hen there was a shout and a
cheer as the stout crew of the _Kestrel_, headed by the gunner and armed
with pikes and capstan-bars, charged down upon them.

There was a shot or two. Hilary was knocked down by his own men as he
had struggled up; the false lieutenant was driven headlong down the
companion hatch, and in less than a minute Sir Henry Norland and his men
were, with two exceptions, who lay stunned upon the deck, driven over
the side, to get to their boat as best they could. Then as Hilary once
more gained his feet the assailing boat was a quarter of a mile astern.

"The treacherous scoundrel!" cried Hilary. "Oh, my lads, my lads,
you've saved the cutter. But tell me, did that fellow get away?"

"What! him as I hit down the hatchway for hysting your honour?" said Tom
Tully. "He's down below."

Hilary and a couple of men ran to the hatchway, to find the false
lieutenant lying below by the cabin door, with one arm broken, and his
head so injured that he lay insensible, with the end of a packet of
papers standing out of his breast.

Hilary seized them at once, and then, as a light broke in upon his
breast, he ran to the locker, opened it and the despatch-box, and longed
to open the papers he held.

But they were close in to the port, and, resolving to deliver the
despatches, he left the false lieutenant well guarded, leaped into one
of the boats, and was rowed ashore to the consul, to whom he told his
tale.

"It has been a trick," said that gentleman; "there is no such street in
the town as that on the despatch, and no such officer known."

"What should you do?" cried Hilary. Then, without waiting to be
answered, he cried, "I know," and, hurrying back to his boat, he was
soon on board, and with the sails once more spread he was on his way
back to Portsmouth with the despatches, and three prisoners in the hold.

Before he had gone many miles he became aware of a swift schooner
sailing across his track; and though, of course, he could not recognise
her, he had a strong suspicion that it was the one that had nearly run
them down.

CHAPTER FORTY FOUR.

A GOOD FIGHT FOR IT.

Before long he found that it evidently meant to intercept him, and he
had the deck cleared for action and the men at quarters.

"They want the despatches they tricked me into carrying," cried Hilary;
"but they go overboard if I am beaten."

To secure this he placed them in the despatch-box, in company with a
couple of heav