e rider tried to save him, but in vain. Down went Pew with a cry that
rang high into the night; and the four hoofs trampled and spurned him and
passed by. He fell on his side, then gently collapsed upon his face, and
moved no more.

I leapt to my feet and hailed the riders. They were pulling up, at any
rate, horrified at the accident; and I soon saw what they were. One,
tailing out behind the rest, was a lad that had gone from the hamlet to
Dr. Livesey's; the rest were revenue officers, whom he had met by the
way, and with whom he had had the intelligence to return at once. Some
news of the lugger in Kitt's Hole had found its way to Supervisor Dance,
and set him forth that night in our direction, and to that circumstance
my mother and I owed our preservation from death.

Pew was dead, stone dead. As for my mother, when we had carried her up to
the hamlet, a little cold water and salts and that soon brought her back
again, and she was none the worse for her terror, though she still
continued to deplore the balance of the money. In the meantime, the
supervisor rode on, as fast as he could, to Kitt's Hole; but his men had
to dismount and grope down the dingle, leading, and sometimes supporting,
their horses, and in continual fear of ambushes; so it was no great
matter for surprise that when they got down to the Hole the lugger was
already under way, though still close in. He hailed her. A voice replied,
telling him to keep out of the moonlight, or he would get some lead in
him, and at the same time a bullet whistled close by his arm. Soon after,
the lugger doubled the point and disappeared. Mr. Dance stood there, as
he said, "like a fish out of water," and all he could do was to despatch
a man to B---- to warn the cutter. "And that," said he, "is just about as
good as nothing. They've got off clean, and there's an end. Only," he
added, "I'm glad I trod on Master Pew's corns;" for by this time he had
heard my story.

I went back with him to the "Admiral Benbow," and you cannot imagine a
house in such a state of smash; the very clock had been thrown down by
these fellows in their furious hunt after my mother and myself, and
though nothing had been actually taken away except the captain's
money-bag and a little silver from the till, I could see at once that we
were ruined. Mr. Dance could make nothing of the scene.

"They got the money, you say? Well, then, Hawkins, what in fortune were
they after; more money, I suppose?"