hard couch,
but found it impossible to sleep. After a time he began to feel that
there was a something missing to which he had been accustomed. He
racked his brain over and over again, vainly trying to remember what it
was, but for some time without success. Then it came suddenly upon him
that the usual faint reflection of the glow which the big fire at the
beach had been wont to throw round the hut was absent. Quickly getting
into a few clothes, he stepped out of the hut, and saw that the moon in
her first quarter was rising high in the heavens, giving just sufficient
light for him to distinguish objects faintly. He therefore did not take
the lantern with him, but at once walked away down to the beach, where
he found the fire out and cold. They had forgotten to replenish it
before turning in for the night. He took out his tinder-box, in order
to get a light, when he happened to look up, and to seaward. And there,
before his astonished gaze, he saw a vessel riding at anchor about two
miles from the shore. In the first paroxysm of his joy, Roger was about
to call aloud, imagining the craft to be one of the vessels of
Cavendish's squadron; but on looking again, and studying the craft more
closely, he saw that she was altogether different from any of the
vessels in the fleet. He was wondering who or what she could be, when
Evans's description of a certain ship flashed across his mind. Yes,
there she certainly was, exactly as Evans had described--the black,
long, and low-lying hull, the flush deck, the schooner rig, and the
enormously tall, tapering, and raking spars! Yes, in that moment Roger
knew her for what she was.

She was the pirate schooner of Jose Leirya!

The man had doubtless missed his papers, and, guessing who had taken
them, had come back to secure them. Evidently knowing the bad landing,
Leirya was waiting for daylight before attempting to send his boats
ashore.

"Six hours more of darkness!" thought Roger, and he bounded back to the
hut as fast as he could go. He awoke the two seamen, and told them all
in a few words. They were naturally overwhelmed with consternation, not
knowing what to do. But said Roger: "I have a plan that may possibly
save us. We must put all our provisions back in the casks, and bury
them in the sand. Then we must hide everything that we brought ashore,
leaving out only poor Evans's belongings. The new hut we must, of
course, leave--they will think that Evans bu