I handed the glass to the carpenter, who was next to me, and asked him to take a look through it.
"Halloa!" cried Dugan, suddenly, "there are the prisoners on the beach. Now let's see what they're going to do. I wonder if they'll think it is a Yankee trick," he added, with a half chuckle, "scuttling that rotten old junk?"
I took the glass from him without answering, for I saw no humor in the situation. A boat put off from the cutter and brought back two of the men from shore, and now, hidden behind a rock, we watched the proceedings in turn. The idea of getting water was apparently abandoned.
The boat rowed to shore again, picked up the rest of the Englishmen, and then I saw that they were getting out the quarter-boat from the other side.
In a few minutes both were loaded. I caught the glint of steel as they handed muskets and cutlasses into them, and then they pulled off to the northward to go around the farther end of the island.
But an idea had seized me that set my blood tingling!
"How many men does such a craft as that carry?" I croaked, hoarsely.
"Twenty-five to thirty," responded Chips, sullenly.
I had counted twenty men besides the prisoners in the two boats that had put off from the cutter. It would take probably two hours to row around to the north shore of the island.
It would do no harm to broach the subject in my mind to the others, and I did so in a few short words, speaking in hoarse whispers.