ratic movements and long intervals of rest on shore, Captain Beardsley
was a fair navigator and knew how to handle his schooner. He knew also,
and quickly assumed, the dignity befitting his station, kept his
quarter-deck sacred to himself, and, except when they were on duty,
never permitted his crew to come aft the foremast This made a gulf
between him and Marcy, but the latter did not mind that. He was content
to be considered one of the crew.

Seventy hours passed, and the only thing the lookouts saw during that
time to indicate that they were not alone on the ocean, was a thin cloud
of smoke in the horizon, which might come from the chimneys of a
peaceful passenger vessel, or from those of a cruiser on the watch for
just such crafts as the _Osprey_ was; and so Captain Beardsley prudently
came about and sailed leisurely back toward the point from whence he
started. This move was just what brought her first prize into the
clutches of the _Osprey_.

Land had been out of sight for almost two days. In her eagerness to
catch something the schooner had gone far beyond the highway toward
which she had first shaped her course, but this retrograde movement
brought her back to it. On the morning of the third day the thrilling
cry "Sail ho!" came from aloft, and in an instant the deck was in
commotion, the man at the wheel so far forgetting himself as to allow
the privateer to swing into the wind with all her canvas flapping.

"Keep her steady, there," shouted the captain angrily. "Where away?" he
continued, hailing the crosstrees.

"Broad on the weather beam. Topsail schooner, and standing straight
across our course."

The captain seized a glass and hastened aloft to take a look at the
stranger, while those on deck crowded to the rail and strained their
eyes for a glimpse of the sail, which had not yet showed her top-hamper
above the horizon. No change was made in the course of the privateer,
and neither was anything done toward casting loose the guns. There would
be time enough for that when the captain had made up his mind what he
was going to do. He sat on the crosstrees beside the lookout for an hour
without saying a word. By that time the sail was visible from the deck.
To quote from one of the crew she was coming up at a hand gallop. Then
Captain Beardsley was satisfied to come down and take charge of the
deck.

"She's ours," Marcy heard him say to the two mates. "I would not sell my
chances of making a rich haul f