"Where's the blarsted light, then?"
"Seems to me I kin see long, thin streaks. O Lawr, boys, Rodden must ha' been hard put, when he drapped the block into the hole. It's shet up tight. Hev ye got the chisel and mallet?"
"They're all right."
"Then less git ashore and drap the block out, though it's an orful pity to lose it in the drink."
"Carn't we git the blarsted thing back to its place agin?"
"Onpossible; wild horses couldn't do it."
Harry whispered to Bigglethorpe: "What'll we do?" and the fisherman answered: "Our duty is to fire, but we weren't told to kill anybody. Don't you fire till I reload."
Then Bigglethorpe called out: "Surrender in the Queen's name," and fired above the scow. Two or three pistol shots rattled over the sentries' heads, and flattened themselves on the rock behind. "All ready!" said the storekeeper, and Harry let fly his duck shot into the middle of the crowd, who paddled vigorously from the shore. Bill Richards, having alarmed the upper sentries by the discharge of his gun, came running down, with the Pilgrims and Rufus, led by the detective, not far behind him. "Shove out the skiff," called Bigglethorpe. The Richards shoved it off, and Bill rowed, when the two sentries got on board. "Go it, Bill, after the old tub," cried Harry; "we'll soon catch up." The Rawdon gang worked hard to get to the narrows, but found it hopeless. "Give it to them," shouted Bangs from the shore; and in response, the guns rang out again, while Bill strained every muscle to the utmost. The punt grounded on the shore above the narrows, and four of the men jumped out into the water and fled up the bank, firing their pistols as they retired. The punt was captured, and brought back to the guarded beach, with a wounded man and some tools in the bottom. Only by swimming, or by a long detour of very many miles, could the four fugitives find their way back to the shore they had sought in vain.
The wounded man was taken out of the punt and laid on the beach. "Is he dead?" asked Bigglethorpe. "No," answered the detective, feeling the head of the victim, and inspecting him by the aid of matches struck by the smoker Sylvanus; "it's a good thing for him thet yore two gens were louded with deck shot end thet they sketter sow, else he'd a been a dead men. He's got a few pellets in the beck of his head, jest eneugh to sten the scoundrel for a few minutes. Ah, he's hed a creck owver the top of his head with a cleb, the colonel's werk, very likely."
"Do you want him kept?" enquired Mr. Bigglethorpe, as sentry.