"There"s her colours!" he panted.
"By Jove, you"re right," cried the Gentleman, and began to row the boat clumsily about. "Stop that hole in the bottom with your foot, will you?"
The boat was water-logged and filling fast. The water was already over the Gentleman"s spurs.
Down on his knees the boy baled for his life.
Behind him he heard a word of command: then the splash of oars, and the regular thump of rowlocks. The privateer"s boat was away--a ten- oared galley from the sound of her, and they were driving her.
"Row, sir, row!" urged the boy. "They"re after us!"
The Gentleman flung back into his oars.
Kit could not but admire him. He was rowing, as he believed, against death. The boat was sodden; he could not row; and the pursuers were coming up hand over hand. Yet his eyes danced, as he gasped,
"This is life."
The boy was looking behind him. He could not see the pursuing boat, but he could hear the sizzle of foam under her keel as she slipped through the water, and the rhythmical sweep of oars.
There was a terrible beauty about it--this swooping of Death on them out of the fog. He could hear the wings he could not see. She was close now, the Angel of the Swarthy Pinions.
On the thwart lay a pistol. He s.n.a.t.c.hed it.
"Good boy!" panted the Gentleman.
Kit glanced forward.
He could see the loom of the land.
"There"s the sh.o.r.e, sir!" he cried.
"And here are they!" gasped the other. "Pretty thing, by Jove!"
A boat"s bows shot up behind them. A figure was standing in the stern.
"_Les voila_!" screamed a voice.
The Gentleman threw up his oars.
"French!"
Kit clapped the pistol to his head.
"Row!" he screamed. "Row!"
The other tumbled back into his oars. Up sprang his foot. The pistol was kicked out of the boy"s hand, and the Gentleman was on him.
"O, you are a villain, Little Chap!" chuckled a voice in the lad"s ear.
For a moment they hugged, the boat rocking beneath them.
"Can you swim?" came the voice at his ear.
"Yes," gurgled the lad, and as he felt the boat going sucked in a breath.
"Then shift for yourself. I can"t."
As the waters closed about them the arms of the Gentleman loosed their hold.
CHAPTER XLIII
A BLACK BORDERER TO THE RESCUE
I
A boy was wading sh.o.r.eward dizzily. As he surged through the water, his body made long rippling waves. He watched them with dull fascination, pointing.
Then he began to whimper peevishly. He was tired, he was cold. The sh.o.r.e waved up and down before his eyes. He knew he couldn"t do it.
From behind him a yell penetrated his dying mind.
It stopped him dead.
He was a little child, nightmare-bound.
Waving to and fro, the water to his knees, he stretched both arms sh.o.r.eward.
"Mother!" he wailed.
A shout answered him.
Some one was crashing down the shingle, racing across the sand, and plunging through the water towards him.
The boy began to t.i.tter.
"Come on, Kit! come on!" came a rousing voice. "Don"t look behind you!
That"s the style! Come on!"
What was this black splashing figure, sword in hand? Was it the Angel of Death in full regimentals? Surely he recognised the face beneath the shako?
"You aren"t mother," the boy giggled, swaying.
A strong arm was round him; a body, firm and full of life, was pressed against his dying one; a voice, quickening as the Spring, was in his ear.