Piers Fleming was at the helm, and near him stood his son. There were grim smiles on their faces while they glanced up at the rigging and out into the mist, and noted the compass and the direction of the wind.
"Son Hans," at last muttered the old man, "it can not be long now. Some of the Calais craft are sure to be hereabout. We will lay this tubful of English pirates alongside right speedily, if so be it is a large ship of good strength."
"They will be caught napping," growled Hans. "'Twill be a fine prize, for the hold is packed to tightness."
"Well bloweth the wind," said Piers, "and the Golden Horn hath now no company."
At the forward end of the low waist of the ship stood Richard among his men.
"Ye do know well," he said, "and all must know, that they would show no quarter. Every man fighteth for his life, for who is taken goeth overboard, dead or alive."
"Aye," responded Ben o' Coventry; "'tis a cutthroat business. I think there would be small room for any Frenchman on the Golden Horn, if one should come aboard."
"Room enough in the sea," said the red-haired O'Rourke, who was captain of the Irish; and he turned then to talk to his gigantic kerns in their own tongue. So did a man named David Griffith talk to a throng of broad-shouldered Welshmen who were also on board, armed with short swords, daggers, and spears or darts. Of the latter several bundles now lay amidships.
Back toward the stern strode Richard slowly, and after him, as if they were drifting about without special intention, strolled three rugged-looking seamen from the old port of London.
The waves ran not too high for a gay summer cruise, and the Golden Horn rode them steadily. She was a fast sailer, for all her breadth of beam. Suddenly her course was changed, and her sails swung in a little; for a command from Captain Fleming sent men to haul on the sheets. Just then a long-drawn vibrating whistle had been heard, and it sounded thrice, from the very direction the ship was taking.