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Fitz the Filibuster, a novel by George Manville Fenn |
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Chapter 38. A Night's Excitement |
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_ CHAPTER THIRTY EIGHT. A NIGHT'S EXCITEMENT Every one seemed bent on celebrating that day as a festival. The fight was a victory, and all were rejoicing in a noisy holiday, while for some hours the crew of the schooner had their turn. Not all, for after a few words with the skipper, the two lads went aloft with the binocular to keep a sharp look-out seaward, and more especially at the two headlands at the entrance to the bay, which they watched in the full expectation of seeing the grim grey nose of the gunboat peering round, prior to her showing her whole length and her swarthy plume of smoke. Arrangements had been made below as well, and the schooner was swinging to a big buoy--head to sea, the sails ready for running up or dropping down from her thin yards. "A nice land wind," the skipper had said, "and if she came it would not be long before we were on equal terms with her." "But it won't last," said Burgess gruffly. "It'll either drop to a dead calm at sundown, or swing round and be dead ahead." "Well, I don't mind the last," replied the captain, "but a dead calm would be dangerous, and sets me thinking whether it wouldn't be better to be off at once." "Well, that depends on you," said the mate. "If it was me I should stop till night and chance it. But where do you mean to go? Right away home?" "I don't know yet," was the reply. "For some reasons I should like to stop and see Don Ramon right out of his difficulties. Besides, I have a little business to transact with him that may take days. No, I shan't go off yet. I may stay here for months, working for Don Ramon. It all depends." "Very well," said the mate coolly, as if it did not matter in the slightest degree to him so long as he was at sea. From time to time the skipper in his walk up and down the deck paused to look up inquiringly, but always to be met with a quiet shake of the head, and go on again. But about half-an-hour before sundown, just when festivities were at their height on shore, and the men were for the most part idling about, leaning over the bulwarks and watching as much of the proceedings as they could see, the two lads, after an hour's rest below, having returned to their look-out, Fitz suddenly exclaimed-- "There she is! But she doesn't look grey." "No," replied Poole eagerly. "What there is of her looks as if turned to gold." Then loudly, "Sail ho!" though there was not a sail in sight, only the steamer's funnel slowly coming into sight from behind one headland and beginning to show her smoke. All was activity now, the men starting to their different places at the bulwarks, and eagerly listening to the skipper's "Where away?" "Coming round the south headland," replied Poole. "That's right," said the skipper. "I can see her now." "Well?" said Burgess. "I shan't move yet. It will be pitch-dark in less than an hour. We can see her plainly enough with the open sea beyond her, but like as not they can't see us, lying close up here under the land. The chances are that they won't see us at all, and then we can run out in the darkness; and I suppose you will have no difficulty in avoiding the rocks?" "Oh, I don't know," said the mate coolly. "Like as not I may run spang on to them in the dark. I shan't, of course, if I can help it." "No," said the skipper dryly; "I suppose not." Their task ended, the boys slid down to the deck once more, and somehow the thought of his anomalous position on board the schooner did not trouble the middy for the time being, for he was seaman enough to be intensely interested in their position, and as eager as Poole for their escape. "Do you think the sun's going down as quickly as usual?" he said suddenly; and his companion laughed. "What's that for?" said Fitz. "Did I say something comic?" "Comic or stupid, whichever you like." "Bah!" ejaculated Fitz angrily, feeling more annoyed with himself than with Poole. "Why of course she is going down at her usual rate." "Sun's a he," said Fitz. "It isn't the moon." "Thankye. You have grown wise," replied Poole sarcastically. "Do you know, I should have almost known that myself. But bother all this! I want to see the canvas shaken out ready for making a start." "Very stupid too," said Fitz. "Why?" "Because the people on board the gunboat mayn't see us now, with our bare poles; and even if they could make us out they wouldn't be able to distinguish us from the other craft lying close in shore." "Right," said Poole sharply. "I was getting impatient. I suppose we are going to run out through the darkness, same as we did before." "I hope not," said Fitz meaningly. "Once was enough for a scrape like that." Poole grunted, with agreement in his cones, and then they leaned over the bulwarks together forward, following the example of most of the men, who were just as keenly on the look-out, and growing as excited in the expectation of the coming adventure, all but two, who, in obedience to a growl from the mate, lowered down the dinghy and then pulled her hand-over-hand by the mooring-cable to where it was made fast to the big ring in the buoy; and there they held on, ready to slip the minute the order was given from the deck. Meanwhile the rejoicings were going on ashore, no one so far having become aware of the approach of the enemy, till she was well clear of the headland, with her smoke floating out like an orange-plume upon a golden sky. "There's the signal," cried Fitz suddenly, as a ball of smoke darted out from the front of the fort, followed by a dull thud. "Hah!" said Poole. "That's like the snap of a mongrel pup. By and by perhaps we shall hear the gunboat speak with a big bark like a mastiff. I wonder whether they will make us out." "So do I," said Fitz. "It will be easy enough to sneak off if they don't." "Don't say sneak," said Fitz. "Why?" "It sounds so cowardly." "Well, this isn't the _Tonans_. The _Teal_ was made to sail, not to fight." "Yes, of course," said Fitz; "but I don't like it all the same." "All right, then, I won't say it again. I wonder where the dad will make for." "Well, that will depend on whether the gunboat sights us. I say, does it make you feel excited?" "Yes, awfully. I seem to want to be doing something." "So do I," said Fitz, "instead of watching the sun go down so slowly." "Look at the gunboat, then. She's not moving slowly. My word, she is slipping through the water! Why, she's bound to see us if it don't soon get dark." The boys lapsed into silence, and as they ceased speaking they were almost startled by the change that had taken place on shore. The shouting and singing had ceased; there was no sound of music, and the bells had left off their clangour; while in place there came a low, dull, murmurous roar as of surf beating upon some rocky coast, a strange mingling of voices, hurrying foot-steps, indescribable, indistinct, and yet apparently expressive of excitement and the change from joy to fear. "It has upset them pretty well," said Poole. "Why, I did hear that they were going in for fireworks as soon as it was dark, and they fired that gun like a challenge. I shouldn't wonder if they have fireworks of a different kind to what they expect." "Yes," said Fitz excitedly. "The gunboat will begin firing shells perhaps, and set fire to the town." "Bad luck to them if they do," cried Poole earnestly, "for it's a beautiful old place with its groves and gardens. Here, I say, Burnett, I wish this wretched little schooner were your _Tonans_, and we were going to fight for poor old Don Ramon. Don't you?" "There's the sun beginning to go down behind the mountain," said Fitz, evading the question. "I say, how long will it be before it's dark?" "Oh, you know as near as I do. Very soon, and the sooner the better. Oh, I say, she must see us. She's heading round and coming straight in." "For us or the fort?" "Both," said Poole emphatically. And then they waited, fancying as the last gleam of the orange sun sank out of sight that they could hear the men breathing hard with suppressed excitement, as they stood there with their sleeves rolled up, waiting for the first order which should mean hauling away at ropes and the schooner beginning to glide towards the great buoy, slackening the cable for the men in the dinghy to cast-off. "Here, look at that!" cried Fitz excitedly, unconsciously identifying himself more and more with the crew. "What's the matter?" said Poole. "Wet your hand, and hold it up." "Right," said Poole; "and so was old Burgess. I don't believe there's a man at sea knows more about the wind than he does. Half-an-hour ago, dead to sea; now right ashore." "Stand by, my lads," growled the boatswain in response to a word from the mate; and a deep low sigh seemed to run all across the deck, as to a man the crew drew in a deep long breath, while with the light rapidly dying out, and the golden tips of the mountains turning purple and then grey, the first order was given, a couple of staysails ran with jigging motion up to their full length, and a chirruping, creaking sound was heard as the men began to haul upon the yard of the mainsail. "Ah!" sighed Fitz. "We are beginning to move." As he spoke the man at the wheel began to run the spokes quickly through his hands, with the result that to all appearance the men in the dinghy, and the buoy, appeared to be coming close under their quarter. Then there was a splash, the dinghy grated against the side, and one of its occupants climbed aboard with the painter, closely followed by the other, the first man running aft with the rope, to make it fast to the ring-bolt astern, while the stops of the capstan rattled as the cast-off cable began to come inboard. "Oh, it will be dark directly," said Poole excitedly, "and I don't believe they can see us now." The enemy would have required keen eyes and good glasses on board the gunboat to have made them out, for as the sails filled, the schooner careened over and began to glide slowly along the shore as if making for the fort, which she passed and left about a quarter of a mile behind, before she was thrown up into the wind to go upon the other tack, spreading more and more canvas and increasing her speed, as the gunboat, now invisible save for a couple of lights which were hoisted up, came dead on for the town, nearing them fast, and calling for all the mate's seamanship to get the schooner during one of her tacks well out of the heavy craft's course, and leaving her to glide by; though as the darkness increased and they were evidently unseen, this became comparatively easy, for the war-vessel's two lights shone out brighter and brighter at every one of the schooner's tacks. But they were anxious times, and Fitz's heart beat fast during the most vital reach, when it seemed to him as they were gliding by the gunboat's bows that they must be seen, even as he could now make out a few sparks rising from time to time from the great funnel, to be smothered in the rolling smoke. But the next minute they were far away, and as they tacked it was this time so that they passed well abaft under the enemy's stern. "Ah," said a voice close to them; and as they looked round sharply it was to see the skipper close at hand. "There, boys," he said, "that was running it pretty close. They can't have been keeping a very good look-out aboard that craft. It was much nearer than I liked.--Ah, I wonder how poor Don Ramon will get on." That finished the excitement for the night, for the next hours were passed in a monotonous tacking to and fro, making longer and longer reaches as they got farther out to sea; but they looked shoreward in vain for the flashes of guns and the deep thunderous roar of the big breech-loading cannon. But the sighing of the wind in the rigging and the lapping of water against the schooner's bows were the only sounds that greeted them in the soft tropic night. _ |
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