“Thank you, Dominique,” Frank said, warmly, though with some difficulty repressing a smile.  “I shall count on you if we have to use force.  As far as I am concerned, I own that I should prefer that they did resist, for I should like nothing better than to stand face to face with that villain, each of us armed with a cutlass.”

“If he know you here, he go up river, get plenty of black men fight for him.  Black fellow bery foolish.  Give him little present he fight.”

“I had not thought of that, Dominique.  Yes, if he has made some creek his headquarters he might, as you say, get the people to take his side by giving them presents; that is, if he knew that we were here.  However, at present he cannot dream that we are after him, and if we can but come upon him unawares we shall make short work of him.”

No news whatever was obtained of the schooner until the headland of La Catarina was passed, but at the large village of Azua they learned that she had anchored for a night in the bay five days before.  She had been seen to sail out, and certainly had not turned into the river Niova.

Touching at every village and exploring every inlet, Frank continued his course until, after rounding the bold promontory of La Beata, he reached the bay at the head of which stands Jaquemel.

Every two or three days they had communicated with the Osprey and slept on board her, leaving her at anchor with her sails down until they had gone some ten miles in advance.  She had at times been obliged to keep at some distance from the shore, owing to the dangers from rocks and shoals.  The pilot on board would have taken her through, but Frank was unwilling to encounter any risk, unless absolutely necessary.

At Jaquemel he learnt that the schooner had put in there a fortnight before, but neither there nor at any point after leaving Azua had she been seen since that time.  She had sailed west.

The next night, after looking in at Bainette, some twenty miles beyond Jaquemel, Frank rejoined the Osprey.

The gig was hoisted up, and they sailed round the point of Gravois, the coast intervening being so rocky and dangerous that, although there was a passage through the shoals to the town of St. Louis, Frank felt certain that the schooner would not be in there.  The coast from here to Cape Dame Marie was high and precipitous, with no indentations where a ship could lie concealed, and the voyage was continued in the yacht as far as this cape.  They were now at the entrance of the great bay of Hayti.

“I take it as pretty certain,” Frank said, as he, George Lechmere, the skipper, and Dominique bent over the chart; “that the schooner is somewhere in this bay.  She has certainly not made her headquarters anywhere along the south coast.  In the first place, she has seldom been seen, and in the second we have examined it thoroughly.  Therefore I take it that she is somewhere here, unless, of course, she has