It would be hard to describe the disorder and terror aboard the Arrow when the convicts realized their mistake.

Benson roared and raved like a madman, and I expected him to vent his anger upon Brown and myself at any moment for having deceived him. But he evidently believed that I was as much astonished as himself at the identity of the stranger. Not being a sailor-man, he did not understand the language of spars and canvas, and had no reason to think that my eyes were any better than his own.

At all events, even if he did intend to settle with me afterward, he now saw that his own life and the lives of his men depended on my being able to run the clipper clear of the English guns.

The Black Roger was pulled down{248} quicker than it takes to tell of it, and the American ensign run up in its place. But it was now too late to correct the error.

The stranger luffed sharply, and soon her main and mizzen yards swung quickly and evenly with the man-o’-war’s precision. Then, letting go his bow-line, he came about and stood across our hawse; at the same time clapping on and sheeting home every rag possible below and aloft.

We were a little to windward of his course now, but he was well ahead. I saw that when he tacked ship it would only be a question of minutes before we were right under his guns, unless we wore ship instantly and ran for it. Even then he would probably be close enough to knock the spars out of us before we could get out of range.

He was evidently determined to find out the meaning of that joke about the flying of a black flag on the high seas.

“Shall we turn and run, or try and pass him to the windward?” I asked Benson, hurriedly, intimating that the former was{249} what I should choose, for I knew he would choose the opposite.

“Head your course, d——n you! If you fail to clear him, you are a dead man,” he roared.

The villain didn’t notice the smile I felt on my lips when he said this, or he would probably have finished with me then and there. He must have been much upset to have talked so wild, for he was usually cool enough.

“Get the men below in the fore-hold,” he bawled to his man, Johnson, and that fellow bundled them down the fore-hatch like sheep, leaving only about a dozen to lounge about the deck as if they were sailors.

By the time this was accomplished we had closed the gap between the vessels to less than half a mile. The Englishman was on the starboard tack and crossing our course with everything drawing. He was heeling over and driving through a perfect smother of foam, and I could see the men running about the decks as they went to stations for{250} stays. He had gotten the weather-gage of us without difficulty.

In a few moments he luffed again on our weather-bow about a quarter of a mile distant. Then, without waiting to use signals, he fired a shot across our course just under our jib-boom end.

“He wants us to heave to,” I said to Benson, for it was evident that the gunboat was not going to be overnice about signalling to men who joked with their colours. Benson ordered me to dip the stars and stripes, but hold steadily on our course. As we came abreast, the stranger came about and lay right on our weather beam with his mainyards aback. I could see that he intended to board us. A second puff flew from an after gun, and with the report a shot tore a great hole through our foresail and whistled away to starboard, but Benson still held on.

I saw great beads of perspiration roll down Brown’s face as he stood watching us driving through the gunboat’s lee. It was a trying moment. If the Englishman fired{251} a broadside into an American ship flying the ensign, it would be no joke for him if all was as it should be on board of her. On the other hand, there was much to justify him in overhauling a ship that had altered her course and set a black flag on sighting him, even if her name was on his register. It seemed an age to me as I stood there, hoping against hope, and I was thinking quickly and coolly of some way to check the ship should she drive past. I knew that if we once went through the Englishman’s lee he would let us pass, so I made ready for the end.

It was not long coming.

We were now but fifty fathoms from the stranger’s broadside, and I could see the men at the guns. I thought to hail him, but I saw that at the first word I would be knocked on the head.

Suddenly a man appeared on the gunboat’s rail with a speaking-trumpet.

“What ship is that?” he bawled, though he might have read the name easily enough,{252} as it was painted on either quarter in letters a foot deep.

“American ship Arrow, Captain Crojack!” roared Benson in return, as he sprang on to the rail at the mizzen.

“Heave to and I’ll send a boat,” ca............