Chapter 77

Lanier stepped to the window of the gun-room and gazed silently across the sunset water. Out of the northern distance, enveloped in a pinkish light, sailed Mr. Welper’s armada, moving straight southward across a sea of rose and gold. “Coming on in line-of-battle,” he remarked to Dirck, amid the clatter of ejectors which the boy was testing on every rifle. “Do you know what I think, Lanier?” said Dirck eagerly, yet with a certain new and becoming modesty in voice and attitude. “What’s that, Dirck?” “I don’t know, bu…