“It’s a boat from the Esperanza!” muttered Norton.  “One of us had better steal back to the camp, and see what our friends are doing.  Dave, you-----”

“Oh, let me go!” interposed Alec.  “I can run the motor boat over to our camp and bring the soldiers here in about twenty minutes—–­or less.”

“My dear boy, those fellows out there who are coming ashore would be sure to hear a motor boat,” declared Norton.  “Even with a muffler on, the sound would reach them.”

“But it’s the only boat we have, .sir,” said Mark, “and, when all’s said, that’s why Billy and Dave took it—–­to bring the men over sooner than they could tramp across these flats.”

“You’re right, Mark; but-----”

Again he was interrupted by one of his eager young friends—–­Chester, this time.

“Perhaps Dave could pole the motor boat over,” he suggested.

“Could you, Dave?  It’s not a large boat by any means.”

“Uh-huh, sure!” assented the guide.  “But slow work—–­lose heap time.”

“No matter.  Anyway, we’ve got to give those fellows time to land and to get to the cabins before we surround them.  Go ahead, Dave; and Alec, you go with him to run the boat back.  I guess you know more about a gasoline engine than any of us.  Hurry now—–­and good luck!”

The intrepid young scout needed no urging.  Before Dave had found a suitable pole, Alec had taken his place at the stern and was pointing her in the direction of the peninsula on which Lieutenant Driscoll and his men were waiting.

In a few minutes Dave was pushing the light but substantial launch along the waterway, and almost immediately it disappeared from sight, swallowed up in the darkness.

It returned in about half an hour, crowded to the gunwales, carrying the dozen men.  In the meantime, a rather startling incident had occurred.

Dave and Alec had been gone only ten minutes or so, when the assembled pickets observed a bright light burst forth from the surrounding gloom and rapidly increase until it assumed the proportions of a large bonfire.

The outlaws were carrying out the first part of their plan, which was to attract the revenue men away from the vicinity of the cabins while they effected a loading of their munitions or other contraband goods upon the Esperanza’s boat.  They counted on the probability that the revenue men would hasten to put out the fire on the coast—–­which was quite a little distance from the cabins—–­and would be unaware of other operations at the same time.

But in this scheme they reckoned without their pursuers; for the crew of the Petrel—–­even now hurrying to the scene of action—–­had received information of this very ruse, and had decided to ignore it and to make directly for Durgan’s Cove.

Not knowing that the Arrow was lying near, or that the dozen men from the fort, with the scout pickets, were already on the scene, those energetic seamen of the Petrel were bending every effort to reach the smugglers’ headquarters on time.