Silas Touchstone disappeared, only to return with a box of armourer's tools. If anything was to be done it must be done speedily, for the Neptune was now close to our quarter.
"Oh, for a single gun!" exclaimed Captain 'Enery. "We could wing her now."
Then, to my unspeakable dismay, I saw, gripping the weather-poop rail of the Neptune, the figure of my enemy, Ned Slater. He had proved his words concerning his friends on the ship by taking possession of her, thanks to the aid of the mutineers.
The light was now sufficiently strong to distinguish the hideous leer of insolent triumph on his features..
"Farewell, Captain Miles!" he shouted. "A thousand thanks for having handed over the Madre treasure, to say nothing of having provided the means to find the way out," and with an ostentatious flourish he displayed the well-known chart.
"May you be much beholden to it, you villain!" returned Captain Jeremy, and, laying hold of a musket, he fired at the double-dyed rogue.
Now, in all my experience I had never known Captain Jeremy to miss his mark at that comparatively short distance, and I fully expected to see the murderous thief fall dead on the deck. But the bullet went wide, so wide indeed that Slater never so much as ducked his head, which he would assuredly have done had it 'scaped him narrowly.
"Try again, Cap'n," came the taunting cry.
"I'll be even with you yet," shouted Captain Jeremy, as he proceeded to reload his piece.
Meanwhile our men worked their hardest to run one of the larboard guns over to the other side, but owing to the shortage of hands and the encumbered state of our decks 'twas evident that the Neptune would be well out of range ere a single gun was in position to open fire.