Joe thought rapidly. The island was large. Perhaps there were no soldiers
farther on, and if he only once got ashore he did not care how quickly
they captured him. He might catch the smallpox, but even that was better
than going back to the bay pirates. He whirled the skiff half about to
the right, and threw all his strength against the oars. The cove was quite
wide, and the nearest point which he must go around a good distance away.
Had he been more of a sailor, he would have gone in the other direction
for the opposite point, and thus had the wind on his pursuers. As it was,
the _Dazzler_ had a beam wind in which to overtake him.
It was nip and tuck for a while. The breeze was light and not very steady,
so sometimes he gained and sometimes they. Once it freshened till the sloop
was within a hundred yards of him, and then it dropped suddenly flat, the
_Dazzler's_ big mainsail flapping idly from side to side.
"Ah! you steal ze skiff, eh?" French Pete howled at him, running into the
cabin for his rifle. "I fix you! You come back queeck, or I kill you!" But
he knew the soldier was watching them from the shore, and did not dare to
fire, even over the lad's head.
Joe did not think of this, for he, who had never been shot at in all his
previous life, had been under fire twice in the last twenty-four hours.
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