k, a torch, a
pyre, a potent of irremediable ruin, bore down the swift current and
struck the _Phoenix_.... Once more the _Mere Honour's_ cannon thundered
loud appeal and warning. In the red light cast by her destroyer the
galleon began to sink, and that so rapidly that her seamen threw
themselves overboard. Yet burning, the _Cygnet_ kept on her way. Borne
by the tide she passed from the narrow to the wider waters; to-night a
waning star, the morn might find her a blackened derelict, if indeed
there was sign of her at all upon the surface of the sea.

Around the base of the hill swept the Admiral and his force. Vain had
been the attack upon the fortress, heavy the loss of the English, but it
was not the Spanish guns which had caused that retreat. Where were
Robert Baldry and his men? What strange failure, unlooked-for disaster,
portended that heavy firing at the rear of the fortress?... The signal
gun! The ships!

John Nevil and his company left attacking forever the fortress of Nueva
Cordoba, and rushed down the hillside towards plain and river. Forth
from the town burst Ambrose Wynch with the guard which had been left in
the square--but where were Robert Baldry and his men? Were these
they--this dwindled band staggering, leaping down from the heights, led
by Henry Sedley, gray, exhausted, speaking in whispers or in strained,
high voices? No time was there for explanation, bewildered conjecture,
tragic apprehension. Scarcely had the three parties joined, when hard
upon their heels came De Guardiola and all his men-at-arms. Nevil
wheeled, fought them back, set face again to the river, but his
adversaries chose not to have it so.

They achieved their purpose, for he gave them battle on the plain, at
his back the red light from the river, before him that bitter,
triumphant fortress. Hard and long did they fight in a death struggle,
fierce and implacable, where quarter was neither asked nor given. Nevil
himself bore a charmed life, but many a gentleman adventurer, many a
simple soldier or mariner gasped his last upon Spanish pike or sword.
Not fifty paces from the river bank Henry Sedley received his quietus.
He had fought as one inspired, all his being tempered to a fine agong of
endeavor too high for suffering or for thought. So now when Arden
caught him, falling, it was with an unruffled brow and a smile remote
and sweet that he looked up at the other's haggard, twisted features.

"My knighthood's yet to seek," he s