I mean that ill-looking scoundrel with the
girl. There, there; it is of no use for you to try and defend yourself.
You were in fault, and the only way for you to amend your failing is by
placing this man in my hands."

"But really, sir--" began Hilary.

"Go to your duty, sir!" exclaimed the lieutenant sternly; and, biting
his lips as he felt how awkwardly he was situated, Hilary went forward,
and soon after the cutter was skimming over the waves with a brisk
breeze abeam.

Time glided on, with the young officer fully determined to do his duty
if he should again have an opportunity of arresting the emissary of the
would-be king; but somehow it seemed as if the opportunity was never to
come. They cruised here and they cruised there, with the usual
vicissitudes of storm and sunshine. Fishing-boats were rigorously
overhauled, great merchant ships bidden to heave-to while a boat was
sent on board, but no capture was made.

They put into port over and over again, always to hear the same news--
that the young Pretender's emissaries were as busy as ever, and that
they came and went with impunity, but how no one could say.

The lieutenant always returned on board, after going ashore to see the
port-admiral, in a furious temper, and his junior and the crew found
this to their cost.

Days and nights of cruising without avail. It seemed as if the
_Kestrel_ was watched out of sight, and then, with the coast clear, the
followers of the young Pretender's fortunes landed in England with
impunity. Hilary heard from time to time that Sir Henry had grown more
daring, and had had two or three narrow escapes from being taken ashore,
but he had always been too clever for his pursuers, and had got away.

Of Adela he had heard nothing, and he frequently hoped that she was safe
with some of their friends, and not leading a fugitive life with her
father.

It was on a gloomy night in November that the _Kestrel_ was well out in
mid-channel on the lookout for a small vessel, of whose coming they had
been warned by a message received the day before from the admiral.

A bright lookout was being kept, in spite of the feeling that it might
be, after all, only a false scent, and that while they were seeking in
one direction the enemy might make their way to the shore in another.

There was nothing for it but to watch, in the hope that this time they
might be right, and all that afternoon and evening the cutter had been
as it were disgui