Conspicuous on the highest point in the landscape stood my grandfather, panting with his exertions as he wiped his forehead. After standing for a moment, bronzed in front like a smith at the furnace, face to face with the sun, he turned and swept with his telescope the road into Spain. Early peasants, microscopic as ants, were bringing their fruits and vegetables into the fortress--a laden mule or two advanced along the beach over which the Major had last night galloped--but nothing resembling what he sought was in sight. Then turning completely round, with his face to the path he had just ascended, he gave a long look towards the Straits; and as he did so, the wind, which had shifted to the south-west towards morning, blew gently on his face. A sail or two was discernible in the distance, outward bound, but nothing resembling the cutter. As the Major looked, a signal was made from Cabrita, and directly two feluccas left their station at Algeçiras, and swooped out, like two white birds, as if to intercept some bark yet hidden by the Point. Again my grandfather looked out to the Strait, and presently a small white sail came in sight near Cabrita. For a quarter of an hour he stood steadily, with levelled telescope, and then he was almost sure--yes, he could swear--that he saw the small English ensign relieved against the sail; and above, at the masthead, the yellow-striped flag that Francisco hoisted before as the mark of a yacht. It was the Fair Unknown--and my grandfather at once comprehended that the pursuers, whom he had escaped the night before, had, on returning to Algeçiras, made arrangements for her capture as soon as she should appear.
The breeze was on her beam, and much fresher with her than farther in the bay, so that the feluccas steered slantingly across her course as she made for the rock. They held on thus, the pursuers and pursued, till within a mile of each other, when the cutter suddenly altered her course to one nearly parallel with that of the feluccas. The latter, however, now gained fast upon her, and presently a puff of smoke from the bow of the foremost was followed by the report of a gun. My grandfather could look no longer through his glass, for his hand shook like a reed, but began, with huge strides, more resembling those of a kangaroo than a quiet middle-aged gentleman, to descend the rock. Breathless, he reached his quarters, had his horse saddled and brought out, and galloped off towards Europa.