"I'd like to try, sir."

"I dare say you would. You're as ready to take risks as I am," he added, with his characteristic pursing of the lips; "and 'pon my word, you're just as lucky! For I'm lucky, Burke; there's no doubt of it. That affair at Calcutta might have done for us but for the morning mist. I'd like to try myself. It would punish a set of rogues, and discourage interloping, to the benefit of the Company. But I can't spare men for the job. Barker has no doubt a large crew; they'll be on the lookout for attack; no, I can't touch it."

Desmond hesitated for a moment. He did not wish to lose the fighting at Chandernagore, but he had the strongest personal reasons for desiring the arrest of the Good Intent.

"Do you think, sir, we shall capture this place tomorrow?" he asked suddenly.

"Scarcely, my boy," said Clive, smiling; "nor by tomorrow week, unless the French have forgotten how to fight. Why do you ask?"

"Because if you'd give me leave I'd like to have a shot at the Good Intent--provided I got back in time to be with you in the fighting line, sir."

"Well, I can't keep things waiting for you. And it seems a wild-goose chase--rather a hazardous one."

"I'd risk that, sir. I could get together some men in Calcutta, and I'd hope to be back here in a couple of days."

"Well, well, Burke, you'd wheedle the Mogul himself. Anyone could tell you're an Irishman. Get along, then; do your best, and if you don't come back I'll try to take Chandernagore without you."

He smiled as he slapped Desmond on the shoulder. Well pleased with his ready consent, Desmond hurried away, got a horse, and riding hard reached Calcutta by eight o'clock and went straight to Mr. Merriman. Explaining what was afoot, he asked for the loan of the men of the Hormuzzeer.

Merriman at once agreed; Captain Barker was a friend of Peloti's; and he needed no stronger inducement.

Desmond hurried down to the river; the Hormuzzeer was lying off Cruttenden Ghat; and Mr. Toley for once broke through his settled sadness of demeanor when he learned of the expedition proposed.

While Toley collected the crew and made his preparations, Desmond consulted a pilot. The Good Intent had passed Calcutta an hour before; but the man said that, though favored by the wind, she would scarcely get past the bar at Mayapur on the evening tide. She might do so if exceptionally lucky; in that case there would be very little chance of overtaking her.

Less than two hours after Desmond reached Calcutta two budgeros left Cruttenden Ghat. Each was provided with a double complement of men, and although the sails filled with a strong following wind, their oars were kept constantly in play. The passengers on board were for the most part unaccustomed to this luxurious mode of traveling. There were a dozen lascars; Hossain the serang; Karim, the man saved by Desmond at Chandernagore; Bulger and the second mate of the Hormuzzeer, and Mr.

Toley, who, like Desmond and the serang, was clothed, much to Bulger's amusement, as a fairly well-to-do ryot.

For some hours the tide was contrary; but when it turned, the budgeros, under the combined impulses of sail, oar and current, made swift progress, arousing some curiosity among the crews of riverside craft, little accustomed to the sight of budgeros moving so rapidly.

Approaching Mayapur, Desmond descried the spars of the Good Intent a long way ahead. Was there enough water to allow her to pass the bar? he wondered. Apparently there was, for she kept straight on her course under full sail. Desmond bit his lips with vexation, and had almost given up hope, though he did not permit any slackening of speed, when to his joy he saw the vessel strike her topsails, then the rest of her canvas.

He at once ran his boats to the shore at Mayapur. There were a number of river craft at the place, so that the movements of his budgeros, if observed from the Good Intent, were not likely to awaken suspicion. On landing he went to the house of a native merchant, Babu Aghor Nath Bose, to whom he had a letter from Mr. Merriman.

"Can you arrange for us," he said, when civilities had been exchanged, "tonight, the loan of two shabby old country boats?"

The native considered.

"I think I can, sahib," he said at length. "I would do much for Merriman Sahib. A man I frequently employ is now anchored off my ghat. No doubt, for fair pay, he and another might be persuaded to lend their craft."

"Very well, be good enough to arrange it. I only require the boats for a few hours tomorrow morning. Do you think twenty rupees would suffice?"

The native opened his eyes. He himself would not have offered so much.

But he said:

"Doubtless that will suffice, sahib. The matter is settled."

"I shall meet you in an hour. Thank you."

Returning to the budgeros, Desmond instructed Hossain to go into the bazaar and buy up all the fresh fruit he could find. The sales for the day were over; but Hossain hunted up the fruit sellers and bargained so successfully that when he returned he was accompanied by a whole gang of coolies, bearing what seemed to Desmond an appalling quantity of melons, all for thirty rupees.

Before this, however, Aghor Nath Bose had reported that the hire of the two boats was duly arranged. They were open boats, little more than barges, with a small cabin or shelter aft. Their crews had been dismissed and had taken their belongings ashore; both were empty of cargo. Desmond went with Bulger on board and arranged a number of bamboos crosswise on the boats, covering up the empty spaces which would usually be occupied by merchandise. Over the bamboos he placed a layer of thin matting, and on this, when Hossain returned, he ordered the coolies to put the melons.

To a casual observer it would have appeared that the boats were laden with a particularly heavy cargo of the golden fruit.

An hour before dawn, the lascars and others from the Hormuzzeer slipped quietly from the budgeros on board the country boats, and bestowed themselves as best they could under the bamboo deck supporting the melons. It was cool in the early morning, although the hot season was approaching; but Desmond did not envy the men their close quarters. They were so much excited, however, at the adventure before them, and so eager to earn the liberal reward promised them if it succeeded, that not a man murmured. The Europeans had cooler quarters in the rude cabins, where they were hidden from prying eyes under miscellaneous native wraps.

Desmond had learned from the pilot that it would be nearly eight o'clock before the depth of water over the bar was sufficient to allow a ship like the Good Intent to proceed with safety. A little before daybreak the two boats crept out from the ghat. It was well to avoid curiosity before Mayapur woke up. Desmond steered the first, Hossain the second; and besides the steersmen there were two men visible on the deck of each.

The tide was running up, but the wind still held from the northeast, and though moderated in force since the evening it was strong enough to take them slowly down toward the Good Intent. The sky was lightening, but a slight mist hung over the river. Desmond kept a close lookout ahead, and after about half an hour he caught sight of the hull of the Good Intent, looming before him out of the mist. Allowing the second boat to come alongside, he turned and spoke to the serang.

"Now, Hossain, there she is. Hail her."

"Hai, hai!" shouted the man. "Do the sahibs want to buy any fresh fruit?"

An oath floated down from the stern. Captain Barker was there, peering intently through the mist up the river.

"Good melons, sahib, all fresh, and not too ripe. Cheap as ragi, sahib."

The mate had joined the captain; the Dutch pilot stood by, smoking a pipe. The fruit boats had by this time come under the stern of the vessel, and Desmond heard the mate say:

"We came away in such a hurry, sir, that we hadn't time to take in a supply of vegetables. Melons'll keep, sir, if they en't overripe."

Barker growled, then bent over and called to the serang. "How much?"

"Very cheap, sahib, very cheap. I will come aboard."

"Then be quick about it: we're going to trip the anchor, melons or no melons. D'ye hear?"

Hossain ran down the sail and clambered up the chains; which the other boatmen made fast to a rope thrown from the deck. Desmond also lowered his sail, steering so as to approach the port quarter of the Good Intent, the serang's boat being on the starboard. No rope was thrown to him, but he found that the tide was now only strong enough to neutralize the wind, and a stroke every now and again with the paddle at the stern kept his boat stationary.

Meanwhile there came from the deck the singsong of men heaving up the anchor. When the serang stepped on board the greater part of the crew of the Good Intent were forward. Little time was spent in haggling. A melon was thrown up as a sample, and the price asked was so extraordinarily low that Captain Barker evidently thought he had got a bargain.

"Heave 'em up," he said, "and if they en't all up to sample--"

He broke off, no doubt believing that his fierce scowl was sufficient to point his threat.

The serang hailed Desmond to come alongside. A few sweeps of the paddle brought the boat close underneath the Good Intent's side, and a second rope enabled him to make fast.

He swarmed up the rope, followed by one of the boatmen. The other, on the boat, began to fill a basket with melons, as if preparing to send them on board. At the same time Karim joined Hossain from the other side, so that there were now four of the party on deck.

At a sign from Desmond, the two natives, carrying out instructions previously given, strolled toward the companionway. Hossain had started a conversation with the captain and mate, telling them about the British fleet he had passed as he came down the river. The Dutch pilot looked on, stolidly puffing his pipe.

Desmond stepped to the side of the vessel as though to hoist the basket with the running tackle. Making a sign to the men below, he called in a loud voice:

"Tano!"

Instantly the men swarmed up the rope. At the signal, misleading to the crew of the Good Intent, man after man crawled from beneath the matting on the boat below, and clambered up the ropes, led by Bulger on one side and Mr. Toley on the other. They made little noise, and that was drowned by the singsong of the sailors and the grinding of the cables; the pilot with his back to the bulwarks saw nothing, and before Captain Barker knew that anything unusual was occurring both Bulger and Toley were tumbling over the sides.

The captain stood almost petrified with amazement as he saw Bulger's red face rising like the morning sun. He stepped back apace.