midnight
The manner of Spike 's escape was simple enough , and without any necromancy . While the steamer , on the one hand , was standing away to the northward and eastward , in order to head him off , and the schooner was edging in with the island , in order to prevent his beating up to windward of it , within its shadows , the brig had run close round the northern margin of the land , and hauled up to leeward of the island , passing between it and the steamer . All this time , her movements were concealed from the schooner by the island itself , and from the steamer , by its shadow and dark back-ground , aided by the distance . By making short tacks , this expedient answered perfectly well ; and , at the very moment when the two revenue vessels met , at midnight , about three leagues to leeward of Blok Island , the brigantine , Molly Swash , was just clearing its most weatherly point , on the larboard tack , and coming out exactly at the spot where the steamer was when first seen that afternoon . Spike stood to the westward , until he was certain of having the island fairly between him and his pursuers , when he went about , and filled away on his course , running out to sea again on an easy bowline . At sunrise the next day he was fifty miles to the southward and eastward of Montauk ; the schooner was going into New London , her officers and people quite chop-fallen ; and the steamer was paddling up the Sound , her captain being fully persuaded that the runaways had returned in the direction from which they had come , and might yet be picked up in that quarter . The weather was light , just a week after the events related in the close of the last chapter .