your sheets, lads, now she begins to move."

The puff did not last long, dying away to nothing in a few minutes, and
then the lugger lay immovable again. The men whistled, stamped the deck
impatiently, and cast anxious glances back at the cutter.

"She is walking along fast," the skipper said, as he examined her
through a glass. "She has got the wind steady, and must be slipping
along at six knots an hour. This is hard luck on us. If we don't get
the breeze soon, it will be a close thing of it."

Another quarter of an hour passed without a breath of wind ruffling the
water. The cutter was fully two miles nearer to them than when she had
first been seen, and was holding the wind steadily.

"Here it comes, lads," the skipper said cheerfully. "Another ten
minutes, and we shall have our share."

The time seemed long, indeed, before the dark line on the water reached
the lugger, and there was something like a cheer, from the crew, as the
craft heeled slightly over, and then began to move through the water.
It was the true breeze this time, and increased every moment in force,
till the lugger was lying well over, with a white wave at her bow.

But the cutter had first gained by the freshening breeze, and James
Walsham, looking back at her, judged that there were not more than four
miles of water between the boats. The breeze was nearly due west, and,
as the lugger was headed as close as she would lie to it, the cutter
had hauled in her sheets and lay up on the same course, so that they
were now sailing almost parallel to each other.

"If we could change places," the skipper said, "we should be safe. We
can sail nearer the wind than she can, but she can edge away now, and
has all the advantage of us."

James had already perceived this, and wondered that the lugger did not
pay off before the wind, so as to make a stern chase of it.

"I want to get a few miles farther out," the skipper said. "Likely
enough there is another cutter somewhere inshore. It is quite enough to
have one of these fellows at one's heels."

Another half hour and the cutter, edging in, was little over three
miles distant. Then the skipper gave the word, the helm was put down,
the sheets slackened off, and, in a minute, the lugger was running dead
before the wind with her sails boomed out, one on either side. The
cutter followed her example, and hoisted a large square sail.

The wind was blowing fresh now, and the sea was getting up. Not a cloud