knew every part of the coast as well as the features of his own face, now looked from time to time at the compasses which stood in the lighted binnacle, or as the seamen then named it, habbitacle—i.e., a small house, for there were two—one for the steersman and another for the gunner who was conning.
The Margaret was now a falcon-shot astern, and the great poop-lantern of the Yellow Frigate was lighted; but this precaution was needless, as her cloud of snow-white canvas and all her taut black rigging were as visible to her consort under the clear blue sky of night as if at noonday.
"Fifeness in sight, and no sign of them yet!" muttered the Admiral; "square the yards, Barton, and stand right away before the breeze."
The temporary bustle of this manoeuvre soon subsided; the rope-ends were again coiled away, and, save the watch and some of the crew, who were listening to another of the boatswain's incredible yarns in the forecastle, all the ship's company had turned into their hammocks. About the middle watch of the night, Barton, who was still impatiently pacing the deck, heard the man (who for a time had replaced the coxwain) at the masthead hailing the deck.
"Poop, ho!"
"Hallo," answered Barton, instinctively grasping his trumpet, which lay on the binnacle; "are you aloft, Dalquhat?"
"Twa sail are in sicht, sir."