Then both pulled on in silence, and doggedly.
In ten minutes or more they had rounded the Point at a respectful distance, for reasons well known to the navigator and the nautical surveyor of Scilly. Peter, without a word, shipped his oar. Armorel did likewise. Then Peter stepped the mast and hoisted the sail, keeping the line in his own hand, and looked ahead, while Armorel took the helm.
'It's Jinkins's boat,' said Peter, because they were now in sight of her. 'What'll Jinkins say when he hears that his boat's gone to pieces?'
'And the two men? Who are they? Will Jinkins say nothing about the men?'
'Strangers they are; gentlemen, I suppose. Well, if the breeze doesn't soon—— Ah, here it is!'
The wind suddenly filled the sail. The boat heeled over under the breeze, and a moment after was flying through the water straight up the broad channel between the two Minaltos and Samson.
The sun was very low now. Between them and the west lay the boat they were pursuing—a small black object, with two black silhouettes of figures clear against the crimson sky. And now Armorel perceived that they had by this time gotten an inkling, at least, of their danger, for they no longer sat passive, but had torn up a plank from the bottom, with which one, kneeling in the bows, was working as with a paddle, but without science. The boat yawed this way and that, but still kept on her course drifting to the rocks.
'If she touches the Ledge, Peter,' said Armorel, 'she will be in little bits in five minutes. The water is rushing over it like a mill-stream.'
This she said ignorant of mill-streams, because there are none on Scilly; but the comparison served.
'If she touches,' Peter replied, 'we may just go home again. For we shall be no good to nobody.'