While Paul was telling his story in the pilot-house, the Chesterfields, finding the Beech Hill boats gathering around the steamer, had pulled close up to the shore, and continued on their way to Sandy Point. Neither Major Billcord nor the students with him had been troubled with a doubt in regard to the fidelity of Bissell to their interests. Even if he was faithless, he had the six ruffians with him, and they would be more than a match for a single man.
However it had happened, it appeared that the magnate and the crews with him knew nothing at all about the capture of the ruffians. They had waited off the point till the Beech Hill fleet came up, and they concluded that the sloop was standing off towards Westport to avoid a meeting with the "tinkers."
The magnate wished the visitors from the other side to see the destruction of the cottage, and he had invited them to be spectators of the expected frolic. He had decided to attend of the cottage first, so that the Beech Hillers might see the fun, and to administer the punishment to Paul Bristol after they had gone, for he did not care to have them witness that spectacle.
"I am afraid you are laboring under a mistake, Major Billcord," continued Captain Gildrock. "Did I understand you to say that you expected Paul here to be punished for his brutality?"
"That is precisely what I do expect; and he will be here in the course of half an hour. But I need not detain you any longer, sir," replied the magnate, with very ill grace. "There is no mistake about it, you may depend upon it."
"If you will pardon me, there is some mistake, for Paul Bristol is here now," added the captain. "Marian, ahoy! Back down this way," he shouted to the barges, which were lying at the entrance to Sandy Bay.
The crews were lying on their oars, and Dick Short promptly gave the order, "Stern all," and the Marian soon put her stern very near the bow of the steamer.
"Stand up, Bristol, and show yourself," said the captain.
Paul stood up in the stern-sheets of the barge, and Major Billcord looked at him as though he had been a spectre from some neighboring graveyard. Then he had a moment's animated conversation with the coxswain at his side. It was another mystery, and possibly the magnate thought he was in the middle of the last chapter of a novel. How had it been possible for him to get out of the clutches of the six ruffians?