n find him without loss of time, I hope."

"Yes, sir. I have told him to hang about outside the gate here, and
I would give him an answer."

"Very well. When you have seen him you will find me at Aikey's. I
have to go there to get a lot of charts. I have only those for
British waters.

"George, do you see to getting these traps down to the boat. I
shall be there in a quarter of an hour. Is there anything else that
you can think of, or that you want yourself?"

"Nothing, sir."

"When you go on board, you may as well get your traps in one of the
spare cabins aft.

"You had better move, too, captain. You and one of the mates can
have the stern cabin. For the present the other mate can have
yours, and the steward can sleep in the saloon. That will make more
room for the extra hands forward."

"It will be a tight stow, sir," the captain said. "I have ordered
ten more hammocks and hooks, but I doubt whether there will be room
to sling them all."

"I am sure there won't, Hawkins. You had better put the hooks in
the saloon beams, and swing five or six of the hammocks there. We
can take the hooks out and stop up the holes when we don't need
them any longer. We may be having hot weather before we have done,
and I don't want the men crowded too closely forward."

Twenty minutes later Frank came down to the boat with the skipper,
carrying a large roll of charts, and a man with a handcart
containing a bundle of jerseys and caps, and fifty white duck
trousers. A large shore boat was alongside when they reached the
Osprey.

"Is this the last lot?" the captain asked the man in charge of the
pile of casks and boxes with which it was filled.

"Yes, sir, this is the last batch."

"Get them on deck, Hawkins," Frank said, "and we can get them down
and stowed when we are under sail. Get the anchor short at once,
the sail covers off and the mainsail up.

"I don't want to lose a minute," he went on, turning to George
Lechmere. "I know that an hour or even a day will make no material
difference, but I am in a fever to be off."

"Have you found out which way they have gone, Major?"

"I have found out that they have sailed for the south, but whether
for the Mediterranean or for the West Indies or South America I
have no idea; but I have some hopes of finding out by the time we
get to Gibraltar."

"And they have got a three days' start of us?"

"Yes, I can hardly believe that it is not more. It seems to me a
fortnight sinc