The climber stopped.
"_Qu"as-tu donc, mon Caporal?_"
"_Nom d"un chien!_" snapped the other. "_Faut il me faire matelot? Aidez moi un peu avec ces satanees cordes!_"
The climber slithered down on his heels, a cataract of shingle streaming behind him.
Swift to seize his chance, Kit rushed the crest, the crash of the Frenchman"s retreat drowning his approach.
There, flat on his face, he peeped.
Beneath him, on the run of the shingle, lay the lugger. Her jib was flapping; the mainsail set for the hoisting; every stick and stay in place. Half a dozen burly Grenadiers, black-muzzled with a week"s beard, were busy about her, stowing their kits, laughing and chattering.
A sprightly little Corporal, balancing on the stern, was spitting forth orders.
The foreign language, there on his native sh.o.r.e, made a discord in the boy"s heart.
"_Quand partirons-nous?_" asked Francois, wading down the shingle, pack on back.
"_Aussitot que tout sera pret la-bas,_" answered the corporal, casting a glance over his shoulder. "_Bah! ces gueux d"Anglais!
Monsieur le General en a par dessus les yeux._"
Kit followed the man"s eyes.
III
A track of feet led from the lugger to the creek across the wet sand.
Along it a tail of smugglers were trundling barrels gingerly. At the entrance to the sluice others were hoisting and heaving. Above them stood that slight figure against the sky-line, the ominous pistol lurking behind him.
And it was clear the ruffians were smouldering to mutiny. Their heads were over their shoulders as they worked, and their eyes on the lugger. The soldiers were coming! they felt the halter tightening round their necks; and they were mad to be away.
Only one man in the world could have held them there at all, Kit felt, and he had all his work cut out. That slight figure against the sky- line, so calm, so terrible, seemed compact of power.
Kit had seen his friend in many moods; now he saw him in another. And the boy thought he loved him in this last role best, because in it he feared him most. This was not the man of poetry, charming as April, gay-hearted as a boy; this was the remorseless leader, iron for his cause, brutal, if you will, as a man who deals with brutes must be.
There was a sultry silence--the silence and horror before the storm breaks. Kit felt it and was appalled. He could almost hear the flames of mutiny roaring in those dull and darkened hearts.
For one moment the boy forgot himself and his cause. He was a play- goer, watching a drama. This man was the hero, valiant, lonely, a miracle of strength. The boy felt for him a pa.s.sionate sympathy. Could he hold them?--Would they break?
Even as he watched, a man shot out of the ruck and away, scampering furiously with the shrugged shoulders and ducked head of one expecting a blow.
It came sure as fate, and as deliberate.
Out shot the Gentleman"s pistol hand.
A crack, a stab of flame, and the man was flopping on the sand like a landed fish.
As the Gentleman fired, another from below stormed up the bank at him.
A flash of lightning darted at him, and struck him in the chest. The fellow collapsed in a heap.
The boy had half risen to his elbow.
"Well done!" he cried with blazing enthusiasm. Then he remembered where he was, and dropped.
No man had heard. The Grenadiers like himself were busy watching the doings in the creek. A murmur of applause rose from among them.
"_Bravo, Monsieur le General! Hein! Canaille_!"
In the creek all was quiet again now. The flame of mutiny was quenched; the Gang had resumed their work; and the Gentleman was wiping his blade upon his sleeve.
CHAPTER LXVI
BUGLES
I
In the loft the Parson was patting the shoulder of the lad now panting beside him.
"Another notch to the Navy," he said.... "What news, boy?"
Kit told of the lugger, ready to sail; of the business of the barrels in the creek; of the rumbling in the drain.
The Parson listened with nodding head.
"I feel like a mouse that knows it"s going to have a cat jump on its back, but don"t know quite when or just how," he muttered.
"Meantime there"s Nelson, sir!" cried the boy, great-eyed and anxious.
"I know, my boy, I know. But while there"s the lugger, there"s hope."
He leaned out of the window. A sentry was now on the shingle-bank; and he could see the tall-plumed bearskins of the Grenadiers busy about the lugger.
The boy took up the telescope.
The mists were lifting, and the sun shone white upon the water. He could see the frigate, faint indeed and far, stately-pacing towards her doom; he could see the mast of the lugger, Grenadier-guarded, and those leagues of shining waste between the two.
Where was help?
An awful darkness drowned his heart.