"Well, what d'you know about that?" queried Billy, easily relapsing
into slang when the first few minutes' surprise had worn off.

"Dunno much about it," Captain Vinton answered in a somewhat gruff
tone, "but it looks to me mighty like a filibuster's craft, or p'rhaps
a smuggler's."

At the word "filibuster," the boys---figuratively speaking---pricked
up their ears.

"What on earth can they be trying to smuggle?" was Hugh's eager
question, to which the captain replied promptly:

"Arms,---leastways, cartridges or gunpowder. They ain't tryin' to
smuggle 'em _into_ Fluridy, but _out_ of it," he explained. "Some
gang of raskils is buyin' small quantities of war goods up state---or
else from Cuby---totin' 'em down the coast an' through th' Everglades,
and gettin' 'em aboard some steamboat like that one, and so away where
they'll do the most harm. Get me?"

"Yes," replied Alec, "but I never would have thought such tricks were
possible in these days."

"Boy, you can't never tell what's just possible or what ain't, in
these days," gravely asserted Captain Vinton. "All sorts o' things
is like to happen, and sometimes it's durned hard to know just what's
goin' on. But if that's any filibustin' outfit, they'd better make
tracks out o' these waters as fast as they can lay beam to wind'ard."