Malta harbour, we falls in with him or one like him, for I don't say,
mind you, that that ere craft is the same which nearly ran foul on us
yesterday; then out he goes right ahead of us, and then just as it's got
dark, down he comes again, and wants to send a boat aboard us. Now you
see as how that's the thing I don't in no manner of ways approve on. If
I was our skipper, I would send a round shot right into the boat, sooner
than any of his people should step on this deck. That's just the trick
the cursed Dutchman's up to."

"No manner o' doubt about it," said Bill gravely; "but you know, Jem,
they say the Dutchman's cruising ground is off the Cape, in a
full-rigged ship, and I never heard on his coming into these parts."

"True as gospel, old shipmate, but how should we know that he hasn't got
tired of the Cape, and taken a trip up here?" argued Jem. "And as to
the matter of the rig, he may shift his craft according to the sea he's
in. Besides, you know as how if there's one _Flying Dutchman_, there
may be two, and this fellow may have come to trouble us here, up the
straits. Depend on't, Bill, the less company one keeps with them sort
of gentry the better."

"Very true, Jem, but suppose a chap out of that boat then does come on
board, what's to happen think ye?" asked Bill, in a tone which showed
that he in no way doubted his messmate's account.

"Why I can't say exactly, because as how I never seed what he does; but
from what I've heard, I believe he tries to slip a letter like into the
skipper's or some 'un's hand who's green enough to take it; and then the
chap, who's no better nor Davy Jones himself, gives a loud laugh, and
down goes the ship to the bottom, or else a hurricane is sure to get up
and drive her ashore. But here comes that cursed felucca's boat. I
wish we might just let fly at her; it would save mischief, I'll be
sworn."

"Bear a hand there with a rope for the boat coming alongside," sung out
the captain in a loud voice, which sounded as ominous of evil to the
ears of the superstitious crew. "Bring a lantern here to the gangway,"
he added. Bowse, with his first mate and Colonel Gauntlett, stood near
the gangway, which was lighted up with a lantern to receive the
strangers, as a small boat containing in all only four persons, came
round under the brig's stern. They pulled only two oars, and two people
were seated in the stern sheet. "Keep an eye to windward there,
Larkins, on that fe