erous; but he dexterously eluded the various
reefs and oyster bars and brought the _Arrow_ safely into smoother
water. Meanwhile, the boys noticed that the wind, which had blown
so strongly, was beginning to slacken, thus allowing the steamer
to gain on the _Arrow_ quite perceptibly. They saw then that she
was a small steamer, like a steam yacht, and light gray in
color,---perhaps one of the United States revenue cutters.

Captain Vinton was astonished. He had already begun to have serious
doubts that this could be the same mysterious vessel he had seen
cruising about the islands the night before. All at once, unexpectedly,
his doubts were resolved into a certainty that it was not the same,
for even while he was wondering, a strange thing happened:

A long, low, gray shape, something like a built-for-speed tug-boat
with a short funnel, darted into view from between two keys, and,
crossing the wake of the revenue cutter, glided swiftly along the
very course the _Arrow_ had taken, heading back toward Snipe Point.
Before the sloop and the steamer had come within hailing distance of
each other, the strange craft, not depending on the dying easterly
wind, was well along the course, sending back---toward a trail of
darker smoke.

CHAPTER II

A CONTRABAND CARGO

"Well, what d'you know about that?" queried Billy, easily relapsing
into slang when the first few minutes' surprise had worn off.

"Dunno much about it," Captain Vinton answered in a somewhat gruff
tone, "but it looks to me mighty like a filibuster's craft, or p'rhaps
a smuggler's."

At the word "filibuster," the boys---figuratively speaking---pricked
up their ears.

"What on earth can they be trying to smuggle?" was Hugh's eager
question, to which the captain replied promptly:

"Arms,---leastways, cartridges or gunpowder. They ain't tryin' to
smuggle 'em _into_ Fluridy, but _out_ of it," he explained. "Some
gang of raskils is buyin' small quantities of war goods up state---or
else from Cuby---totin' 'em down the coast an' through th' Everglades,
and gettin' 'em aboard some steamboat like that one, and so away where
they'll do the most harm. Get me?"

"Yes," replied Alec, "but I never would have thought such tricks were
possible in these days."

"Boy, you can't never tell what's just possible or what ain't, in
these days," gravely asserted Captain Vinton. "All sorts o' things
is like to happen, and sometimes it's durned hard to know just