'Keep out of sight, men,' the captain whispered, as with Mr. Sennit he hastened forward, and flat on the deck peered through his glasses at the silent enemy.
'Let us give them a volley,' the mate whispered.
'No, no,' the old man replied. 'They must be the——'
The remainder of the sentence was never finished. With peculiar deliberation the captain closed his glasses, and sitting bolt upright looked fixedly at his companion.
'Why, they're nothing but the trunks of two dead trees!' he said.
'With the stump branches looking like men in the gloom last night, sir,' Mr. Sennit added. 'I'm sure they might have deceived anyone, and we were much closer than I supposed.'
'Let the port watch go below,' the skipper said. 'You all did your best, and we were ready for anyone. Can't be too particular hereabouts, anyhow.'
Whereupon all the weapons were returned to their stands in the fore cabin, brooms and hose were brought into use for the usual scrub down; but when the fellows got into the chains to clear away the grease, and beyond earshot of the captain, their remarks respecting that night adventure among Malay 'pirates' proved sufficiently amusing.
At anyrate, it was not long before a light breeze stiffened so quickly that the 'Alert' sped along in good style, and speedily left Malacca Strait and its numerous islands far astern.
'Now we're getting into the seas I have such good cause to remember, Master Jack,' the quarter-master observed. 'But for your dad I should certainly have left my bones in them long ago.'