"Well, what have we to care about them?"
"Care?" said he, with a mixture of frown and grin. "Only that you are the captain's friend, and I daresay, are going at this time of night to do a job for him in Brighton yourself—I should think, young gentleman, you were only laughing at Sam Grapnel. Better not! Why, you see, though the fellows with their pens behind their ears are no more than six-watered gin to us, the dragoons are another sort of thing. I must go back. So, young gentleman, I wish you a very good night."
The oddity of the wish in the midst of this elemental uproar, made me laugh, shivering as I was. Yet, to be left to find my own way at such a time, was startling. I offered him money.
"At another opportunity, sir," said he, rather pacified by the offer. "But, if they come upon the captain unawares, they will find every thing ready to their hands; all at sixes and sevens just now. It will take an hour or two before he can clear the cargo off the ground; and there goes the whole speculation. Don't you hear them? You have only to drop your ear to the ground, to know the whole affair. A lubber deserted from us a week ago, and no doubt he has laid the information."
I lay down, and clearly enough heard the trampling of horses, and in considerable numbers. My own situation was now somewhat embarrassing. They were evidently coming up in our direction; and, to be found past midnight, armed, (for my gun had been restored to me,) in company with an unquestionable smuggler, must have made appearances tell strongly against me. But my companion's mind was made up with the promptitude of a life which has no time to waste on thinking.
"I must go back this moment, or all our comrades will be taken in the fact. And, take my advice, you had better do the same; for go I will. The captain shan't have it to say that I let him be caught without warning."
I still hesitated, and he still urged.
"You can do no better, sir; for if you stand here five minutes longer, you will either be taken, or you will lose the number of your mess, by a carbine slug, or the slash of a sabre; while, if you turn back, you will have ten times the chance of escape along the shore."
I could now distinctly hear the clatter of hoofs, and the jingling of bridles. There was no time to deliberate; I certainly felt no inclination to be the means of the captain's ruin or death, and I followed my guide, who set off with the swiftness of a deer.
We soon reached the shore, where our intelligence struck considerable alarm. "I thought that it would be so," said the captain; "I had notice from a friend in the customs itself, that a spy was at work, and it was to this that we owed the chase of the lugger. For the revenue officers I care not a straw, but the dragoons are to be avoided when we can. We may fight upon occasion, it is true, but we choose our time for it. We have now only to get out of the way; and clever as they are, they may find us not so easily laid hold of."