"Hear there, forward. Obey this youth, who fills the place of poor Marston."

"Ay, ay, sir," cried the men, simultaneously; and, as their new officer walked forward, many a cap was respectfully touched to him, and many a gray head uncovered before the stripling--such is the tribute true bravery everywhere receives! so universal is the homage it irresistibly challenges!

"Do you see, my lord! That lad will make his way, mark me. Observe how readily he a.s.sumes the duties of his station. He is already in the rigging! going aloft to see that the men are properly fishing the fore-topmast."

"Your protege shall not want advancement through my forgetfulness, be a.s.sured, Kenard. But why are you so anxiously looking through your gla.s.s to the windward?"

"For the three-masted frigatoon."

"You are doubtless mistaken in her character!"

"I cannot be, my lord. No honest trader in these waters ever had such a rig. She is a pirate, and, if she is anywhere near us, will be sure to give us a taste of her quality ere long."

"And we are far less prepared to meet him than before."

"Four guns, and a dozen men and two good officers less, my lord; nevertheless, we must do what we can to fight him off. That he is in our neighbourhood somewhere, I am confident. These gentry are like sleuth hounds; once on your track, double and turn as you will, they never lose it till they run you down. I believe I see an object in the wake of the moon, under that cloud to the windward," he suddenly added, looking steadily through his spygla.s.s. "It is gone. It may have been the cap of a wave! There, I think I see it again. By--"

"Sail, ho!" shouted Mark, from the fore rigging.

"Where away?" demanded the captain, without removing the gla.s.s from his eye.

"Just in the moon's wake, three points off the weather quarter."

"I see it. 'Tis the same, my lord. I was sure he would not take his eye off of us. Edwards, see all clear for action. Station all the men you can spare from working ship at the guns, and select twenty of the best for boarders. Be prompt. Keep away a point, helmsman. Aloft there! Get through with your duty and come down. I give you command of the lee battery, sir," he said to Mark. "Cheerily, men, all! Prepare for battle with merry hearts, that's my maxim, my lord," he added, turning round to the n.o.bleman.

"How do you make her out now, Kenard?" asked the earl, who had heard the announcement of the stranger's vicinage with a pang of anxious solicitude for the safety of Grace; "I am unable to hold my gla.s.s steadily with this pitching of the ship."

"She is walking this way with a nimble foot," replied the captain, who, after giving his brief and rapid orders, once more turned to observe the motions of the strange sail. "She is a three-masted lugger--with her three huge topsails spread without a reef, ploughing her way towards us, and sending a cloud of spray to her masthead."

"Is she heavily armed?"

"I cannot see; but above her bulwarks is something like a ma.s.s of human heads."

"How far off is she?"

"Not more than two miles."

"In what time will she overtake us?"

"She must be going seven or eight knots; we do not make more than five,"

he said, glancing over the side. "Probably in two hours' time."

"In two hours! We can increase our sail; you have studding-sails, captain?"

"But not a stun'sail boom--every deck-spar is washed overboard. Crippled as I am, I cannot carry one st.i.tch more sail, my lord. We must let him come an he will, and trust the issue to Providence. That's my maxim, my lord."

"Providence give us the victory!" said the earl, devoutly.

"Amen!" responded the captain, taking the gla.s.s from his eye, and reverently touching his cap.

The earl immediately went below, and met Grace coming from her stateroom wrapped in comfortable garments, and enveloped in a hood and cloak.

"My dear niece," he said, taking her hand and leading her to a sofa, "I have come to prepare you for a scene of trial and danger infinitely greater than that we have just pa.s.sed through. Hitherto we have had to contend with the terrible display of the power of the Almighty, when he moves upon the deep in his anger--but it was tempered with mercy. We have now to meet the fiercer pa.s.sions of men, to whom the word mercy is unknown."

"Speak, dear uncle!" she said, with a calmness that surprised him. "I fear not for myself--I have a trust, thanks to my sainted mother, that places me above all fear of death."

This was spoken with that serene confidence which innocence and purity alone can wear.

The earl pressed her hand in silence, touched by the sweet simplicity of her manner, and admiring the sublime hope which elevated her above the fear that gives bitterness to the cup of life.

"There is a strange vessel bearing down upon us, which the captain has reason to think is a pirate," he said, with more composure.

Grace turned pale, but betrayed no emotion beyond an upward glance of her eyes and a movement of her lips, as if in silent prayer.

"It is our intention to fight him, and only surrender with our lives. In case we should be overcome, and the pirates board us--and I should not survive to protect you any longer--" Here the earl stopped from emotion, pressed his niece to his heart, and then hastily added, "you are my brother's daughter! you have his spirit and decision! I will trust to you."

"Uncle, speak! explain, my lord!" gasped the young creature, terrified at his manner rather than his words, which her innocence could not comprehend.

He drew from his breast a dagger, and silently placed it in her hands.

"For what is this, my lord?" she gasped, half guessing its fearful meaning.

"You must sacrifice yourself before you suffer these ruffians to lay hands upon you," he said, with emotion that nearly rendered his words inaudible.

She clasped her hands over her forehead and stared in his face with a wild glare--her colourless lips parted with horror--and her whole frame shivering. Like a thunderbolt, the horrible reality of her situation had flashed upon her.

"Ha! what? ha! what? ha--wh--" and with a piercing and most heart-rending shriek she fell upon the cabin floor. He raised her, and spoke to her in tender accents of sympathy.

"Enough," she gasped--"enough, uncle--say no more."

"Dear niece, be calm!"

"Nay--do not think Grace Fitzgerald is not herself," she said, with forced calmness. "Uncle!"

"My dear child!" he answered, folding her to his heart.

"Give it me!"

"Oh G.o.d!" groaned the earl, overcome with the full realization of the evil that threatened her. "Must it be, my child?"

"It must. Give me the dagger," she added, with energy. "I will not now shrink from it--it may yet be, next to Heaven, my best friend."

"Take it, heroic girl--but our danger may not be so great--we may yet conquer! I feel, when I look on you, and reflect on your helpless state, the might of a host in my single arm. Ha! there is a gun. I must leave you for a while. Remain in your stateroom, and both you and your maid be careful to lie on the floor below the line of shot. G.o.d bless you, my child! Your presence alone should ensure the salvation of the ship."

He embraced her with almost parental affection, tenderly forced her to enter her stateroom, and closed the door. Then arming himself from his luggage with a brace of pistols, and buckling on his sword, he hurried to the deck as the report of a second gun came booming over the sea.

"She has fired, captain?" he said, as he joined the commander on the quarter-deck, who was looking to windward with his gla.s.s.

"A long shot to bring us to. It is plain he takes us for an unarmed vessel."