Page:The Dark Frigate (Hawes).djvu/148

quarter-deck to the waist, where the carpenter had nailed in place new planks not twelve hours since, and together they raised a bundle. It was on the larboard side, and since all had gathered for the moment to starboard to watch the strange ketch, there was no man to observe them. Some one moved above them and they hesitated, then they heard slow steps receding and thick’ undertones that they recognized as Jacob’s. When he had gone, the one who had brought the bundle whispered, "Heave it far out," and together they hove it.

Still in the shadow of the quarter-deck, the two slipped silently back, unseen, and when Harry Malcolm came hurrying from one side, and Jacob from the other, to see what had made the splash, there was no one there nor could any man answer their questions.

“Have you done as you said?” Phil asked in a breathless whisper.

“That I have.” And it was Will Canty who spoke.

“Then we shall like enough be hanged; but thou art a tall fellow and I love thee for it.”

There came over the water a voice distinctly calling, “Whence your ship?”

“Back to your guns, ye dogs!” cried Mate Malcolm in a voice that could be heard the length of the deck, yet that was not loud enough to be heard on board the stranger.

“Of England,” the Old One called from the quarter-deck. ‘‘And whence is yours?”

There was a space of silence, in which the two vessels came nearer each other, and I would have you know that hearts ever so courageous were thumping at a lively pace.