ngering behind
long enough to lash the rudder amidships. Then he also took his place in
the tender and picked up one of the oars, Julius took the other, Marcy
knelt in the bow to feel for the channel with his boathook, and the work
of towing the schooner through the Inlet was begun. There was not a buoy
in sight, and when he removed them the officer whose business it was to
guard that particular part of the coast must have thought he had done
his full duty, for the active little launch that Marcy so much dreaded
did not put in her appearance. They passed through the Inlet without
running the _Fairy Belle_ aground or seeing anything alarming; and it
was not until the broad Atlantic opened before them that the
long-expected hail came.

"Not a thing in sight," said Jack, with some disappointment in his
tones. "I was in hopes we could get through with our business so that
you could return to the Sound before daylight, but perhaps it is just as
well as it is. You want to keep away from those soldiers long enough to
make them believe that you have been to Newbern. Haul the skiff
alongside, and we'll fill away for Hatteras."

"Jack, Jack!" exclaimed Marcy suddenly, "there comes something."

Looking in the direction indicated by his brother's finger, the
experienced sailor distinctly made out the white canvas of a natty
little schooner that was holding in for the Inlet. It was the most
unwelcome sight he had seen for many a day.

CHAPTER XVII.

AN UNEXPECTED MEETING.

"What is she, Jack?" said Marcy, in a suppressed whisper. "Do you make
her out?"

His voice was husky, and he trembled as he asked the question, for he
knew by the exclamation that fell from his brother's lips that those
white sails were things he did not like to see.

"I make her out easy enough, in spite of her disguise," was Sailor
Jack's reply. "And I would rather meet all the gunboats in Uncle Sam's
navy than her."

"Disguise!" Marcy almost gasped. "You surely don't think----"

"No, I don't think anything about it," Jack interposed. "I know that
that is Captain Beardsley's schooner. I wish from the bottom of my heart
that she had been sunk or captured before she ever caught us here; but
it is too late to get away from her. She will go by within less than
twenty yards of us."

"And do you think Beardsley will know the _Fairy Belle_ in her new
dress?" asked Marcy, who had never before been