But Tom Horn said nothing, holding the glass leveled. Another fifteen minutes lifted the sail into plainer view.
"She is a brig," said the clerk, "and, by her build and manner of wearing her rigging, she's American." He was silent for a few moments more; then he held out the glass very quietly to Anthony and said: "It was a brig we saw prowling off the coast of the Jerseys when we were there, I think."
Anthony took the glass and picked up the approaching vessel. She was brig-rigged and slackly kept; her dress of sails was shabby and patched, but the morning light caught and held in a foretopsail that was white and new.
XLIII
Mademoiselle Lafargue was reading at one of the windows of the main cabin when Anthony came in. He went to the arms-chest in one corner, threw up the lid, and stood glowering into it. She said nothing. He took out a musket, examined the lock, and snapped it; and he did the like with a half-dozen more. Then pistols: he carefully laid them upon a settle in a row—cold, shining, deadly; he loaded them, and the muskets, too.
Then she spoke.
"Something has happened," she said.
"There is a vessel ahead that I have reason to mistrust," said Anthony. "A slatternly-looking ship; the same that I saw going up and down the coast before you sent for me."
She put down her book and arose.