In double quick time the three Sea Scouts boarded the Kestrel. Their boat, with a double painter rove as a matter of precaution, was dropped astern of the Kestrel’s dinghy and the ketch was again put on her former course. By this time the Weymouth and Pool cutters had drawn ahead to a distance of nearly a quarter of a mile; but, sportsman-like, they had backed their head-sails to enable the Kestrel to recover her lead.
“You fellows looked like having a long pull,” remarked Craddock to the three youths whose jerseys bore the inscription, “Third Wootton Bridge Sea Scouts.” “Bit risky, isn’t it?”
“We weren’t going to be out of it,” explained the Second. “Our Troop left yesterday in the Pixie. We couldn’t get away. I work at a garage. Jim, here, is at a baker’s; and Tim has a job at the yacht-yard. At the last lap, so to speak, we got the time off, and Tim’s boss lent us this double-sculler.”
“You might have found yourselves in difficulties off Chichester Bar,” observed Mr. Grant. “There’s often a nasty sea running there, I believe.”
“Yes, sir,” admitted the Second. “But we weren’t going to risk that in that sort of boat. We were going to row as far as Ryde, where the skipper of a motor tug promised to tow us across to Portsmouth.”
“I don’t see how that would help you very much,” commented the Scoutmaster. “You would still have to get into Chichester Harbour.”
“Inland water all the way, sir,” declared the lad. “There’s a channel between Portsmouth and Langston Harbour, and another between Langston and Chichester. It’s all right for small boats, but you couldn’t do it because of the bridges, unless you unship your masts.”
Past a couple of “scrapped” monitors, the unwieldy appearance and huge guns of which afforded considerable interest to the Kestrel’s crew, the ketch tore through the water. Off Ryde they sighted two other craft—a yawl and a converted lifeboat—both of which bore the distinguishing flag of the Sea Scout brotherhood.
“Now, where do we make for, sir?” asked Brandon.
“Steer for that fort,” replied Mr. Grant, indicating a circular structure painted in black and yellow squares and rising sheer out of the sea.