As it was getting dark we saw "No. 1" slow down to speak a small merchant steamer going north, and directly afterwards we were ordered back to Suez to inform Captain Helston that all three Patagonians had been sighted steaming south very fast.
Round went our helm, we heeled well over, our stern swung round, and we were off on our way back before you could say "knife"; but you should have heard what Mr. Parker and the Sub said, and the quarter-master too, for that matter, only he didn't do it so loudly.
We made our number to the Laird at Suez early next morning, having kept up nearly twenty-seven knots for the last twenty hours—a jolly good performance. We hadn't to wait long, for we ran alongside the Sylvia, filled up with coal, took ten tons in bags on deck, and away we went for Aden at twenty knots—quite an easy, comfortable speed.
I had to see the coal aboard, and made myself beastly dirty, and much missed the gun-room bath on board the Laird.
We got into Aden on the third afternoon without meeting any adventures. "No. 2" and "No. 1" were there, and so were two of the three Patagonians.
Mr. Pattison and Mr. Lang, the Skippers of "No. 1" and "No. 2", came aboard of us directly. They told us that they had reached Aden only four hours after the Patagonians.
They immediately made arrangements to coal, and meanwhile had gone on board the two Patagonians in frock coats and swords, and been received in a very friendly manner, and shown all over both, and not a trace of Staunton, Hopkins, or Chinese, for the matter of that, could they see. "We felt rather sold, you can imagine," said Mr. Pattison, "at having our long chase for nothing—a very tame ending."
The third destroyer, we were told by people on shore, had left an hour before we came, and was sighted from the top of the rock making east, till she disappeared below the horizon steaming at great speed.
"I could not follow her," continued Mr. Pattison, "for of course we had no coal, and some of our condenser-tubes were leaking badly, and both of us required a few days in harbour to put things right down in the engine-room. And not only that, but I dare not let these two Patagonians out of my sight, for Captain Helston thinks they will probably lie in wait for him in the Straits to the westward."
"We can go on directly we've coaled," interposed Mr. Parker eagerly, "for there is nothing the matter with us. Is there, Chapman?"