"Now, men, quick with the saws!" cried the lieutenant, excitedly. "Quick work, and we'll be done and away before the Spaniards discover us!"
It required quick work, indeed—quicker than any of the brave boat's crew then thought.
The lieutenant had no more than given his orders when an interruption, startling and unwelcome, occurred. He had been anxiously scanning the outlines of the fortifications and congratulated himself that no movement was visible in that quarter. The Spaniards were napping, he thought, and all was well.
But the reverse was the case, as he quickly discovered. No sooner had one of the sailors began to saw away at the cable than suddenly and without warning a shower of bullets rained around them in the water and the ominous boom of a cannon from the shore told they had been discovered.
"A masked battery to the left!" cried Clif. "They have ambushed us!"
This was true. The fortifications which had alone received the lieutenant's attention remained silent, while from the left a concealed battery kept up a raking fire upon the small boat and the intrepid crew.
The Spaniards had not yet gotten the range, it is true, but it was a tight place to be in—in an open boat, unarmed, helpless and exposed to the raking fire from shore.
But the men in that boat were full of nerve. Not once did they falter while shells and shot whistled and burst over their heads, beyond them and even among them.
"Hurry up, Wilson," cried the lieutenant to the sailor sawing the cable. "That cable must be cut before we leave the spot."
"Ay, ay, sir," responded the other. "If it kills every man of us!"