"DEFENCE, NOT DEFIANCE."
"What did you say? Oh yes, I remember. It has come out all right; but
we shall have them in here directly, after us."
"What's that?" said the skipper, who overheard his words. "I hope not,
and I doubt of their getting within shot. Here, Burgess."
"Hallo!" growled the mate, and he came slowly up, looking, as Poole
afterwards said, like the proverbial bear with a sore head.
"Here's Mr Burnett prophesying all kinds of evil things about us."
"Ah!" growled the mate. "He didn't know any better. I never prophesy
till after the thing has taken place. What did he say?"
"That we shall have the gunboat in here after us directly. What do you
say to that?"
The mate's sour countenance expanded into a broad smile, and he came
close up to the middy and clapped him on the shoulder.
"Good lad," he said. "I hope you are right."
"Hope I'm right!" said Fitz, staring. "Why, if she steams in within
shot they'll make such practice with that gun that we shall be knocked
all to pieces."
"You mean they would if they got well within sight; but look for
yourself. Where could they lay her to get a shot? I can't see."
"No," said Fitz thoughtfully, as he looked anxiously back and saw that
they were thoroughly sheltered by projecting cliff and headland. "I
suppose they couldn't get within shot."
"No. That's right, my lad; and they couldn't come in anything like near
enough if it were all open water from here to where they are now."
"What, is the water so shoal?" asked Fitz.
"Shoal? Yes," growled the mate, his face growing sour again. "We've
nearly scraped the bottom over and over again. I only wish they'd try
it. They'd be fast on some of those jags and splinters, and most likely
with a hole in the bottom. My opinion, Captain Reed, is that if the
skipper of that gunboat does venture in he'll never get out again; and
that would suit us down to the ground. Bah--bah! He knows this coast
too well, and he won't be such a fool as to try."
"No," said the skipper confidently; "you are quite right, Burgess. He
won't be such a fool as to try. But we must have a boat out at once to
go back and watch, for I'm pretty sure that Don what's-his-name will be
lowering a couple of his with armed crews to come in and scuttle us if
they can't tow us out."
"Ah, well, they can't do that," said the mate coolly. "They'd be
meeting us on equal terms then, and you won't let them."
"No," said the skipper, smiling, as he turned to Fitz; "I don't think we
shall let them do that, Mr Burnett. My lads will be only too glad to
receive the gunboat's crew on equal terms and send them back with a flea
in their ears."
"Ay," said the mate, with a grunt; "and quite right too. I think it is
our turn to give them a bit of our mind, after the way in which they
have been scuffling us about lately. Shall I go with the boat?"
"Yes, you'd better. Take the gig, and four men to row."
"I can go, father?" cried Poole eagerly.
"Well, I don't know," said the skipper. "If you go, Mr Burnett here
will want to be with you, and I know how particular he is as a young
officer not to be seen having anything to do with our filibustering, as
he calls it."
Fitz frowned with annoyance, and seemed to give himself a regular
snatch.
"You'd rather not go, of course?" continued the skipper dryly.
"I can't help wanting to go, Mr Reed," replied the lad sharply; "and if
I went just as a spectator I don't see how I should be favouring any of
your designs."
"Well, no," said the skipper dryly, "if you put it like that. I don't
see after all how you could be accused of turning buccaneer. But would
you really like to go?"
"Why, of course," said Fitz. "It's all experience."
"Off with you then," said the skipper; "only don't get within shot. I
don't want to have to turn amateur doctor again on your behalf. I am
clever enough at cuts and bruises, and I dare say if I were hard put to
it I could manage to mend a broken leg or arm, but I wouldn't undertake
to be hunting you all over to find where a rifle-bullet had gone.
Accidents are my line, not wounds received in war; and, by the way,
while we are talking of such subjects, if we have to lie up here in this
river for any time, you had better let me give you a dose or two of
quinine."
"Oh, but I am quite well now," cried Fitz.
"Yes, and I want you to keep so, my lad. That's a very good old proverb
that says, `Prevention is better than cure.'"
A very short time afterwards the schooner's gig, with her little
well-armed crew, was allowed to glide down with the stream, with the
mate, boat-hook in hand, standing in the bows, Poole astern with the
rudder-lines, and Fitz a spectator, thoroughly enjoying the beauty of
the vast cliffs that arose on either side as they descended towards the
river's mouth.
It was all zigzag and winding, the stream carrying them along slowly,
for a sharp sea-breeze was dead against them, explaining how it was that
the schooner had sailed up so easily as she had.
Fitz had ample proof, without Poole's drawing his attention to the fact,
that there was no possibility of the gunboat making practice with her
heavy piece, for everywhere the schooner was sheltered, the course of
the river being all zigzag and wind, till all at once, as the men were
dipping their oars gently, the gig passed round a bend, and there was
the enemy about three miles off shore, lying-to, with her great black
plume of smoke floating towards them, spreading out like a haze and
making her look strange and indistinct.
"Did you bring a glass, Poole, my lad?" growled the mate.
"No; I never thought of that."
"Humph! Never mind. I think I can manage. Both of you lads give a
sharp look-out and tell me what you can see."
"Why, there's something between us and her hull," said Poole, "but I
can't quite make out what it is. Surely she isn't on a rock?"
"No," cried Fitz; "I can see. She has lowered a boat."
"Two," said the mate, in his deep hoarse voice. "I can make 'em out
now. I thought that was it at first. Pull away, my lads, for all
you're worth. Pull your port line, my lad, and let's run back. Hug the
shore as much as you can, so as to keep out of the stream. Hah! If we
had thought to bring a mast and sail and one of the other boats we could
have been back in no time with this wind astern."
The gig swung round as the men bent in their quick steady pull, and they
began to ascend the stream once more, while Fitz rose in his place, to
look back watching the half-obscured gunboat till they had swept round
the bend once more and she was out of sight, when he re-seated himself
and noticed that the mate was still standing, intent upon cautiously
taking cartridges from his pouch and thrusting them into the chambers of
the revolver which he had drawn from the holster of his belt.
This looked like business, and Fitz turned to dart an inquiring look at
his companion, who answered it with a nod.
"Well," thought Fitz, "if he thinks we are going to have a fight before
we get back, why doesn't he order his men to load?"
But it proved that the mate did not anticipate a fight before they got
back. He had other thoughts in his head, and when at last, after a long
and anxious row against the sharp current, with the lads constantly
looking back to see if the gunboat's men were within sight, they reached
the final zigzag, and caught sight of the schooner, old Burgess raised
his hand and fired three shots at the face of the towering cliff.
These three were echoed back as about a score, when there was an
interval, and three tiny puffs of grey smoke darted from the schooner's
deck, and echoed in their turn.
"Signal answered," said Poole quietly, and the men made their ash-blades
bend again in their eagerness to get back aboard.
"Why, what have they been about?" whispered Fitz.
"Looks like going fishing," said Poole, with a grin. "Don't chaff at a
time like this," cried Fitz pettishly. "I didn't know that you had got
boarding-netting like a man-of-war."
"What, don't you remember the night you came aboard?"
"Not likely, with everything knocked out of my head as it was."
"Oh yes, we've got all these little necessaries. Father goes on the
Volunteer system: `Defence, not Defiance.'"
"Well, that's defiant enough," said Fitz. "It's like saying, `You're
not coming aboard here,' in string."
"Of course. You don't suppose we want a set of half Indian, half
Spanish mongrel sailors taking possession of the _Teal_? You wait till
we get aboard, and you'll see all our lads busy with the fleas."
"Busy with the fleas?" said Fitz. "What do you mean?"
"Those father talked about, to put in the Don's ears before we send them
back."
"How can you go on making poor jokes at a time like this?" said the
middy, in a tone of annoyance. "Why, it looks as if we are in for a
serious fight."
"As if _we_ are!" said Poole, emphasising the "we."
"How many more times am I to tell you that it is our game and not
yours?"
"But look here," said Fitz excitedly. "Your father really does mean to
fight?"
"My father does, and so does every one else," replied Poole. "In oars,
my lads," and the next moment the mate hooked on close to the gangway.
"I suppose," continued Poole, "you will stop on deck till the row
begins? You will want to see all you can."
"Of course," said Fitz, whose face was once more growing flushed.
"Well, I wouldn't stop up too long. The enemy may fire, and you will be
safer down below."
"Yes, I suppose so," said the middy coolly; "and of course you are
coming too?"
"Coming too? That's likely, isn't it?" said Poole contemptuously.
"Just as likely as that I should go and hide."
"But it's no business of yours. You are not going to fight."
"No," said Fitz, "but I want to see."