On the Blockade (Paperback)

Excerpt: ... engine room, and both vessels went ahead, the Bronx coming about to her new course. 191 CHAPTER XVII A COUPLE OF ASTONISHED CONSPIRATORS The fog had been very variable in its density, and had been lifting and settling at times during the day of the capture. By the time the two vessels were ready to get under way, it had become more solid than before. The night had come, and the darkness with it, at about the same time. The lookouts were still in their places; but so far as seeing anything was concerned they might as well have been in the hold. If the Arran was still in the vicinity, as no doubt she was, the Bronx might run into her. Wherever she was, it was well assured that her officers knew nothing of the capture of the Ocklockonee, for not a great gun had been discharged, and the combat had been so quickly decided that there had been very little noise of any kind. Everything worked without friction on board of the Bronx; and Captain Passford felt even 192 more elastic than usual. Doubtless the capture he had just made afforded him a good deal of inspiration; but the fact that the mystery of the deaf mute and the second lieutenant had been solved, and the unfathomable catastrophe which their presence on board threatened had been escaped was a great source of relief. The two conspirators were disabled and confined to the sick bay, and they were not likely to make any trouble at present. If they had had any definite plan on which they intended to act, they had certainly lost their opportunities, for the visit of Hungerford to the engine room of the Bronx, no doubt for the purpose of disabling the machinery, and the effort of Pawcett to warn the officers of the prize, had been simply acts of desperation, adopted after they had evidently failed in every other direction. Pawcett was not really a loyal officer, and his expression and manners had attracted the attention of both the captain and the first lieutenant. The deaf mute had been brought on...