THE MEETING WITH THE BELLEVITE AT NIGHT  
Christy looked at his watch when the sail was reported to him, and found that it wanted ten minutes of eleven. The Bronx had been steaming for just about three hours, and must have made about forty miles, as he hastily figured up the run in his mind.
 
"How was the weather when you left the deck, Mr. Flint?" asked the commander.
 
"Clear as a bell, and bright starlight," replied the executive officer.
 
"Not a night for blockade runners," added the captain.
 
"No, sir."
 
"The sail is reported on the port bow, which looks as though she might be coming in from sea," continued Christy, as he went into his stateroom with his navy revolver in his hand.
 
He put the formidable weapon back into the 291 drawer from which he had taken it; but the lesson of the evening had made a strong impression on his mind. Though he had permitted Captain Flanger to believe that he was not at all disturbed by his presence in his cabin, and had kept up the humor with which the intruder had introduced himself, yet he had felt a sense of humiliation through the whole of the scene. It was a new thing to be confronted by an enemy in his own cabin; and the privateersman, armed with two heavy revolvers, had all the advantage, while neither he nor the steward had a weapon of any kind.
 
With even an ordinary revolver in his hip pocket, he would not have been helpless, and he might have saved himself without requiring this service of the steward. Opening his valise, he took from it a smaller revolver, and put it in his hip pocket, which he had never used for any other purpose; and he resolved not to be caught again in an unarmed condition, even when no danger was apparent. In action he carried a navy revolver in each of his hip pockets.
 
Thus prepared for any emergency, though none might come for years, he went on deck, and made 292 his way to the bridge, where he could get the best view of the approaching sail. He obtained his first sight of the vessel as soon as he reached the bridge, and saw that the sail was a steamer, much larger than the Bronx. She carried no sail, for the wind was from the west; but the commander soon realized that she was moving at great speed.
 
"We must be about forty miles off the station of the blockaders before the entrance to Mobile Bay," said Christy, after he had thought the matter over for a moment.
 
"I should think so," replied the first lieutenant.
 
"That sail appears to be headed for the station. She is a large steamer, and I judge by the way she is coming up with us that she is very fast," added Christy with some anxiety in his tones.
 
"She must be a steamer of fifteen hundred tons, and perhaps more," said Mr. Flint, after he had looked at her through his night glass.
 
"In that case she is too big for us to fight her, and too fast for us to run away from her; and Captain Flanger may be a free man in a few hours."
 
"It does not follow that we shall have to fight 293 her or run away from her," added the first lieutenant, still gazing at the approaching steamer through his glass. "I don't believe she is a Confederate vessel. The rebels do not buy steamers as big as that one in England."
 
"But they may have captured her," suggested Christy.
 
"I may be mistaken, Captain Passford, but I think that steamer is the Bellevite," added Mr. Flint.
 
"I hope so," replied Christy, who did not like the idea of fighting or trying to run away from a craft three times as strong as the Bronx. "Have the ensign set at the peak, Mr. Flint." And a quartermaster was sent aft to attend to this duty.
 
The strange sail continued to approach; and, little by little, the first lieutenant, who had sailed in the Bellevite several years, identified her as that steamer. It was probable that she had chased some vessel, and was now returning to her station. As she came nearer, she fired a gun for the Bronx to come to; and when within hail of her, stopped her screw.
 
"Steamer, ahoy!" came from her in the well-known voice of Mr. Blowitt, formerly the commander 294 of the Bronx, and now executive officer of the Bellevite.
 
"On board the steamer!" replied Mr. Flint from the bridge.
 
"What steamer is that?" called Mr. Blowitt.
 
"The United States steamer Bronx, under sealed orders. What steamer is that?"
 
"The United States steamer Bellevite. We will send a boat to you," returned Mr. Blowitt.
 
The big steamer, as she certainly was compared with the Bronx, started her screw again, and came within less than half a cable's length of the little gunboat, for the water was very still, with a gentle breeze from the westward. The boat was dropped into the water; and in a minute or two it was at the accommodation ladder of the Bronx, when a couple of officers mounted the side.
 
"I am glad to see you, Captain Passford," said Mr. Blowitt, who was properly received when he stepped down upon the deck.
 
"I am just as glad to see you, Mr. Blowitt," replied Christy, taking the offered hand of his old friend.
 
"Mr. Vapoor, chief engineer of the Bellevite," said the executive officer, presenting Christy's 295 greatest crony on earth, for he had held back in deference to his superior officer.
 
"The happiest moment I have had since I saw you last!" exclaimed the engineer, as he grasped the commander of the Bronx with his right hand, while he threw his left around the neck of his friend, and would have hugged him if Christy had not gently avoided such a "gush" in presence of the watch on deck. "I wish you were back in the Bellevite, Christy."
 
"I wish I were myself," replied t............