“She is probably making for Cumberland harbour,” said the master, who had been looking at the chart, “and if she gets in there it may be a hard matter to persuade her to come out again, unless we send in the boats and cut her out.”
For a considerable time neither of the ships altered their course. The stranger, however, going free, was making faster way through the water than the Champion, which was close-hauled, and it seemed very likely, should the wind shift more to the eastward, that the former vessel would pass her. The sun was already approaching the horizon, and although the crescent moon could be seen faintly in the sky, it would not long afford its light. The stranger, if inclined to escape, might do so during the hours of darkness. The two ships, however, were now scarcely three miles apart, and rapidly approaching each other. The Champion was prepared for action, the crew were at their quarters, and the guns run out. The sea was sufficiently smooth to allow even the lee guns to be fought without difficulty. Mr Billhook had taken the telescope and was narrowly examining the stranger.
“Shiver my timbers, but I believe she is the same buccaneering craft we found alongside the Ouzel Galley, when we chased her till she had well-nigh run on those rascally Bahama reefs,” he exclaimed, still keeping his eye at the glass. “Yes, there is a square patch on her mizen-topsail to repair a hole which I doubt not an enemy’s shot had made, as she was showing her heels in the fashion the picaroons always do, unless they hope to make a prize of some unwary merchantman.”
The commander, on hearing this, took the telescope.
“Yes,” he said. “If not the same vessel, she is very like her; and should she be so, she will not wait to allow us an opportunity of taking her if she can help it, but will run ahead of us even now, unless the wind shifts a point or two more to the eastward, and then our best chance of catching her will be to tack and stand in for the land.”
The wind, however, held and the sun went down, when the stranger, setting flying sails above her royals, stood almost across the Champion’s bows.
“Try her with our foremost gun,” cried the commander to the second lieutenant, who had gone to his station forward.
McTrigger, the gunner, who was on the look-out expecting the order, trained the gun himself, and in the dim light of evening the white splinters were seen flying from the stranger’s side. The next instant nine flashes of flame issued forth from her, the shot ricocheting over the calm ocean, three or four passing close to the corvette but failing to strike her.
“The fellow wishes to show us that he can give as good as he can take,” said the master. “I wonder, since he has got so many teeth, he ran from us in the fashion he did before.”
“Perhaps they were not as well sharpened as they are now,” remarked the doctor, chuckling at his own wit.