During the first few hours of the afternoon we had looked on deck several times, but felt better satisfied to remain below, out of the drizzle. Now the captain's big voice rumbled some kind of good news, and each of us made a dash for the stairs.

Even as we piled out into the cockpit the mate gave a yell and sailors sprang to haul down the topmast-and main-topmast-staysails. Off in the southwest, which had been leaden from horizon to meridian showing no distinction of water and sky, appeared a spot of light, a glow, growing rapidly brighter. Before it the misty rain was being wiped as if by magic from the air.

Looking toward the northward I beheld the other yacht standing out in bold relief upon a blacker, more dismal background. She was beautiful at that moment—her sides and sails unnaturally whitened against the gloom, suggesting a cameo set on a piece of slate. Our blocks began to creak, sails bulged into huge scoops, masts tilted majestically, and the Whim, freed from her enforced idleness, bounded in response.

"Wind!" Tommy shouted, his arms held skyward. "Aphrodite, sweet and mighty, send a gale before the nighty!"

"But," Monsieur looked at him reprovingly, "Aphrodite is not goddess of the wind!"

"Who said she was?" he innocently asked.

"You conjure her for the gale—bah!"

"That's because she rhymes with nighty, gezabo! When my Muse sings, to hell with mythology! Come join the clouds—you're sordid!"

"These have been sordid clouds," the little fellow laughed. "I would rather join you in other, but a more genial, wet."

"Gates, how long before we catch her?" I called.

"I carn't measure her speed yet, sir, but should say we won't be far behind in an hour and a harf."

"Then," Tommy announced, "we'll go below and drink to the safety of our sweet Princess—for, unless I'm greatly mistaken, this day will see the finish of one good yacht! Give over the wheel and join us, Captain!"

It was a hilarious four that touched glasses in the cabin, and after Gates went above we set to work in good earnest on our arms and cartridge belts. Having seen that each piece worked perfectly we followed him up, and the sight which greeted our eyes made us laugh for joy.

How we accomplished it only Gates could have told, but now in the late afternoon light the Orchid seemed to be less than half her former distance. Looking over the rail at the flying water I felt a great pride in my father's craft, for she fairly skimmed along. Monsieur began at once to hug the captain, and this time the old skipper did not mind—at least, he permitted it.

There was, of course, some concern along with our happiness; first of importance being the declining day that held scarcely more than an hour of light. Had it been otherwise, had the blessing of good sailing weather come to us earlier, we might have held an immediate council of war; but this for the present could be left. It was a profound disappointment, though, and showed in our strained silence. Gates stood at my elbow.

"How'll we find her in the morning—if we don't catch up pretty soon?" I asked.

"I was thinking of that, sir. Now, as she sees we can sail circles around her with a good breeze, she won't hold the same course, and can give us a mighty slip during the night. We're almost in——" he hesitated, and again ventured: "We're almost in close enough to send a shot across her bows, sir, if you wish to bring her about!"

Tommy, overhearing, let out a yell of joy. The old skipper's suggestion electrified us all, particularly myself, for it promised that he would see this affair through at any and all costs—and I had been apprehensive regarding the attitude of Gates, lest his love for me, or for the Whim, cause him to balk short of the danger line. So, hastily imploring Monsieur to hug him again, I dashed below for one of the rifles. This arm was a neat high-power sporting model, but I thought it might persuade our kidnaper to look around.

Coming up, however, I found that another plan had been adopted. Gates and Tommy were busily unlacing the canvas cover from our brass cannon. While it was only used for signaling, it could make a stunning racket. Bilkins was holding a box of blank shells, each containing somewhere near twenty drams of black powder. As I approached, Tommy was excitedly arguing with Gates who, this time, seemed to demur.

"It's not of the Orchid I'm thinking, sir," he turned appealingly to me, "but ourselves! Miss Nancy—as Mr. Thomas calls this young howitzer, here,—won't stand much fooling. She warn't built for it, and if we go pressing her too hard she'll bust a stay—which is the same, sir, as sending harf of us to the sick-bay!"

"What I want to do," Tommy explained, "is load her up with sinkers and truck like that, and touch her off right! Just a blank won't tell those devils anything, but if we pepper 'em with a hat full of old junk they'll haul-to in a jiffy!"

"Surest thing in the world," I cried. "Suppose she does bust a stay, Gates! We can huddle in the cockpit and fire her with a long lanyard—then let her bust!"

"That's easy, sir," he still remonstrated, "but suppose Miss Sylvia's looking out a porthole and stops one of the sinkers!"

The thought of it made me shiver. Tommy, however, his enthusiasm undampened, acquiesced at once, saying:

"Righto, Gates! Blank it is! Cartridge, Bilkins! I'm ready—say when!"

"Wait! Let's get a bit closer, sir," Gates urged.

Several minutes passed. We were only four hundred yards from the Orchid now and cutting down the space. She stood off our starboard quarter and, although a great deal more obscure in the gathering dusk, her cabin lights came on changing the portholes to a line of golden disks. Then another solitary light appeared, being carried aft by a sailor who fastened it to the taffrail. It was the stern lantern being swung out for the night, and I could not help smiling at this delightful display of audacity, deliberately to put up that tell-tale beacon, right in our faces, as it were.

"It's a good bluff," Gates chuckled, "but they don't intend leaving it there for long, sir. I'd say we'd better fire now, Mr. Thomas, and when they stop we'll have a little chat with 'em."

Tommy sprang up and pulled the string, and our eyes were dazzled, our ears jarred, with a perfectly glorious explosion that lighted up the sea for a hundred yards.

"Whiz-bang!" Tommy yelled. "I wish I had this thing in Kentucky! It'd work wonders for the Democrats!"

Nothing happened aboard the Orchid. She did not vary her course an inch. The sailor at the helm had given a frantic jump when Miss Nancy went off, but resumed his place evidently aware that no missiles had been fired.

"Load her up again," I urged. "Let's keep on till they get mad!"

Bilkins passed out the shells and the piece was loaded and fired, loaded and fired, till we seemed surely to have waked old Nep himself. I do not know how many rounds we shot but it must have continued for some time, thoroughly engrossing us. Now suddenly the stern light went out, and immediately afterwards the portholes, losing their glow, became as nothing. The tropical night, always swift in coming, had fallen more stealthily than we realized, and the yacht melted into darkness.

"SacrÉ bleu!" Monsieur raged—for the night was overcast and as black as sin.

But Gates was already stripping the searchlight of its cover. When he had swung open the big lens Tommy struck a match, which blew out. His second was blown out by a hiss of air that preceded the flow of gas, and the professor jumbled matters by trying his hand. But these efforts scarcely took more time than the telling, and when the powerful streak of light finally pierced the darkness the very first thing it showed us was a white sail.

"I shouldn't have worried about night catching us, sir, if I'd thought of this before," Gates laughed. "And there's plenty of extra acetylene tanks, too, so she carn't get away now!"

"You'll have to haul down some sail, though," I replied, seeing that the Orchid lay nearly abeam of us.

"No quicker said than done, sir."

He went to direct this, while we held our light squarely on the fleeing outlaw. Nobody was astir about her deck; indeed, so undisturbed did she appear that the sailor standing statue-like at her wheel might have been the only living thing aboard.

I breathed fast with thinking that maybe Sylvia might come up, and my senses were so alert, my mind, eyes, ears so intently reaching toward her, that now I heard what was indeed a most unexpected sound: a piano. Grasping Tommy's arm I whispered this to him, and he nodded, saying in a low tone:

"Yes, I hear it plainly. Reminds me of Monsieur's master musician playing a rhapsody in the dark, d'you remember? Listen! Gods, it's 'De puis le jour,' from Louise!" Yet in the next breath he added: "Cheerful girl you have, Jack,—she's switched off from her love song to Chopin's funeral march!"

I dolefully smiled to myself, not at the funeral march but at the realization that dreams are only dreams and nothing more, that Gates's common sense had come nearer hitting the mark than all of our professor's psychology; for I had seen no piano in that cabin, and five minutes ago I would have sworn its interior was as well known to me as the Whim. But an instant later my smile had given way to a cry of rage, as a little streak of fire spat from one of the portholes and the big lens of our searchlight, with a bang, shattered into a thousand pieces.

"The nerve of it," Tommy yelled, violently shaking his hand that had been resting on the brass frame. "Damn his hide, he nearly shot off my finger!"

"Are you hit?" I asked quickly.

"Hell, no; but my hand feels like a pincushion! Say, he knows how to shoot, though! I'll give him that much!"

"Those people are prepared for all that comes, I tell you," Monsieur vigorously nodded his head. "They must even have violet spectacles for looking into search-lights, else that fellow's eyes could not have stood the glare."

Again the Orchid was invisible. For a moment I thought that out of the dark sky my gods were derisively mocking me; but it was a human sound, a long, triumphant laugh, doubtless from the coarse-throated creature who had made the lucky shot.

Gates, fearing we might answer it in kind, came forward to counsel silence, at the same time sending a sailor for the megaphone and ordering another to extinguish our own lights. With his knife he then hastily cut the megaphone in half, keeping the large end whose openings now tapered from about eight inch to eighteen inch diameters. As we stood, not understanding what he meant to do, I heard across the water a rattling of blocks and knew the Orchid, free of pursuit, was changing her course. Gates cocked his head and listened, then whispered to the mate who went back and changed the Whim's course.

"Now, Mr. Jack," he said, in a guarded tone, "we're behind her, and dark, too; so keep all hands as quiet as mice, sir! Take the wheel and steer as I signal from under my coat with this electric torch, like this: one long, means put your helm up a point, two long means two points; but a short flash means down a point, two short down two points. D'you understand, sir? We've got to keep close to her, or daylight'll find her gone! I'm going out on the bowsprit and, with this piece of megaphone to help, think I can follow by sound. They're apt to make some noise, believing themselves safe. And their blocks are bound to rattle when they change their course—which they'll be doing before long as we're both headed for the coast of Florida, twenty-five or thirty miles off. Now go back quiet, sir, and watch for my lights."

God bless old Gates, I said to myself.

Till well into the night that indefatigable sea dog sat astride the bowsprit with the crude sound magnifier over his ear, while I, alert and watchful, gripped the wheel as though I were driving a speed boat. In the beginning he had sent a few signals, and we jockied this way and that, but after perhaps an hour we settled down to another straight course—though I could not tell how near we were, or if we were sailing right, or if they suspected us.

Tommy had come aft to keep me company, and now asked in a whisper:

"What do you think about that piano?"

"I think she played like an angel."

"Son, you don't get the point. What do you think about changing suddenly from that exquisite Charpentier love song to a funeral march—just before the rifle went off?"

"You don't mean she was signaling?" I asked in surprise, for the idea knocked me a little bit silly.

"I mean just that; of course, she was signaling, and taking a big chance, too. You may put your own construction on the first piece she played, but the instant she saw what they were up to she sent us the flash. The only trouble about it was that we weren't anywhere near as quick."

"But look here," I said, alarmed by another thought, "suppose she meant it would be her funeral march if we keep up the pursuit?"

Tommy considered this.

"I reckon not," he finally replied. "They might threaten us with her death if we don't turn back, but there'd be no reason to kill her otherwise. No, she saw them preparing to shoot—which you can't deny that they did, jolly good and well."

"She's a queen," I murmured.

"Queen! That girl must be a royal straight flush in hearts, and if it weren't for Nell I'd adore her to the tips of my teeth!"

At midnight I sent the mate to relieve Gates and gave the wheel to a likely sailor, and after making sure they understood the signals we went below for a bite to eat. Although the day of suspense had been wearing, my brain was too active to permit much thought of sleep; but finally Gates nodded, awoke with a jerk, and started off to bed. He had had no easy time of it on the bowsprit, good old Gates!

Tommy and I talked in low tones while the professor sat to one side, humped over and buried in thought. He was a strange looking spectacle when buried in thought. His countenance then became all wrinkles, with a kind of turned-up nubbin in the middle that I knew to be a nose, only because I'd previously seen it—otherwise it might have been almost anything that one does not expect to find in the center of a man's face. Tommy regarded him a moment in silence.

"Monsieur," he whispered, "come join this confab. We're up against the real thing in the morning, and may as well begin to lay pipe. The old catamount who shot out our searchlight won't have any more regard for our personal lights, let's keep that in mind. What's more, he has a real excuse now, because we fired those blanks at him which he'll find it convenient to say weren't blanks. So the business is coming off to a certainty. What's your idea?"

"My idea?"

"I meant to be that flattering, yes. What do you think we'll be up against when ordering the Orchid to surrender?"

"I do not know; but something we are not expecting, you may be sure," he dolefully answered.

"That sort of gloom won't get us anywhere," Tommy retorted. "Try another thought!"

"It gets us very far! If we expect to experience what we are not expecting, then we are expecting it! How can we be surprised when we are prepared for the thing we are not prepared for? It is obvious. That is my idea."

"Then you ought to keep it in a less fragile place. Try still another, gezabo!"

But he was inclined to pout now, and would neither talk nor listen to our entreaties.

"Well," he exclaimed at last, with a superior smile as he struck the table smartly, "I will tell you this: I have nothing more to say!"

It was a lot of preparation for a mighty small result, I thought, and Tommy smiled at the childish gentleman, murmuring sweetly:

"If you really mean that, and stick to it, pray accept my congratulations upon having reached the height of conversational charm. Now, Jack, let's plan!"

But Monsieur, while unwilling to talk, was also unwilling to be ignored. I think he wanted to be coaxed. People get that way, sometimes. So he petulantly exclaimed:

"You think I am what you call an old crank!"

"No I don't, honest!" Tommy gave me a wink. "Even if I did, it's a compliment in America to be called a crank, because cranks make things move. Now help us out, like a good sport. By this time tomorrow you'll be shot to pieces, for all we know."

He said it solemnly, but his humorous mouth showed how much he wanted to laugh. I believe Tommy would have walked to the gallows joking with his executioner. That infectious smile, sometimes the flash of his teeth, but always a snap in his honest gray eyes, were invariably quickened by the imminence of danger. I knew Tommy; therefore I also knew that beneath his jocose raillery were nerves stretched to concert pitch that meant music for whoever stood in his way tomorrow.

The professor sat up straighter and blinked at him.

"Why do you say I get shot to pieces?"

"Why not? The fellow'd be a fool to sit by and let us go aboard—and we've got to go aboard!"

"It is nonsense! You want my advice? Then leave him alone!"

I think that Tommy's eyes narrowed slightly. I know that my teeth clenched at this evidence of quitting; yet what could we expect from a chap who did nothing but teach in a University?

"You won't be in any danger," I said, arising. "We'll manage all right. Come on, Tommy!"

"You will not manage—that is just it," he angrily retorted. "You two boys will strut about like roosters showing what good fighters you are, and get blown up through the insides! Have I not seen it often? Bah!" He ran his hands through his hair. "Why is it, when brains are as easily cultivated as biceps, that young bloods think only of a strong arm! You stay in the cabin and leave the man to me; then I will take him before your eyes, and nobody get hurt!"

"I don't think we quite understand!"

"Of course! But there are no ladies on the Orchid whom I desire to charm, therefore I will be rational. Your Capitaine Gates will lower a boat, we row to the scoundrel's yacht, I present my authority, he surrenders, and we bring him back. There is no bloodshed, and my two young friends who are disposed to ridicule me will not get hurt!"

Tommy flushed, and I felt uncommonly like a pup.

"But suppose he won't come?—suppose he begins to fight?"—we asked these questions simultaneously. They were quite unnecessary, for the man would not come and, moreover, he would fight; but Monsieur's earnestness and visionary assumption had completely disarmed us.

"In that case, your Gates and I will shoot him," he answered, as a matter of course. "Such grizzly alternatives must sometimes be the means of peace and harmony."

Some might at times have called him an idiot, and on occasions I have found myself wondering if he possessed a scintilla of common sense, but no one after this could call him a coward. He would have gone single-handed to the Orchid with the same beautiful faith that a wee child would crawl into the kennel of a vicious dog. It was not in Monsieur to consider that anyone would dare disobey his Azurian authority.

"Gezabo," Tommy said tenderly, "I'm going to lock you up tomorrow, for if anyone so much as rumples your noble topknot I'll cut him to ribbons—so'll Jack. Now kick us, and go to bed. We've been a pair of braying asses, and you're a sure-nuff Prince!"

And, although I thought that Tommy had done most of the braying, I was willing to let it go at that. A lack of discriminating accuracy on his part might have been pardoned when we were faced by issues of so much greater portent. The dawn was but six hours off, and with it would come—what?