ter a
little while. "Ye can tell by the feel of her. The wind is steady but
small."

"Then he can't go clear of the islands till long after night,"
thankfully returned Jack.

Joe made another trip to crane his neck at the main hatch. The bright
thread of daylight had dimmed. He could scarce discern it. The lads
occupied themselves with reckoning the distance, the hour, and the
vessel's speed. Now that Joe had satisfied himself that the end of the
day was near, he knew what the ship's bell meant when it was struck
every half-hour. They would await the passing of another hour, until two
bells of the first watch, by which time they calculated the brig should
be in the wide, outer channel between the seaward islands.

The plan was to emerge through the forepeak in the very bows of the ship
where a scuttle was let into the deck. There they might hope to lower
themselves to the chain stays under the bowsprit and so drop into the
sea. They would be washed past the ship, close to her side, and into the
wake, and there was little chance of drawing attention. True it was that
in this hard choice they preferred to swim to the bottom if so it had to
be.

They crouched where they were hid, waiting to hear the fateful signal of
two bells. It struck, mellow, clear, and they were about to creep in the
direction of the forepeak. But Joe Hawkridge gripped his comrade's arm
and held him fast. A whispered warning and they ceased to move. Behind
them, in the after part of the ship, gleamed a lantern. It illumined the
open door of the bulkhead which walled off the storeroom. And in this
doorway, like a life-sized portrait, grotesque and sinister, set in a
frame, was the figure of Blackbeard.

He advanced into the hold and the cowering stowaways assumed that he had
come to search them out. The impulse was to dash into the forepeak and
so plunge overboard, flinging away all caution, but before their
palsied muscles could respond, the behavior of Blackbeard held them
irresolute and curious. He had turned his back to them and was shouting
boisterously to others to follow him. Seven men came through the
doorway, one after the other, hanging back with evident reluctance. It
was impossible to discern who they were, whether officers or seamen.
Every one carried in his arms what looked to be a tub or an iron pot.
These they set upon the dunnage boards which covered the ballast and
made a flooring in the hold.

Blackbeard bellowed at them to s