Then, with a piercing shriek, she fled.
The sailors looked aghast, staring at each other for explanations.
"Let"s after her, Jack!" cried one; "she"ll be overboard double quick if she fouls agin them blessed bulwarks. It"s as rotten as tinder."
Off they ran, and they tried all they could to bring the girl back.
But she had had such a scare that she would not hear of it.
She had seen a man hiding there.
"Bah!" cried Jack Tiller, "why should a man hide away from us?"
"Yes, that"s it, miss, why?"
"I don"t care, I know it was a man. I knew the face. I have seen it in madame"s book of photographs."
"The dooce you did."
"Who was it?"
"One of the brigands. The likeness was taken in prison."
This made the gallant tars laugh again.
"That"s the natural bogey hereabouts," said Joe Basalt; "damme if I believe half their yarns about the brigands."
"Nor I neither."
And so, failing to persuade the girl to go on board then, they went back up the jetty, dropped into their boat, and, unlocking it, rowed out to sea.
CHAPTER x.x.xIX.
A TRIP BY WATER--BOAT, AHOY!--A COMPACT FOR MONEY--THE STOWAWAY ON BOARD THE "WESTWARD HO!"--HIS VISION--IN THE HANDS OF THE PHILISTINES.
Hunston had overheard every word uttered.
The full sense of his danger flashed across him.
He was watched, he felt sure.
"Not yet," said Hunston to himself, "not yet. Sooner than let them get hold of me, I"d lay my bones at the bottom of the sea."
With which intention he dropped into the water.
But he did not even touch the bottom, for before he had got far under, he struck out, and after taking a dozen strokes; under water, he came to the surface.
"That"s another narrow squeak," he said to himself, as he took in a deep draught of air. "The last time I had to swim for it was in Cuba, and a narrow squeak it was too."
He had been rescued on that memorable occasion by his enemy, Jack Harkaway himself.
"Well, this squares that old account," he said, turning over on his back to float. "He saved me last time. He"s the cause this time of my having to take this risk."
He began to look anxiously about him.
There was a boat at no great distance being rowed by two men, so Hunston thought of signalling them.
"Suppose they are some of those wretched Greeks, and recognise me?"
He gave it up.
But he could hardly keep himself afloat now.
What if they did recognise him?
Would they give him up?
Perhaps.
Well, at the worst they could only take his life for his misdeeds, and his life was in sore jeopardy now.
So he resolved to hail the men in the boat.
"Boat ahoy!"
"Hullo!"
"Man overboard!"
The signal of the sinking man caught the quick ears of the two men in the boat, and they pulled towards him double quick.
Hunston caught hold of the side of the boat.
"This arm. Catch under my armpit. There; thanks. I"ve hurt the other."
Barely rescued from the jaws of death, and yet all his coolness and presence of mind had come back to him.
In a trice he was lying at the bottom of the boat, panting and waiting to recover his breath to renew his thanks for their service.
"Why, mounseer, you speak English," said one of the sailors.
Hunston nodded.
"I am English."