This appeared suspicious. Not less suspicious was the fact that the water behind the vessel was ruffled by dragging objects of various kinds, which seemed to have something to do with her slowness of motion. As the wind grew lighter, and the speed of the vessel fell until it was moving at barely a two-knots' rate, these objects were drawn in, and proved to be buckets, spars, and other drags which had been towed astern to reduce the vessel's speed. Her tardiness of motion was evidently the work of design. It was now about ten o'clock. The moon hovered on the western horizon, near its hour of setting. The wind was nearly east, and favorable to the vessel's course, but was growing lighter every moment. The speed of the ketch diminished until it seemed almost to have come to rest. It had now reached the eastern entrance to the bay, the passage here being narrowed by rocks on the one hand and a shoal on the other. Through this passage it stole onward like a ghost, for nearly an hour, all around being tranquil, nothing anywhere to arouse distrust. The craft seemed a coaster delayed by the light winds in making harbor. The gliding ketch had now come so near to the large vessel in front, that the latter had lost its dimness of outline and was much more plainly visible. It was evidently no Moorish craft, its large hull, its lofty masts, its tracery of spars and rigging being rather those of an English or American frigate than a product of Tripolitan dock-yards. Its great bulk and sweeping spars arose in striking contrast to the low-decked vessels which could be seen here and there huddled about the inner sides of the harbor. A half-hour more passed. The ketch was now close aboard the frigate-like craft, steering directly towards it. Despite the seeming security of the harbor, there were sentries posted on the frigate and officers moving about its deck. From one of these now came a loud hail in the Tripolitan tongue. "What craft is that?" "The Mastico, from Malta," came the answer, in the same language. "Keep off. Do you want to run afoul of us?" "We would like to ride beside you for the night," came the answer. "We have lost our anchors in a gale." The conversation continued, in the Tripolitan language, as the ketch crept slowly up, an officer of the frigate and the pilot of the smaller vessel being the spokesmen. A number of Moorish sailors were looking with mild curiosity over the frigate's rails, without a moment's suspicion that anything was wrong. The moon still dimly lit up the waters of the bay, but not with light enough to make any object very distinct.