ed, and
as he looked he saw the anchor broken out and the jib flung to the breeze.

"Can't land here!" the soldier shouted back. "Smallpox!"

"But I must!" he cried, choking down a half-sob and preparing to row.

"Then I 'll shoot you," was the cheering response, and the rifle came to
shoulder again.

Joe thought rapidly. The island was large. Perhaps there were no soldiers
farther on, and if he only once got ashore he did not care how quickly
they captured him. He might catch the smallpox, but even that was better
than going back to the bay pirates. He whirled the skiff half about to
the right, and threw all his strength against the oars. The cove was quite
wide, and the nearest point which he must go around a good distance away.
Had he been more of a sailor, he would have gone in the other direction
for the opposite point, and thus had the wind on his pursuers. As it was,
the _Dazzler_ had a beam wind in which to overtake him.

It was nip and tuck for a while. The breeze was light and not very steady,
so sometimes he gained and sometimes they. Once it freshened till the sloop
was within a hundred yards of him, and then it dropped suddenly flat, the
_Dazzler's_ big mainsail flapping idly from side to side.

"Ah! you steal ze skiff, eh?" French Pete howled at him, running into the
cabin for his rifle. "I fix you! You come back queeck, or I kill you!" But
he knew the soldier was watching them from the shore, and did not dare to
fire, even over the lad's head.

Joe did not think of this, for he, who had never been shot at in all his
previous life, had been under fire twice in the last twenty-four hours.
Once more or less could n't amount to much. So he pulled steadily away,
while French Pete raved like a wild man, threatening him with all manner
of punishments once he laid hands upon him again. To complicate matters,
'Frisco Kid waxed mutinous.

"Just you shoot him, and I 'll see you hung for it--see if I don't," he
threatened. "You 'd better let him go. He 's a good boy and all right,
and not raised for the dirty life you and I are leading."

"You too, eh!" the Frenchman shrieked, beside himself with rage. "Den I
fix you, you rat!"

He made a rush for the boy, but 'Frisco Kid led him a lively chase from
cockpit to bowsprit and back again. A sharp capful of wind arriving just
then, French Pete abandoned the one chase for the other. Springing to the
tiller and slacking away on the main-sheet,--for the wind favore