execution?"

"Oh, no, no! and I thank you for your kind aid."

"I am not wholly disinterested, lady; you are beautiful, and may steal
away the captain's heart from me."

Julia shuddered.

"Be ready," continued Florette, "and as soon as possible after it
becomes dark we will make the attempt."

It was as Florette had called it, a bold plan, but not impracticable,
as any one acquainted with the position of things will at once
acknowledge. Only one man would be at the tiller, and he might or
might not notice the passing of any other person behind him. This
passage once accomplished, it would be an easy undertaking to slide
down the strong painter, or rope which made fast the boat to the stern
of the brig. It was a plan in which the chances were decidedly in
favor of the success of the attempt.

The Raker had for some time ceased firing, and set studding-sails in
hopes of gaining on the pirate; but the most the privateer was able to
do, was to still preserve the relative positions of the two vessels.

The sun sunk beneath the waters, leaving a cloudless sky shedding such
a light from its starry orbs, that if the pirate had hoped to escape
under cover of the night, he speedily saw the impossibility of such an
attempt eluding the watch from the privateer.

The captain of the pirate still kept his position upon the
companion-way, with his head bent upon his breast, either buried in
thought, or yielding to the weakness of his physical powers,
occasioned by the loss of blood from his wound.

Florette, who was continually passing up and down through the
cabin-door, carefully noted the state of things upon the quarter-deck,
and perceiving every thing to be as favorable as could be expected,
soon had Julia in readiness for her share in the undertaking.

"But first," said she, "let me put out the light in the binnacle."

The girl stood for a moment in deep thought, when her ready wit
suggested a way to accomplish this feat, sufficiently simple to avoid
suspicion. Seizing the broad palmetto hat of the pirate, and bidding
Julia to be in readiness to profit by the moment of darkness which
would ensue, she returned to the deck, and approaching the pirate,
exclaimed,

"William, I have brought you your hat."

At the moment of presenting it to him, as it passed the
binnacle-light, she gave it a swift motion, which at once extinguished
the flame.

"Curses on the girl!" muttered the man at the helm.

"O, I was careless,