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vessel, the ketch, it now appeared, carried as many men or more, and every man knew his place and duty. Looking down on her deck, Phil saw her gun crews toiling with sponges and rammers to load anew.

She was herself, it seemed, a sea rover athirst for blood and in those wild, remote seas there was no fraternity among thieves. As the main yardarm of the Rose of Devon swung toward her rigging when the ship rolled, the bearded man ran a rope about the spar and in a moment the vessels were locked abeam and were drifting together till their sides should touch.

Philip Marsham again drew the dirk that Colin Samson had wrought for him and leaning far out struck at the fellow’s breast, who swung back to avoid the thrust, which pricked him but did no more. Then the fellow sprang to the attack with his own knife in hand, for he had thrown a knot in the rope, which creaked and tightened; and with a yell of triumph he struck at the lad, who swung to one side and struck back.

It was a brave fight in the empty air, and the two were like warring spiders as they circled and swung in the darkness and thrust each at the other. But the lad was many years the younger, and by so much the more nimble, and his dirk — for which all thanks to Colin Samson! — smote the fellow a slashing blow in the thigh. And while the fellow clung to the shrouds, weak with pain, a second Rose-of-Devon’s man came crawling over Phil who hung below from the yard, and slashed the rope.

“We are clear! We are clear! God be thanked!” the Old One yelled.

Meanwhile the men of the Rose of Devon had succeeded in firing three guns of the larboard broadside,