CHAPTER XXI
Crack o' Doom
MR. LAW'S capacity for surprise was exhausted. He viewed the schooner with no more display of emotion than resided in narrowing eyelids and tightening muscles about his mouth.
"Much farther to go?" he inquired presently.
"At our present pace—say two hours."
"And can we hold our own?"
"Just about," Barcus allowed.
"Anything to be done?"
"Nothing but pray, if you remember how."
Later, however, after another glance astern, Barcus revised this opinion. "Take the wheel and let me have a squint at that engine. She ought to have more power than she's developing just now. … No good," he soon reported briefly, taking the wheel again; "she'll go just so fast and no faster."
As the next hour wore itself out, it was seen that the pursuer was gaining. Inch by inch she crept up in the wake of her prey; and they counted surely on being overhauled by the time they could effect a landing, if not before.
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