The British watchers saw all the lighters coming and going. Their patrol boats now and then pulled very near the schooner, but they had no right to board her. No doubt they had further plans of their own, but they were a little slow with them. The truth was, that the Opdykes deserved the praise given them by Captain Avery. Nobody would have expected such a rapid discharge of a cargo as they effected. That is, nobody without visiting the schooner that night and seeing how a hundred strong men could handle goods.
"Captain," said Mynheer Opdyke, at last, "you have no time to lose. The ship for Belfast goes out with the morning tide, and her cargo is a good one. We put on part of it ourselves, but we insured it pretty well. I think the corvette is going to pretend to change her anchorage, and she will slip alongside of you while she's moving."
"That's what I'm ready for," replied the captain, laughing. "She may anchor on this very spot as soon as she pleases after this lighter goes."
He took a small bag of money that was handed him by the merchant, and the latter went over the side.
"Ho, ho!" he chuckled, as he did so. "I make one hundred per cent. Now I go and report to my British friends that they must take the American pirate within three days, or she will get away from them. Our house is on good terms with them."
That might be, but if it were expected that he would give up profitable business for friendship's sake, that was expecting altogether too much.
Very still lay the Noank during the hour that followed. Carefully muffled were the oars of a small boat that came back to her from a swiftly rowed scouting expedition. Then it seemed as if her anchor came up without a sound, and the booms swung away without creaking. No voices were heard from stem to stern, and a swarm of dark figures flitted around her deck as if they wore moccasons.
"Belfast ship gone out," Up-na-tan had reported to Captain Avery. "Lobster corvette ready to lift anchor. Four lobster boat in water, now. British think they come and take Noank while all crew ashore. Think schooner go sleep."
"Pretty good!" said the captain. "They'd run out to sea with us, then, and the French'd never do a thing about it. America isn't a power yet, and England is. Never mind, we're goin' to spile their luck this time."
The schooner slipped away as if the water had been oiled for her. There was wind enough and not a great deal more. Every sail she could spread was in its place, and her breathless crew watched their canvas feverishly as she sped toward the channel at the harbor mouth.