This information made everybody jump, on board the Royal James, and the noise of the sawing and the hammering ceased as completely as had the songs of the birds. In a few minutes that quick and able mariner, Bonnet, had sent three armed boats down the river to reconnoitre. If the vessels entering the river were merchantmen, they should not be allowed to get away; but if they were enemies, although it was difficult to understand how enemies could make their appearance in these quiet waters, they must be attended to, either by fight or flight.
When the three boats came back, and it was late before they appeared, every man upon the Royal James was crowded along her side to hear the news, and even the people on the prizes knew that something had happened, and stood upon every point of vantage, hoping that in some way they could find out what it was.
The news brought by the boats was to the effect that two vessels, not sailing as merchantmen and well armed and manned, were now ashore on sand-bars, not very far above the mouth of the river. Now Bonnet swore bravely. If the work upon his vessels had been finished he would up anchor and away and sail past these two grounded ships, whatever they were and whatever they came for. He would sail past them and take with him his two prizes; he would glide out to sea with the tide, and he would laugh at them as he left them behind. But the Royal James was not ready to sail.
The tide was now low; five hours afterward, when it should be high, those two ships, whatever they were, would float again, and the Royal James, whatever her course of action should be, would be cut off from the mouth of the river. This was a greater risk than even a pirate as bold as Bonnet would wish to run, and so there was no sleep that night on the Royal James. The blows of the hammers and the sounds of the saws made a greater noise than they had ever done before, so that the night birds were frightened and flew shrieking away. Every man worked with all the energy that was in him, for each hairy rascal had reason to believe that if the vessel they were on did not get out of the river before the two armed strangers should be afloat there might be hard times ahead for them. Even Ben Greenway was aroused. "The de'il shall not get him any sooner than can be helped," he said to himself, and he hammered and sawed with the rest of them.