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The gallivat was Angria's own vessel, used in his visits up river to his country house, and, during calm weather, in occasional excursions to Suwarndrug and the other forts on the sea coast. As Desmond was aware, it boasted a large state cabin aft, and he thought it very probable that the serang had appropriated this for his watch below.
He received his orders in dumb show from the foreman of the gang. Miserable as he was, he would not have been a boy if he had not been interested in his novel surroundings; and no intelligent boy could have failed to take an interest in the construction of a gallivat. It was a large rowboat of from thirty to seventy tons, with two masts, the mizzen being very slight.
Striking out to the left, still followed by the Gujarati, he swam along past the sterns of the lashed vessels until he came under the side of the one nearest the shore. He caught at the hempen cable, swarmed up it, and, the gallivat having but little freeboard, soon reached the bulwark. There he paused to recover his breath and to listen.
The true explanation of their blunder did not at the moment occur to Desmond. The fact was that the men trying so earnestly to save the gallivat knew nothing of what had happened to the grab.
The water was warm, and a few minutes' steady swimming brought them within twenty or thirty yards of the light. The hulls of the gallivats and their tall raking spars could now be seen looming up out of the blackness. Desmond perceived that the light was on the outermost of the line, and, treading water for a moment, he caught the low hum of voices coming from the after part of the gallivat.
But for the shouting on shore the noise of the sweeps must by this time have been heard. In the glow of the blazing vessels in mid channel the moving gallivat had almost certainly been seen. Desmond grew more and more anxious. "Hail the grab," he said to the serang as the vessel loomed up ahead. "Hai, hai, Tremukji!" cried the man. There came an answering hail.
Fuzl Khan clung to the helm with all his strength, but his arms were almost torn from their sockets, and he called aloud for Desmond to come to his assistance. It was fortunate that little was required of the crew, for in a few minutes all of them save the four Marathas from the gallivat were prostrated with seasickness.
This was then taken on board the grab, and Desmond ordered one of the Mysoreans to load the grab's stern chasers, telling the Marathas whom he intended to leave on the gallivat that, at the first sign of any attempt to pursue, their vessel would be sunk. Then in two parties the fugitives went on board the grab.
They came to the ropes by which the vessel was lashed to the next in the line. For a moment Desmond stood irresolute; then he led the way swiftly and silently to the deck of the adjacent gallivat, crossed it without mishap, and so across the third. Fortunately both were sailors, accustomed to finding their way on shipboard in the night, as much by sense of touch as by sight.
Then, shouting the order to make fast, the Gujarati flung a hawser across to the grab. The two men on board her obeyed without question; but they were still at the work when Desmond and Fuzl Khan, followed by the two Mysoreans, leaped upon them from the deck of the gallivat.
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