I felt for the letter, and my hand came in contact with the pistols in my belt. I felt a strange impulse, here upon the spot, in the midst of the smuggler-gang, and before the eyes of their drunken leader, to blow out my brains. At this moment I thought of the good Hans who was risking himself for a cause that was not a whit better. And yet he may thank heaven, I said to myself, that he is not on this expedition. "Boat ahoy!" suddenly rang over the water as before, and the _Lightning_ again loomed out of the dusk, and a couple of shots were fired. This was the signal for a chase which lasted probably an hour, during which the cutter, while seeming to make every effort, by countless dexterous and daring evolutions, to escape her pursuer, drew ever nearer and nearer to that part of the coast which had been agreed upon between Pinnow and the officers, about half a mile above Zanowitz, where the depth of the water would allow her to run almost immediately upon the beach. From here one could proceed to Zehrendorf by a wagon-road which ran along the strand to Zanowitz, and from there over the heath; or one could go directly across the heath; but in the latter case there was a large and very dangerous morass to be crossed, which could only be done by secret paths known to the smugglers alone. It was ten to one that Herr von Zehren would choose the way over the moor instead of that along the coast, from the spot to which the cutter had apparently been driven. While the chase lasted, I did not move from the spot in which I was, fully determined to take no active part in the affair, happen what might. Herr von Zehren made my passive part an easy one; often as he came near me, he never once took any notice of me. During this hour of excitement his intoxication seemed to have increased; his behavior was that of a raging madman. He shrieked to Pinnow to run the schooner down; he returned the fire of the officers with one of Pinnow's old guns, which he had found in the cabin, although the _Lightning_ prudently kept at a distance which would have been too great for even a rifle of long range; and as the cutter, after a long tack out to sea, on which she distanced the schooner, stood in again and reached the shore unmolested, he leaped out into the shallow water, and his men had all to follow him, after each had been loaded with one of the heavy packs which were made up for this purpose. There were eleven carriers in all, as Pinnow offered the services of the boatmen he had brought from Zanowitz, saying that he could get along with the deaf and dumb Jacob alone; and thus the place of one of the two men whom I had sent home was filled. But there still remained a twelfth pack, which lay upon the deck, and would have been left, as there was no one to carry it, had I not managed to get it on my shoulders by laying it on the gunwale of the boat, and then springing into the surf, which reached to my knees.