"Surely such an important point can easily be ascertained," remarked Maas. "Will you leave it to me to make inquiries?"
"Oh, don't you trouble," responded Browne. "I shall sift the matter myself later on." As he said this he noticed that Jimmy Foote had not entered the smoking-room with them. In an idle sort of a way he wondered at his absence.
"How long will it take you to repair the damage, do you think?" Browne inquired of the chief-engineer.
"Well, sir, it all depends upon circumstances," said that officer. "If we find the duplicate pins we can do it in less than an hour; if we cannot, it may take us twelve hours, and it may take us twenty-four."
"And how long do you think it will be before that boat comes up?" asked Browne, turning to the captain.
"Oh, a good hour at least, sir," the captain replied. "She has seen us; and I'm afraid it would be of no use our even thinking of trying to get away from her."
"But how do you know that she wants us?" Maas inquired. "Being aware of our own guilt, we naturally presume she knows it too. As Shakespeare says, 'Conscience doth make cowards of us all.'"
"I don't think there can be very much doubt, but that she's after us," said Browne lugubriously. "Her appearance at such a time is rather too much of a coincidence. Well, Mr. M'Cartney, you'd better get to work as soon as possible. In the meantime, Captain Mason, keep your eye on yonder vessel, and let me know how she progresses. We," he continued, turning to MacAndrew and Maas, "must endeavour to find some place in which to hide Monsieur Petrovitch, should the commanding officer take it into his head to send a boat to search the ship."
The captain and the engineer rose and left the room; and, when the door had closed behind them, the others sat down to the consideration of the problem, which Browne had placed before them. It was knotty in more points than one. If, as Browne had the best of reasons for supposing, the warship was in search of them, they would hunt the yacht from stem to stern, from truck to keelson, before they would be satisfied that the man they wanted was not on board. To allow him to be found would be the most disastrous thing that could possibly happen to all of them. But the question that had to be settled was, where he could be hidden with any reasonable chance of safety. They had barely an hour in which to make up their minds on this point, and to stow the fugitive away before the man-o'-war's boat would arrive. In vain they ransacked their brains. Every hiding-place they hit upon seemed to have some disadvantage.