On getting round the next point, the vessel was distinctly visible.  The shouting on the shore was now plainly heard, and there could be no doubt that a desperate fight was going on there.  It seemed to be close to the water’s edge.

“There is a boat rowing off to the ship,” one of the sailors said.

“Then get out your oars again.  She is not more than half a mile away, and she can hardly get under way before we reach her.  Besides, judging from the sound of the fight, the pirates must have lost a good many men, and will not be able to man all the oars even if they gain their ship.”

The men sat down to their oars with alacrity.  Every sailor on board felt it almost as a personal insult, that pirates should dare to enter the Venetian waters and carry on their depredations there.  The glare of the burning houses, too, had fired their indignation to the utmost, and all were eager for the fight.

Three boats were now seen rowing towards the ship.

“Stretch to your oars, men,” the captain said.  “We must be alongside them, if we can, before they can take to their sweeps.”

The pirates had now seen them; and Francis, standing at the bow eagerly watching the vessel, could hear orders shouted to the boats.  These pulled rapidly alongside, and he could see the men clambering up in the greatest haste.  There was a din of voices.  Some men tried to get up the sails, others got out oars, and the utmost confusion evidently prevailed.  In obedience to the shouts of the officers, the sails were lowered again, and all betook themselves to the oars; but scarce a stroke had been pulled before the Venetian galley ran up alongside.  Grapnels were thrown, and the crew, seizing their weapons, sprang on to the deck of the pirate.

The crew of the latter knew that they had no mercy to expect, and although weakened by the loss of nearly a third of their number in the fighting on shore, sprang from their benches, and rushed to oppose their assailants, with the desperation of despair.  They were led by Ruggiero Mocenigo, who, furious at the failure of his schemes, and preferring death to the shame of being carried to Venice as a pirate and a traitor, rushed upon the Venetians with a fury which, at first, carried all before it.  Supported by his Moors and renegades he drove back the boarders, and almost succeeded in clearing the deck of his vessel.

He himself engaged hand-to-hand with the commander of the Venetian galley, and at the third thrust ran him through the throat; but the Venetians, although they had yielded to the first onslaught, again poured over the bulwarks of the galley.  Polani, burning to punish the man who had so repeatedly tried to injure him, accompanied them, Francis keeping close beside him.

“Ruggiero Mocenigo, traitor and villain, your time has come!”

Ruggiero started at hearing his name thus proclaimed, for on board his own ship he was simply known as the captain; but in the dim light he recognized Polani, and at once crossed swords with him.