It looked dangerously like a quarrel. Hodge relapsed into silence and the elder Ross looked furtively from Mr. Carmichael to the captain, as if expecting the former to come to the rescue. “What you have there,” said the secretary at last, “is authority enough, and is the same under which many of our cruisers are now sailing. It is a letter of marque respected by the British Admiralty.” “Mayhap so,” replied Conyngham, “but the date is made out wrong. I sailed in the Surprise on the 1st of May, and this is made out on the 2d.” “Tut, tut! that is too bad,” muttered Mr. Hodge, “and the last one I’ve got, and in fact the only one I had. What now are we to do?” “My brother comes down from Paris to-morrow,” put in Ross, “and he may bring news proving that we have time to wait, or perhaps he may have seen Dr. Franklin and have the very paper the captain desires.” Hardly had he spoken than a sound of hurrying feet came down the hallway outside. The door burst open, and in rushed the younger Ross. Evidently the position of the candles on the table prevented him from seeing that Conyngham was present, for in his first words he asked for him, and upon the latter rising, he came quickly to his side. “We must think and act quickly,” he cried. “But two hours behind me in the road is a messenger from de Vergennes instructing the authorities to seize the vessel and not to allow her to depart. I have this on the very best authority. I saw Dr. Franklin but an hour or so before I received the news. He expected me to wait until to-morrow, when he should have been granted an audience with the Foreign Minister, but upon ascertaining the importance of immediate action (I was told by the very messenger to whom I had once been presented by Dr. Bancroft) I sought out the doctor. Search high or low, I could not find him, but by good fortune I met Silas Deane in company with our misanthropic friend, Mr. Lee. They ordered me to post it here at once and tell you to get under way at the earliest possible moment.” “Where was Dr. Franklin, do you suppose?” asked Allan. “Dining with some fair countess or duchess at Versailles,” replied Hodge, who leaned perhaps a little toward the Lee faction. The secretary shrugged his shoulders and said nothing, but Conyngham spoke quickly. “Gentlemen,” he said, “there is but one thing to do. Commission or no commission, I sail from Dunkirk on the early morning tide. We have but a few hours before us. May the Powers grant the messenger does not arrive before then. Stormont must have played his trump card and won.” Quickly the party broke up and accompanied Conyngham to the water’s edge. Early in the morning, while still the mist hung over the harbor and shrouded the houses and shipping, a ghostlike vessel appeared in mid-channel, fanned by the damp shore breeze. It was the Revenge. On the fast ebb tide she slid swiftly out to sea. CHAPTER XIII IN THE CHANNEL