“One of them’s swallowing a fish,” said Roger. “Now they’ve both gone.”
The two last cormorants rose from the tree and flew after the others, swinging at first low, then high, over the lake, wheeling far away by Darien, and coming down to the water where neither Roger nor Titty could see them.
“There’s Captain Flint,” said Roger. They could see his big rowing boat between Houseboat Bay and Wild Cat Island. He was on his way to join in the whaling expedition.
They waved, but he was rowing with his back to them, and at the other side of the lake.
“This is the place where I was anchored in Amazon ,” said the able-seaman, “and I heard the pirates row past me, and then they crashed into the rocks.”
“Real pirates?” said the boy.
“I couldn’t see them,” said Titty, “but I heard the oars of their ship’s gig, and I heard them talk. They swore like real ones. And then I heard them hit the rocks.”
“It’s all rocks on this side,” said the boy.
Titty rowed slowly round the island. There was no good place for beaching Swallow .
“There’s the place where we landed with Captain Flint,” said Roger.
“His boat has narrow bows,” said Titty. “We couldn’t get Swallow ’s nose in there.”
She rowed nearer to the north end of the island.