So he said, and so I thought, and so it presently proved when the fog closed in about us. We had no compass, and could only hold on as nearly as we could guess in the direction we thought we ought to go. Once we made sure we heard the tramp of the sentry on the battlements of the fort, and the low-voiced challenge of guard-relieving,--which would make the time eleven o’clock,--but before we could be certain of these sounds we were tangled again as to our directions, and the next sounds that came to us were the bumping of our boat’s bows against the side of a ship, and a hoarse voice shouting, “Avast there, you lubbers! Unship your oars and lie still or I’ll fire into you!” XVI THE CUP OF TANTALUS TAKING it all in all, it seems that we should have come promptly to the conclusion that, on this raw night of the seventeenth of December, the stars in their courses were fighting against us; that our own lucky star, if we had any, was a million miles below the horizon. At the gruff hail from the ship we had collided with, there was nothing for it but to lie on our oars, and to take what was coming to us. I expected a peremptory command to come aboard; but instead, a boat-hook was reached down to hold us as we were, a lantern was lowered in our direction, and the officer of the watch demanded to know who we were and what we were doing. Here was a chance for the exercising of my most promising gift, and I improved it instantly. “If this is a king’s ship, we are wearing his majesty’s colors. If not, you may go to the devil with your questions,” I made answer, with all the coolness I could muster. “Your names, your business, and the night password!” roared our questioner, losing patience, as I thought he would. “We don’t yield any of the three to every jack-in-a-box ensign who bobs up to ask them,” I retorted blandly. “Go and call your captain, my friend.” Judging by the choking and spluttering going on in the upper dimnesses I thought our officer, a little man with bullet eyes and a turned-up nose, would have a fit. When he had sworn himself into some atmosphere of coherence he commanded us to tumble aboard, or by all the sea-gods he would keelhaul us first and hang us at the yard-arm afterward. Whereupon I laughed pleasantly, and told him we should do well enough as we were if he would let us have a compass by which to find our way ashore. That brought him down to us, hand-under-hand on the first rope he could lay hold of; and when he dropped into our cockle-shell we had much ado to keep him from swamping it or himself. “Up the side, the pair of you!” he blustered, lugging out a huge pistol; and then the light of the lantern showed him our Loyal American facings and my captain’s shoulder-knot, and he changed countenance.