at midnight the three watchers put on the bathing-suits which were supplied by maxwell kane, and then seated themselves again on the after-deck, to await developments.
“what i want to know is, how are we going to carry any guns with us, with this rig?” asked kane, as they seated themselves, and nick asked chick if he had supplied himself with weapons.
“i think that two apiece will be sufficient,” replied nick, “and you can easily carry them.”
“but how?”
“in a belt around your body. see? here is mine,” and he lifted his belt from another chair. “i shall buckle that around me before we go into the water.”
“but they will get wet.”
“sure.”
“won’t they be useless after that?”
“hardly. get yours, and i will load them for you with my cartridges. you could soak them in water for a week, and they would do their work just as well after that.”
for an hour and a half they talked upon random subjects, but all the time the keen eyes of the detective never wandered from the water of the cove. he had[75] brought his watch on deck with him, and from time to time he glanced at it.
“it is two o’clock,” he announced, after an unusually long silence between them. “i think we will make a move now, if you are ready.”
“ready,” they each replied.
“are you a good swimmer, max?” asked nick.
“the best that ever was,” was the reply.
“all right. i’m going to take the lead in this affair. chick will follow me, and you will follow behind him.”
“all right. where——”
“you will take your cues from chick. whatever you see him do, you will copy without delay. understand that?”
“yes; it’s plain enough. where——”
“if he dives, you are to dive, and you are to follow him under the water wherever he goes. no matter what he does, you do it, too.”
“i will. now, confound it, tell me where you are going?”
“to the aurora.”
“you haven’t seen any sign of the pirate, have you? i haven’t.”
“no.”
“then what makes you so certain that the aurora is the place to go?”
“i think, from what you have said, that she is the yacht which will be the object of attack, if an attack is made; but, anyhow, her position is much better than ours. she is farther out and she lies so that she will[76] be first in line for attack, even if the pirate has no direct information about her.”
“but the watch will see us come aboard, and there will be the devil to pay.”
“i have just told you that you are to do as chick and i do; however, i may as well tell you that i am not going aboard of her.”
“oh! you are not?”
“max, there is only one way to capture this pirate and his ship as well, if he does enter this harbor to-night, and that is to go aboard of the shadow.”
“i’m onto that, all right.”
“i shall, therefore, not make the slightest effort to prevent him and his men from looting the aurora from stem to stern, if they care to do so. it will be while they are up to that trick, or one like it, that we will get in our fine work.”
“you might as well tell me something about what that will be before we take to the water. i will be all the better able to obey orders in that case.”
“very well; listen.”
“i’m listening.”
“we will swim out to the aurora. when we get within a reasonable distance from her, we will dive, and not come to the surface again until we are under her chains. in that way we will avoid observation from her deck.”
“sure.”
“fortunately, it is a warm night, and the water is[77] quite warm, also, but i don’t think it will be necessary for us to remain in the water all the time.”
“thank goodness for that.”
“a yacht like the aurora is not very well guarded when she is at anchor in a place of this kind.”
“huh! i know that only too well.”
“fortunately, the tide is coming in, and her bow points toward the open sound. it will be high and slack in a couple of hours, so under her bow will be the best vantage ground for us, and it will be the least-guarded part of the yacht.”
“i know that. you mean to get aboard of her, don’t you, and to keep watch from there?”
“if it is practicable, yes.”
the detective buckled his belt around him, and then let himself carefully down over the side into the water. his companions did the same, and in another moment they were swimming silently toward the aurora.
there was no moon, fortunately, for the weather had changed into one of those still, but cloudy, nights which often precede a storm; and yet there was a bright moon shining somewhere back of the clouds, and sufficient of its brilliancy penetrated them so that floating objects upon the water could be seen at a considerable distance.
at a distance of about a cable’s length from the aurora the three men disappeared under the water, and they did not reappear until they were well under the chains of the aurora; and there they paused a moment and held a whispered consultation.
the surface of the cove, and of the sound out beyond[78] it, was as smooth as glass. there was not a ripple any where to be seen, and the detective knew that if the pirate attempted to approach on the surface of the water, his craft would create a ripple which a close watcher would surely discover.
on the other hand, if he should approach under the water, as the detective had no doubt he would do, he would in all probability observe his previous program, and come to the surface close under the bow of the vessel he intended to attack.
“in that case,” he argued, “he will be right where we want him. but it is too early yet. wait here until i climb aboard the aurora, and if all is clear i will call you up there, and we will do our waiting on the deck.”
he found that all was clear, and in another moment the three were together on the deck of sam kearney’s floating palace. after that there followed another period of waiting, although it was a short one.
scarcely half an hour had passed when nick suddenly seized chick by the arm and pointed toward a black object which seemed to be floating on the water, and which was plainly drifting directly toward them.
“it is the amidships turret,” he whispered. “it is the only thing about her which shows above the water, and the man who is doing the steering is doubtless looking directly at the bow of this yacht; so be careful. he will discover the slightest motion we make, if we do not keep well out of sight. follow me.”
he turned and crawled away on his belly, wriggling along like a snake, until he was well out of sight behind[79] the capstan. then, rising to his knees, he made his way rapidly to the vessel’s rail and softly let himself down into the water.
there was not a splash or a sound, and his companions were equally fortunate.
as soon as the detective was in the water, one stroke took him a fathom nearer to the bow of the yacht, and he saw that the pirate craft was swinging silently, as if she were on a pivot affixed amidships, so that she would eventually lie directly across the yacht’s bow, but still with her stem pointed seaward, so that she could start ahead on the instant, and shoot away out of danger.
“she must be provided with the kuhnstader propeller to do that,” he whispered in kane’s ear. “it is a double propeller, and the one farthest aft works on a knuckle-joint, so that it can be made to serve as a rudder as well as a propeller. and it must be very deep in the water, too, to work so silently. come on.”
he sank out of sight in the water, and swam with powerful strokes toward the stern of the shadow. he had noticed how far he would have to go before he went under the water, and accordingly, when he did rise to the surface, he was about ten feet, or a trifle more, abaft of the stern of the vessel.
“see!” he whispered to kane, who had risen to the surface close beside him. “captain sparkle is already climbing aboard the aurora, and i don’t wonder that he surprised you, kane, when he paid his visit to you. there has not been a sound made by his vessel, loud enough to wake a sleeping dog. you hadn’t a ghost[80] of a show. by jove! but i am anxious to see the interior of that craft.”
“how are you going to do it?”
“follow, as i told you, and you will soon see.”
again he sank beneath the surface, but this time he was under only a moment, and, when he reappeared, he was directly abeam of the amidships turret, and his companions were beside him.
“you see,” he whispered, treading water silently; “they won’t have occasion to make use of that machine-gun of theirs to-night, and they know it. in all probability the amidships turret is unguarded; or even if there is a man there, his eyes are intently fixed on the aurora. he won’t think of trouble from this side. come on, now!”
he swam quickly to the side of the vessel.
she was so low in the water that it was an easy matter for them to reach and seize hold of the rail which has already been described. in another moment the three men had hauled themselves aboard of the shadow, and then, gliding along like so many shadows themselves, they passed through the open turret into the interior of the pirate cruiser.
