re, however, to make their way aft in
the same cautious manner in which he had come forward. The black, in
order to run less risk of being discovered, had stripped himself naked,
and oiled his body all over. The doing so was his own idea, and he
grinned when he proposed it to Dan.

"I like one big eel, and if dey try to catch me I slip out of dere
hands," he observed, chuckling.

"We could not hope for a better opportunity than the present," whispered
Gerald into Dan's ear.

"All right, sir," answered Dan, touching Pompey and Tim. The former, as
agreed on, noiseless as a cat, crept up on deck, when he immediately
gave a tug to the string. Gerald, with Dan and Pompey, followed, and,
crawling on all-fours, began to make their way aft. The booms and boats
would have concealed them for some part of the distance from Jacques
Busson even had it been daylight; they therefore ran no risk of being
discovered till they reached the after-part of the quarter-deck. Pompey
had now to play the chief part in the drama. Crawling up on the lee
side of the poop, he lay flat on the deck, while Gerald and Dan stole
after him, ready to spring up to his aid directly he had thrown himself
on Busson, leaving the helmsman to be dealt with by the captain and
Owen. Pompey had just reached the break of the poop, having waited for
the moment that Jacques Busson's back was towards him: a few seconds
passed, when the Frenchman again turned round, and, advancing a pace or
two forward, shouted to the man on the look-out. No answer came.
"Bete," he exclaimed, "he is asleep. I must arouse him with a rope's
end."

As he spoke he advanced, about to descend the steps leading to the
quarter-deck--at that moment Pompey, who had been watching him as a
serpent does its expected victim, springing to his feet, threw his arms
round the Frenchman's neck, while he at the same moment shoved a large
lump of oakum into his mouth before he could even utter a cry. Dan,
quick as lightning, joined him, while Gerald whistled shrilly the
promised signal to his father and Owen. It was heard too by Tim, who
pulling the line, the rest of the _Ouzel Galley's_ crew sprang up, some
throwing themselves on the two Frenchmen slumbering under the weather
bulwarks before they had time to draw their pistols. The men on the
forecastle, however, aroused by the noise, fired theirs at their
advancing opponents; but owing to the darkness and their hurry the
bullets missed th