On the eighth day after his
arrival, a small fishing-smack with a green pennant came racing past
the two castles at the entrance of Dunkirk pier, slackened her
main-sheet, spun down between the forts with the wind astern,
rounded, and cast anchor in the Royal Basin. Her crew then lowered a
little cockleshell of a dinghy, which she carried inboard, and a
tanned, red-bearded man pulled straight for the Commodore's galley.
He bore a letter addressed to Captain Roderick Salt. It was written
in cipher, but read as follows:
Dear S.,--Portland suspected you and had you followed. I saw his
eye upon you during your last interview with William. It was
clever to get through, nor can I discover how you managed it: for
the account given by your pursuers is plainly absurd. I've been
turning over their cock-and-bull story, which finds credence
here, and cannot fit it with the probabilities. Yet they seem
William's men. I find that the horse on which one of them
returned is not the same as that upon which he rode away; nor
does their narrative account for this. But the main point is
that you are safe. By the way, I hope you have kept your son at
your side; for I have now received the information about which I
dropped you some hints.
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