"Yes, I've been watching it," was Wolf Larsen's calm reply.He measured the distance away to the fog-bank and for an instant paused to feel the weight of the wind on his cheek."We'll make it, I think; but you can depend upon it that blessed brother of mine has twigged our little game and is just a-humping for us.Ah, look at that!"The blot of smoke had suddenly grown larger, and it was very black.
"I'll beat you out, though, brother mine," he chuckled."I'll beat you out, and I hope you no worse than that you rack your old engines into scrap."When we hove to, a hasty though orderly confusion reigned.The boats came aboard from every side at once.As fast as the prisoners came over the rail they were marshalled forward into the forecastle by our hunters, while our sailors hoisted in the boats, pell-mell, dropping them anywhere upon the deck and not stopping to lash them.We were already under way, all sails set and drawing, and the sheets being slacked off for a wind abeam, as the last boat lifted clear of the water and swung in the tackles.
There was need for haste.The Macedonia , belching the blackest of smoke from her funnel, was charging down upon us from out of the northeast.
Neglecting the boats that remained to her, she had altered her course so as to anticipate ours.She was not running straight for us, but ahead of us.Our courses were converging like the sides of an angle, the vertex of which was at the edge of the fog-bank.It was there, or not at all, that the Macedonia could hope to catch us.The hope for the Ghost lay in that she should pass that point before the Macedonia arrived at it.
Wolf Larsen was steering, his eyes glistening and snapping as they dwelt upon and leaped from detail to detail of the chase.Now he studied the sea to windward for signs of the wind slackening or freshening, now the Macedonia ; and again, his eyes roved over every sail, and he gave commands to slack a sheet here a trifle, to come in on one there a trifle, till he was drawing out of the Ghost the last bit of speed she possessed.
All feuds and grudges were forgotten, and I was surprised at the alacrity with which the men who had so long endured his brutality sprang to execute his orders.Strange to say, the unfortunate Johnson came into my mind as we lifted and surged and heeled along, and I was aware of a regret that he was not alive and present; he had so loved the Ghost and delighted in her sailing powers.
"Better get your rifles, you fellows," Wolf Larsen called to our hunters;and the five men lined the lee rail, guns in hand, and waited.
The Macedonia was now but a mile away, the black smoke pouring from her funnel at a right angle, so madly she raced, pounding through the sea at a seventeen-knot gait -- "`Sky-hooting through the brine,'"as Wolf Larsen quoted while gazing at her.We were not making more than nine knots, but the fog-bank was very near.
A puff of smoke broke from the Macedonia's deck, we heard a heavy report, and a round hole took form in the stretched canvas of our mainsail.
They were shooting at us with one of the small cannon which rumor had said they carried on board.Our men, clustering amidships, waved their hats and raised a derisive cheer.Again there was a puff of smoke and a loud report, this time the cannon-ball striking not more than twenty feet astern and glancing twice from sea to sea to windward ere it sank.
But there was no rifle-firing for the reason that all their hunters were out in the boats or our prisoners.When the two vessels were half a mile apart, a third shot made another hole in our mainsail.Then we entered the fog.It was about us, veiling and hiding us in its dense wet gauze.
