"'Twill reach the Englishmen's ears," said the boy Merry, who stood on the forecastle of the schooner, by the side of his commander, listening with breathless interest to the sounds; "they set a sentinel on the point, as the sun went down, and if he is a trifle better than a dead man, or a marine asleep, he will suspect something is wrong."
"Never!" returned Barnstable, with a long breath, that announced all his apprehensions were removed; "he will be more likely to believe it a mermaid fanning herself this cool evening, than to suspect the real fact. What say you, Master Coffin? will the soldier smell the truth?"
"They're a dumb race," said the cockswain, casting his eyes over his shoulders, to ascertain that none of their own marine guard was near him; "now, there was our sergeant, who ought to know something, seeing that he has been afloat these four years, maintained, dead in the face and eyes of what every man, who has ever doubled Good Hope, knows to be true, that there was no such vessel to be fallen in with in them seas, as the Flying Dutchman! and then, again, when I told him that he was a 'know-nothing,' and asked him if the Dutchman was a more unlikely thing than that there should be places where the inhabitants split the year into two watches, and had day for six months, and night the rest of the time, the greenhorn laughed in my face, and I do believe he would have told me I lied, but for one thing."
"And what might that be?" asked Barnstable, gravely.
"Why, sir," returned Tom, stretching his bony fingers, as he surveyed his broad palm, by the little light that remained, "though I am a peaceable man, I can be roused."
"I never doubled the east cape; though I can find my way through Le Maire in the darkest night that ever fell from the heavens; but I have seen them that have seen her, and spoken her, too."
"Well, be it so; you must turn flying Yankee, yourself, to-night, Master Coffin. Man your boat at once, sir, and arm your crew."
The cockswain paused a moment before he proceeded to obey this unexpected order, and, pointing towards the battery, he inquired, with infinite phlegm:
"For shore-work, sir? Shall we take the cutlashes and pistols? or shall we want the pikes?"