They had just finished their dinner when Jack, getting up on the chest in which the mast was stepped, so that he might have a better look-out, exclaimed, “I see a sail between us and the land. The sun just now glanced on it. There’s a breeze in shore, depend on it, and it will reach us before long.”
Bill jumped up to have a look-out also. He could not distinguish the sail, but he thought by the darker colour of the water to the southward that a breeze was playing over it, though it had not as yet got as far as they were. They again took to their oars and pulled on. Jack, however, occasionally turned round to look to the southward, for he entertained the uncomfortable idea that they were pursued.
They were now, they agreed, nearer the ship to the northward. Her lofty sails must have caught a light westerly air, which did not reach close down to the water, and had sent her along two or three knots an hour. They could see half-way down her courses, and Jack declared his belief that she was a frigate, but whether English or French he could not determine.
Unless, however, they were to hoist their sail, they might pass very close to her without being discovered, and the course she was steering would take her somewhat to the eastward of them.
They would have to settle the point as to whether she was a friend or foe, and in the former case whether it would be advisable to hoist their sail, and made every signal in their power to attract her attention, or to keep the sail lowered until she was at a distance from them. Bill had not been convinced that Jack had seen a sail to the southward.
“Whether or not I saw one before, there’s one now,” cried Jack, “and pretty near, too, and what’s worse, it’s a boat, so that they have oars, and will be coming up with us in spite of the calm.”
“They must have had a breeze to get thus far,” remarked Bill.
“Yes, but it has failed them now; see, they are lowering down the sail.” As Jack spoke, a light patch of white like the wing of a wild-fowl was seen for a moment glancing above the water landward.
“Yes, there’s no doubt that was a sail, which must have come from the shore; but it is a question whether the Frenchmen will have the pluck to pull on in the hopes of finding us, or will turn back. One thing is certain, that we had better try to keep ahead, when they will have farther to come if they still pursue us.”
Once more the boys got their oars out, and laboured away as energetically as before. They every now and then, however, looked back to ascertain if the boat were coming after them. Meantime a light breeze played occasionally over the water, but it was so light that it would not have helped them much, and they thought it wiser not to hoist their sail, as it would betray their position should a French boat really be in pursuit of them.