“One more salute,” ordered Captain Lockyer, “and then be damned to ’em!”
Touching his forelock obediently, the sailor hurried away. The captain,
his usual ruddy color greatly accentuated by what was apparently anger,
put his glass to his eye and returned to a study of the land which lay
off the starboard bow of H.M.S. _Sophia_. For a long minute there was
silence, neither of his two companions, junior naval officers, daring to
interrupt him.
The frigate, against whose side the lazy waves beat the minor melodies
of the cerulean sea, lay at anchor, perhaps a half mile from the shore.
Directly opposite the length of the ship, a narrow, twisting, but
navigable pass gave ingress to a small bay; but what was in the bay, if
anything, could not be seen from without.
With a roar that loosened a thousand echoes, a cannon on the frigate’s
deck spoke, doubtless in response to the order of the ship’s commander.
As the echoes died away, however, no sign of life could be seen anywhere
in the vicinity of the pass.
Captain Lockyer lowered his glass with a curse.
“If I could only get my hands on that dog of a pirate!” he muttered. One
of his subordinates, gathering courage, spoke up:
“Couldn’t it be possible that no one’s there, sir?”
The Britisher laughed scornfully.
“Not there? He’s there well enough, but is too frightened to show
himself. And I’m not surprised ... he knows I’d hang him like a dog if I
could only catch him!” He growled in his beard. “It’s been forty-eight
hours since we’ve been hanging around here, not daring to stick our nose
in, for fear they’d blow us out of the water if we did. And that’s just
what they want us to do! I can swear there’s at least twenty heavy guns
trained on the other end of that channel. But I’m not so easily fooled as
that!” He breathed heavily and glared shoreward over the rail.
“But might I not suggest, again, sir,” said the first junior officer,
“that it might have been wise to have sent a boat in to reconnoitre? At
least you could have—”
“You have much to learn, Lieutenant!” said Lockyer, coldly. “That would
be playing right into their hands. If I had sent in a boat, it would
never have returned. But there’s no use staying here any longer. It won’t
be long before we come back—in force—and when we do ... when we do....”
His voice trailed off menacingly, into nothingness....
Half an hour later Captain Lockyer, still pacing his deck, watched Grande
Terre, covering but a tiny segment of the horizon and dim and dreamy in
the blue perspective, disappear from sight behind the level disk of the
sea.
And Captain Lockyer of H.M.S. _Sophia_ grimly promised himself that he
had not seen the last of it ... which, however, remained to be seen.