"The Champion has started her wheels again, Ernest," said Bob Hale, as I rang the bell; "she is backing out of the inlet into the open lake."
"All right—let her back. We have a good three miles the start of her, and she can't catch us before we get to Parkville," I replied.
I informed Vallington through the speaking tube in regard to the situation, with which he was entirely satisfied. I asked him to keep the boat moving at her best pace, assuring him, if he did so, that we were perfectly safe from capture. In half an hour we passed Pine Island, with the Champion, which did not appear to be straining herself, fully three miles astern. I was afterwards told that the captain of the Adieno held her back, fearing that if she crowded us again, we should run ashore, burst the boiler, or otherwise damage his steamer.
In an hour and a half after the passage of The Sisters Channel, we were off the bluff, within half a mile of the steamboat pier, which we saw crowded with people. It was plain that we had succeeded in creating an excitement, and not a few of us had some delicacy about landing in the presence of the multitude. The Champion still kept her relative distance from us, and was now more than a mile beyond Cleaver Island.
"Where shall we land?" I asked of Vallington through the tube, after Bob and I had considered the matter a little.
"Wherever you please, commodore," replied our chief.
"What do you say, Bob?" I added, turning to my companion.
"Can't we land at the boat pier, in front of the Institute?"
"No; there isn't water enough to float the Adieno. In fact the only safe place is the regular steamboat pier."
"I suppose my father is there, and I don't like to meet him just yet," replied Bob, earnestly.