Page:Frank Stockton--Adventures of Captain Horn.djvu/343

ADVENTURES OF CAPTAIN HORN would be an unnecessary hardship. The captain awoke at early dawn, and, as he stepped out of the tent, he glanced over sea and land. There were no signs of storm, the brig had not slipped out into deep water, their boats were still high and dry upon the beach, and there was something encouraging in the soft, early light and the pleasant morning air. He was surprised, however, to find that he was not the first man out. On a piece of higher ground, a little back from the tents, Shirley was standing, a glass to his eye.

"What do you see?" cried the captain.

"A sail!" returned Shirley.

At this every man in the tents came running out. Even to the negroes the words, "A sail," had the startling effect which they always have upon ship wrecked men.

The effect upon Captain Horn was a strange one, and he could scarcely understand it himself. It was amazing that succor, if succor it should prove to be, had arrived so quickly after their disaster. But not withstanding the fact that he would be overjoyed to be taken off that desolate coast, he could not help a strong feeling of regret that a sail had appeared so soon. If they had had time to conceal their treasure, all might have been well. With the bags of gold buried in a trench, or covered with sand so as to look like a natural mound, he and his sailors might have been taken off merely as shipwrecked sailors, and carried to some port where he might charter another vessel and come back after his gold. But now he knew that whoever landed on this beach must know everything, for it would be impossible to conceal the 329