The young rascals
are dead. Drowned or blown up, what matters it? They will never
trouble you again."
"You don't know the villains as well as I do. They have as many
lives as cats. I could have sworn that they were burned at that
mill, for I watched till it fell, and not a soul came out; and to
this moment I don't know how they escaped, unless they flew away in
the smoke. Then I thought at any rate the chief rogue was done for,
when Muller wrote to tell me he was going to finish him for me the
next day. Then they both got through that day's fighting by the
Scheldt, though I hear they were in the front of it. And now, when
I leave them fastened up like puppies in a basket, in a sinking
boat, comes this explosion, and all is uncertain again."
"Not a bit of it," the other voice said; "they simply preferred a
sudden death to a slow one. The matter is simple enough."
"I wish I could think so," the other said. "But I tell you, after
this night's work I shall never feel my life's safe for one hour,
till I hear certain news of their death.
"Stop rowing," he said, in Dutch. "There is a bit of a plank; we
must be just on the place where she blew up! Listen, does anyone
hear anything?"
There was a long silence, and then he said, "Row about for half an
hour. It's as dark as a wolf's mouth, but we may come upon them."
In the meantime, the two lads were swimming steadily and quietly
away.
Presently Hugh said, "I must get rid of my sword, Master Rupert, it
seems pulling me down.
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