ok
after us."

"I feel very sure that Ned will not prove treacherous, though I cannot
say how the Malay will act," I observed.

"At all events we will get up our anchors and be ready for a start,"
said the first mate.

He gave the order accordingly. Just as they were up to the bows, I
caught sight of a small object ahead, which I trusted was the canoe. I
pointed it out to the first mate.

"No doubt about it. I hope that we shall find that we might have saved
ourselves the trouble of weighing," he observed.

It approached rapidly. In little more than a minute it dropped
alongside us and Ned and Kalong leapt into our boat.

"Not a moment to lose!" exclaimed Ned; "there's a whole fleet of prahus
in the next reach. Some of the people were ashore, and that we might
find out who they were, we landed some way below where they lay and
crept up close to them until we could hear them speaking. They know of
the brig, and, we found, were just about to get under weigh hoping to
surprise her."

"We must be on board first, then, or they'll murder the whole of us.
Out oars, lads, and pull as you never pulled before," cried the first
mate.

The crews required no further orders, the boats were got round and away
we went with the current, the men pulling with all their might.

"We must go on board and fight for our lives, for if we are taken
they'll not be worth much," said the first mate.

"My poor father, what will become of him?" I exclaimed.

"We have no proof that your father is among the white men spoken of,
Harry. If he is, he will not be worse off than he would have been had
we not gone up the river. We must, however, try and ascertain the truth
of the report, and make another attempt to rescue him should we find
that he is really there."

We had not much time or inclination for talking; while the first mate
steered, I kept looking astern to ascertain if we were pursued. We
rapidly shot by the places we had slowly passed coming up; we were
thankful that we had the tide in our favour. We had got to the end of a
long reach, when I saw rounding the further end of the point we had last
passed a number of dark objects stretching across the stream. I had no
doubt that they were the piratical prahus, though whether they had
discovered us or not we could not ascertain. They were swift craft, I
knew, and might possibly overtake us before we could reach the brig.
There was no use in telling the men to give way,