From first to last less than five minutes' activity had been needed for
the task of scotching this water-moccasin of the salt seas and putting its
keepers at the mercy of the country whose hospitality they had too long
abused.
Well content, after a little, Lanyard lay on his oars and contemplated with
much interest what the night permitted to be visible: the landing stage, no
more than a dark, vague mass in the darkness; the land picked out with but
few lights, mainly at windows of the base buildings, painting dim ribbons
upon the polished floor of the lagoon.
Methodically these were eclipsed as a moving figure passed before them.
Listening intently, Lanyard could distinguish the slow footfalls of an
unsuspecting sentry--no other sounds, more than gentle voices of the night:
murmurs of blind wavelets, the plaintive whisper of a little breeze belated
amid the tree-tops of that dark forest, and a slow, weary soughing of
swells upon the distant ocean shore.
Perceiving as yet not the slightest indication of an alarm ashore, Lanyard
ventured to continue rowing, but with utmost caution, lifting and dipping
his blades as gingerly as though they were fashioned of brittle glass, and
for want of a better guide keeping the stern of the dory square to the
shank of the T-stage.
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