Now was Chippy's chance, while the men were busy with the task of closing the heavy flap with as little noise as possible. He had been standing with the sweep in his hand. He began, with the tiniest, the softest of strokes, to turn his boat round. But his discovery would have been certain had not the men been so busy with the task of reclosing the heavy trap. It fell into place with a soft thud, which echoed along the water-gate, and as it did so Chippy glided into the open, and turned the nose of his craft down-stream. He now put out all his strength, sculled a dozen hard, swift strokes, then held his hand, and floated close beside the wall in the deep shadow. From this cover he saw the boat glide out and the men give way as they gained the open stream. They pulled out some distance, and so skilfully did they use the muffled oars that Chippy scarce caught a sound. 'Rullocks muffled, too,' thought the scout; and very likely the thieves had muffled the rowlocks also. CHAPTER XXIV ON BOARD THE 'THREE SPIRES' When the boat was well out from the shore its nose was turned, and it began to drop at an easy pace down the river. In cover of the bank Chippy was sculling his best. He had seen how the warehouse was robbed; he meant to see where the plunder was taken. Beyond Elliotts' warehouse there were only two or three scattered buildings, and then the river-shore stretched away empty and deserted. For nearly a mile the men pulled steadily down, and left Chippy a long way behind. But the night was brightening fast; the moon was coming up, and he could see the dark spot upon the water which meant the gliding boat laden with plunder. Then the boat turned and came towards the shore on the scout's side. It crossed his line of sight, and disappeared as if into the bank. 'Gone up Fuller's Creek,' said Chippy to himself, and sculled harder than ever. Fuller's Creek was a wide, deep backwater, never used nowadays for any active purpose, though occasionally an old hulk was towed there, and left to rot. Chippy supposed that his men had pulled up to the very top of the creek, where there was a deserted landing-stage, and he put all the strength of his wiry frame into driving his boat down to the creek and up it as hard as he could go. He entered the broad, dark water-mouth, for the moon was not yet shining into the creek, and sculled into its shadow. Half-way up, a dark bulk loomed high in his path, and he swung the nose of his craft to port, to pass round the _Three Spires_, an old barquentine left to rot in Fuller's Creek out of the way of the river traffic. The _Three Spires_, named from the three chief churches of the town, whose steeples rose high above the roofs of Bardon, was a broad, roomy old craft, and had carried many a good cargo in her time. But she was now past her work, and, her spars, rigging, and raffle all torn away, her hulk lay abandoned in Fuller's Creek, for the breakers-up did not want her.