There was no wind whatever. The water was quite smooth, and the Parson rose and fell at the slow undulations of the long ocean rollers, while at every motion the spars creaked and the sails flapped idly. All around there arose a gray wall of fog, deep, dense, and fixed, which shut them in on every side, while overhead the sky itself was concealed from view by the same dull-gray canopy. Behind that wall of fog anything might lie concealed; the whole French fleet might be there, without those on board the Parson being anything the wiser. This Claude felt, and as he thought of the possibility of this, he began to see that Zac's anxiety was very well founded, and that if the Parson should be captured it would be no easy task to deliver her from the grasp of the captor. Still there came no further sounds, and Claude, after listening for a long time without hearing anything, began, at length, to conclude that Zac had been deceived. "Don't you think," he asked, "that it may, after all, have been the rustle of the sails, or the creaking of the spars?" Zac shook his head. "No," said he; "I've heerd it twice; an' I know very well all the sounds that sails an' spars can make; an' I don't see as how I can be mistook. O, no; it was human voice, an' nothin' else in natur'. I wouldn't mind it a mite if I could do anythin'. But to set here an' jest git caught, like a rat in a trap, is what I call too--almighty--bad!" At this very instant, and while Zac was yet speaking, there came through the fog the sound of a voice. Claude heard it, and Zac also. The latter grasped the arm of his friend, and held his breath. It was a human voice. There was not the slightest doubt now of that. Words had been spoken, but they were unintelligible. They listened still. There was silence for a few moments, and then the silence was broken once more. Words were again heard. They were French, and they heard them this time with perfect distinctness. They were these:-- "_Put her head a little over this way_." CHAPTER II. A MEETING IN MID OCEAN. _Put her head a little over this way_!