set up a derisive yell,
which came faintly to the ears of the privateer's crew.

"Oh, how I'd like to get my hands on that fellow!" shouted Captain
Beardsley. "I'd learn him to insult a Confederate government vessel.
I'd----"

Marcy Gray, who stood holding fast to the halliards, looking aloft and
listening to what Beardsley had to say, saw the lookout, who had
remained at his post all this time, touch the captain on the shoulder
and direct his gaze toward something in the horizon. Marcy looked, too,
and was electrified to see a thick, black smoke floating up among the
clouds. Could it be that there was a cruiser off there bearing down upon
them? He looked at Captain Beardsley again, and came to the conclusion
that there must be something suspicious about the stranger, for the
captain, after gazing at the smoke through his glass, squared around and
backed down from aloft with much more celerity than Marcy ever saw him
exhibit before.

"It is a cruiser," thought the young pilot, when the captain assumed
charge of the deck and ordered the schooner to be put about and headed
toward Crooked Inlet. "She has heard the sound of our guns and is coming
up to see what is the matter."

Marcy couldn't decide whether the captain's pale face and excited,
nervous manner were occasioned by the fears that had been conjured up by
the sudden appearance of that strange vessel in the offing, or by the
rage and disappointment he felt over the loss of the valuable prize he
had so confidently expected to capture. He hauled down the schooner's
flag, packed it away in the chest where it was usually kept, and then
had leisure to take a look at the crew. Could they be the same men who
had so valiantly fired into that unarmed brig a short half hour before?

"It _is_ a cruiser," repeated Marcy, turning to the side to conceal the
look of exultation which he knew the thought brought to his face. "It
can't be anything else, for the whole ship's company are scared out of
their boots. We were so busy with the brig that we never saw her until
she got so close on to us that she is liable to cut us off from the
Inlet. If she comes within range of us Captain Beardsley will find that
there is a heap of difference between shooting and being shot at. I
hope----"

Marcy was about to add that he hoped the on-coming war ship would either
capture or sink the _Osprey_, and so put a stop to her piratical career;
but if she did, what would become of him? If one