The skipper looked about him anxiously, as though he was in doubt whether to go to the east or the west. But he had been around the two points west of him, and he seemed to think that his safest way was to stick to the ground with which he had become acquainted. The schooner was half a mile from Simms's Point by this time; but Pearl evidently thought that all he had to do was to return to the westward of the buoys by the way he had come into the Gut, and the Sylph could not come near his boat. He came about, and stood to the north-west.
"We are all right still, Dory Dornwood," said Pearl, as he glanced at the steamer. "She can't come any nearer to us than she is now, and a quarter of a mile is as good as a mile."
Dory kept his eye on the Sylph. The moment she stopped her screw, there was a lively movement on board of her. Orders were given in quick and sharp tones; and presently her two quarter-boats, which were swung on davits, were dropping into the water. This was what Dory had expected her to do before this time.
"What is she doing, Dory Dornwood?" asked Pearl, when he discovered that something was going on upon the deck of the steamer.
"She is doing the next thing," answered Dory, who was determined not to give the enemy any comfort.
"What is she about?" demanded the skipper.
"You have a pair of eyes, and you know how to use them."
By this time the boats began to drop into the water. They were lowered from the davits with the oarsmen on the thwarts, and an officer in the stern-sheets. Pearl could not help seeing what the steamer was doing now. He looked troubled, and he used some needless profanity in an under tone.
"What is going on now, Dory?" asked Peppers, who could not see the steamer through the aperture in the door.
"The steamer is getting out her boats," replied Dory. "She has just dropped one from each quarter into the water."