Although the ship was swaying badly as usual, Captain Morel, who had just been on night duty, soon fell asleep in his hammock. This is already the basic skill of seafarers. However, his eyelids had barely closed for a moment when a shrill bell lifted him out of the hammock.

"What's wrong?" Captain Morel climbed up the ladder and reached out to push open the cover of the staircase, and the strong sunlight shone down, making Captain Morel, who had become accustomed to the darkness of the cabin, unable to open his eyes for a moment.

Morel stood in front of him with one hand in front of him and shouted, "What's wrong?" ”

"Captain, a strange British ship has been discovered!" Big Fleickler, who was on duty next to the steering wheel, shouted.

"Where?" By this time Morel's eyes had adjusted to the light outside, and he strode over to Lecle on the shaky wet deck and asked at the same time.

Leckler handed the brass telescope in his hand to Morel, "Captain, look over there, where the smoke is rising, that boat is ugly!" ”

By this time, Morel had already seen the smoke over there.

"Is there a fire on their ship? Or was it burned by our Greek fire? Morel said, holding the telescope in front of his eyes.

"This boat is really ugly!" Morel couldn't help but sigh as well.

It was a gray ship with a large chimney that was belching thick black smoke. On either side of the boat, there were two large paddle wheels, turning, and judging by the waves stirred up at the bow, the boat was not slow. And on the bow of this ship, the British flag is clearly flying.

"It's from us." "I'd like to see if it's fast or if we're fast." ”

Morel looked up at the sails—all the sails had been raised. But because there is only a little breeze at sea at this time, the speed of the ship is not very fast.

This is not a problem when dealing with other sailboats, because if the wind is not strong enough, the clipper boat will not be able to run fast, and the other sailboats will not be able to run fast either. But the ship that was now chasing them was clearly a special case - it had no sails at all, but it was running fast.

"I'll take the helm." Morel said, and Leckler stepped aside.

Morel controlled the steering wheel and adjusted the direction of the ship slightly, but the speed of the ship did not improve much. Leckler is also a veteran at the helm of ships, and Morel is not necessarily better than him. At this time, changing people is actually just a superstitious taste, and the idea of changing people for luck is just that. Maybe if you change someone, the wind will rise?

However, Morrell's luck didn't seem to be much better than that of Laker, and the wind was still blowing like that. The speed of the ship still couldn't get up, and the boat behind seemed to be chasing a little closer.

"Leckler, it looks like we're going to have to get rid of some of our cargo now." Morel said to Leckler.

"Captain, if we lose our cargo, we're going to lose a lot of money." "If we lose our goods and there's a gust of wind, that's not ...... Besides, the boat is far from us, as long as we can hold out until the evening......"

Chasing between ships at sea is often very time-consuming. If there is not much difference in the speed of the two sides, it is normal for a chase to be several hours, or even days. And according to the contract signed between Morel and the "military-industrial complex", the loss of goods is subject to compensation.

Running the route from France to Ireland is very profitable. You only need to make a dozen trips to buy a new boat. And this route is not long, and it doesn't take much time to run a dozen or so trips. But a big reason why this route has such a high profit is also because of the risk of this route. Once the goods are lost, the payment for the goods needs to be compensated by the shipowner. The reason why Morel still has only one boat is because he lost one of his boats because he ran aground not long ago.

"Leckler, we bought insurance this time." Morel replied.

"But the guys at the insurance company don't necessarily agree that we have to abandon the goods. The last time Captain Le Tielie lost his cargo because of a storm, and when he returned, the guys from the insurance company said he had 'mishandled it', so he paid only the bare minimum – a little more? Besides, the contract signed between the insurance company and us, did you really read it word by word? Include the disclaimer in that attachment? ”

Morel paused for a moment, then said, "That's dozens of pages long......

"So you're sure that if we lose the goods now, Amodea Insurance will compensate us?"

"Unless my boat has holes in the top of the British shells, these sons of ...... Well, let's run like this first, and if the British ship gets closer by more than a kilometer in an hour, we will throw away part of the cargo...... We've made so many trips that we've already made enough money to lose. At all times, our own safety is always more important than money. Laker. You know, one of the tragedies of life is getting a lot of money, but you die before you can enjoy it. ”

"Captain," replied Leckler, "I think there is a greater tragedy in life, and that is that you don't have a penny, but you still don't die......

"Alright, Leckler, I'm sure you'll have a lot of money before you die." "You come and hold the rudder for me, and I'll go down and get the rangefinder." ”

Leckler took the rudder, and Morel went down to the deck, and after a little tinkering with it, came up with a little brass stick. This is a convergence rangefinder that can be used to measure the distance between objects. However, this size is too small, and the measurement accuracy is very average. But for Morel, it was enough.

Far from getting stronger, the winds at sea are getting weaker. Instead of going up, the speed of the clipper boat is getting slower and slower. The British ship behind was not affected at all, and still chased closer and closer.

Morel put down the rangefinder in his hand, sighed and said, "It's better to lose the goods, it's too fast." If we don't lose anything, we won't be able to support it in the dark. ”

"Why don't we fight with 'Greek fire'?" Leckler was still a little reluctant to carry those goods, because in this ship, there was also his investment.

"Leckler, sober up!" "Look at the shape of that ship, you look at the height of their freeboard, it's not a clipping boat, there must be a cannon on it!" They still have a speed advantage, they can control the distance, and then use cannons to send us all to the bottom of the sea! Leckler, going to the sea to make a fortune is a very risky business, with a lot of gambling flavor. But if you gamble on this, you can't gamble casually in the future, because your net worth and life have been staked here. ”

Leckler was persuaded by Morel anyway. So the sailors began to move boxes of cargo out of the hold and threw them into the sea.

As more cargo was thrown into the sea, the ship became lighter and its speed increased somewhat. But there was still no wind at sea, so the British ship continued to approach. Nowadays, even without a telescope, you can clearly see the huge paddle wheel on the side of the ship constantly churning the sea and making waves.

Morel had thrown all his cargo overboard, but he still couldn't get out of the British ship, and as far as the situation was concerned, they would not survive until sunset unless there was a sudden gust of wind.

"Enemy ship shelling!" The lookout post on the mast shouted loudly. Everyone looked behind them and saw a puff of green smoke rising from the bow of the British ship. After a few more moments, the rumbling of cannonballs was heard, followed by the whistling of shells breaking through the air.

"Boom", a column of water emerged from the starboard side of Morel's ship, but it was still several hundred meters away from the boat. If it weren't for the relative calm of the sea at this time, such a small column of water would not be easy to notice.

It is actually very difficult to hit the target by firing at such a long distance. This kind of shelling, in addition to trying luck, is actually more of a warning and demonstration, the basic meaning is "you can't run anymore, surrender quickly!" ”

But for Morel and them, once they surrendered, the ship was gone, and they really had to fall into the miserable state of "having no penny, but still not dying". So unless there is really no hope, Morel will never surrender.

So Morel they continued to run, and the British continued to chase and continue to fire at them.

The British chased closer and closer, and the shells fell closer and closer to Morel and their ship. At this time, without a telescope at all, with the naked eye, everyone could already see the British ship and the very thick cannon on the bow.

As they fled, the French prayed to God, Jesus, the Virgin Mary, St. Peter, St. John, and all the other saints they could think of, and made a promise: "If we can escape, we will go to the church every day to pray to God." Although now because the French government has not yet had time to reconcile with the Holy See, there is not even a "legitimate" priest in those churches.

But it turns out once again that the French are indeed sons of God – and they are their own sons. A 24-pound shell hit the mast of the clipper ship accurately, breaking it in two.

The mast fell into the water with the sail, but the rope on the mast was still attached to the ship. The mast that fell into the water suddenly became the de facto anchor, dragging the ship to a dead end, causing the speed of the clipper to drop sharply.

"Quick! Cut the cable! Morel shouted, threw away the steering wheel, picked up an axe himself, and threw himself at the cable. And Leckler, pale, and dejected - having lost a mast, they could not outrun the British anyway.

"Oh my God!" Leckler shouted. At the same time there was a loud bang from the British ship behind.

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