Chapter Seventeen.The next morning one of the first things that saluted Aleck’s eyes on making his way up to the look-out on the cliff, was the sloop-of-war about a couple of miles out, sailing very slowly along, followed at a short distance by the Revenue cutter, and the lad had not been watching five minutes before he became aware of the fact that Ness Dunning’s work in the garden was at a standstill, that individual being laid flat upon his chest watching the vessels’ movements through a piece of pipe.Away to the right on the cliffs, dotted about which lay Eilygugg, there was a white speck here and a blue speck there, and a little more intent gazing proved to the lad that there was another speck upon the edge of the farthest cliff in view.“Women on the look-out to give warning to the smugglers,” thought Aleck, and he hurried back to see if his uncle was down, and if he were not to return to the cliff-top with the glass.But the captain was just descending, and his first words were:“That’s right, my boy; let’s have breakfast. By the way, did you get my paper?”This started the lad, who was crammed with his news, which he hurriedly made known.“Humph!” said the old man. “Rather a lively experience for you, my lad; but you must be careful, for I don’t want to have you in trouble over helping smugglers to escape.”“No, uncle, of course not,” said Aleck; “but do you think I did wrong?”“Certainly, my boy. This fellow—ill-conditioned fellow Megg—was fighting against the law. He was doubtless there on some business connected with smuggling, and nearly got caught by the press-gang—an institution I do not admire, but those in authority consider it a necessity for the supply of the Navy. Keep away from all these worries, and as much as possible from Rockabie and its young ruffians.”“Yes, uncle; but I really did not seek to be amongst all that business in Rockabie yesterday,” pleaded Aleck.“Of course not, my boy, and you need not look so penitent. The law’s the law, of course, but I’m afraid if I had been appealed to as you were last night I should have done the same, and given the scoundrel a good talking to as I brought him away. There, have no more to do with it, and keep out of sight if there are boats landed, as there most probably will be, to make a search.”“But suppose the officers land and know me again, uncle?”“There, there, I’m just in the midst of a tiresomely intricate chapter of my book, and don’t want to have my attention taken off.”“No, uncle, of course not; but if the officers and men know me again?”“Why, let them, my lad. You were doing no harm, and they can do you none. Now let’s finish our breakfast.”“Shall I stay in, uncle?” said Aleck. “Tom Bodger slept down in the boat last night, and I wanted to take him some breakfast.”“Go and take it then, of course.”“And then stay in?”“No, no; nonsense. Now don’t bother me any more.”“I won’t get into any trouble,” Aleck said to himself, as he hurried out, armed with two huge sandwiches and a mug of well-sweetened coffee, with which he got on pretty well going through the garden, hardly spilling a drop, till he was startled by the voice of the gardener, saying, from the other side, in anticipation:“Thankye, Master Aleck. That’s very good of yer.”That startling made the lad half stop, and about a tablespoonful of the hot preparation flew out on to the path. But Aleck paid no attention, not even turning his head, but increasing his pace, with the mug troubling him a good deal in his efforts to preserve the liquid in a state of equilibrium in a rapidly descending and very slippery and uneven rocky path.“I daresay you’d like it,” muttered Aleck, as he hurried on, followed directly after by:“I’m over here, Master Aleck.”“Thank you for the information, Ness, but they say none are so deaf as those who will not hear.”At the next zigzag of the path he was out of sight and hearing, and a few minutes later close upon the niche devoted to his boat, with the big sandwiches complete, and quite three parts of the coffee in the mug.“Sorry to have been so long, Tom,” he cried, breathlessly, “but here you—”Aleck was going to sayare, but he felt that it would not be correct, for Tom was not there, nor anywhere within sight down the narrow waterway in the direction of the sea. He had left tokens of his presence in the shape of tidy touches, for the boat tackle had all been taken out and stowed away in the overhanging cavernous part, and the boat lay ready for any amount of necessary repairs, for, in spite of the sailor’s declaration the previous evening, she had been leaking to such an extent during the night since she had been tied up, that she was one quarter full of water.“Why, he ought to have stopped to mend the hole properly. Seen the men-o’-war coming, I suppose, and gone back to Rockabie so as not to be found if the sailors come searching here. But how stupid! What am I to do with this coffee and bacon?”A moment was sufficient for his decision, and he turned and hurried back, made straight for the tool-house, where he placed the mug on the bench, with the sandwiches carefully balanced across. Then, carefully keeping out of the gardener’s sight till the last minute, he turned down a path which led him near, and then, putting his hands to his lips, he shouted:“Ness!”“Yes, Master Aleck,” came directly from where the man was making believe to have been busy for hours.“I’ve put some coffee and something to eat in the tool-shed,” bellowed Aleck. “Let him think what he likes,” he muttered, as he ran back indoors, obtained the glass, and was off again to make for the cliff and watch the proceedings of the men-o’-war.Their proceedings seemed to be nil, for both vessels were hove to, and after watching them for a few minutes by means of the glass, Aleck closed it, and hung about, undecided what to do.A minute later he had made up his mind, for the cave in which the smugglers’ boats lay drawn up attracted him, and he was level with the cottages and preparing to descend when it occurred to him that he had better not go, for if Eben had been suspicious of his visit and ready to think him guilty of giving information to the press-gang people and Revenue men, it was quite possible that others there might be the same, while doubtless the women who had lost son, husband, or father during the past night would be in no pleasant temper to encounter.So instead of descending, Aleck went on in the direction of the great gap in the cliff where he had had so exciting an encounter with the smuggler, intending to make for the shelf again so as to sit down and watch the sloop and cutter, but only to find when he reached the place, that the view in that direction was cut off by towering rocks.Consequently he climbed back, went round the head of the deep combe, and crept round to the other side, mounted to the top, and then stood looking down into another of the great rifts in the coast-line, one which had perpendicular sides, the haunt of wild fowl, going sheer down to the water, which here came several hundred yards right into the land.There were plenty of capital places here where a strong-headed person could go and perch and excite no more notice than a sea-bird. They were what ordinary inshore folk would have called “terribly dangerous,” but such an idea never occurred to Aleck, who selected one of the most risky, in a spot where the vast wall where he stood was gashed by a great crack, which allowed of a descent of some thirty feet to a broad ledge littered by the preenings of the sea-birds, which seemed, though none were present, to have made it their home.It was a delightful spot for anyone who could climb to it without growing giddy; but there was no going farther, for the angle of the ledge was quite straight, and when the lad peered over he was looking straight into the gurgling, foaming and fretting water a hundred feet below.“What a boat cove that would have made,” he thought, “if there were not so many sharp rocks rising from the bottom! I shouldn’t like to try and take my kittiwake in there, big as it is.”The gloomy place, with its black shadowy niches and caves at the surface of the water, had a strange fascination for him. In fact, with its solemn twilight and irregular crag, arch and hollow, it looked quite an ideal entrance to some mermaid city such as is described by the poets who deal in fable.But there were the two little men-o’-war to watch, and Aleck drew back a step or two from the edge to select a comfortable seat, where the colour of the rock which rose up behind was likely to assimilate with his garments and not throw him up as a plainly-seen watcher if a telescope were directed shoreward from one of the vessels.“I wonder whether the smugglers ever come here,” thought Aleck, as he looked at the face of the rock in a spot that just suited his purpose; and then he laughed to himself and felt no doubt at all, for there, just level with his face, and about eighteen inches within a crack in the rock, a shabby old horn lanthorn was wedged, and just below it was a tinder-box and a square wide-mouthed bottle, well corked, evidently to protect its contents from the spray which would come rushing up from below in a storm, the contents being so many thin slips of wood, whose sharply-pointed ends had been dipped in molten brimstone.“One of their look-outs,” he said to himself, as he turned again to sit down, but only to start and crouch upon his knees in surprise; for close up to the rock wall, half hidden by a tuft of sea-pink and grey sea holly, was a very old ragged black silk neckerchief, folded and creased as if lately torn off, and bearing strange rusty dark stains, dry and unpleasant-looking, and with very little consideration Aleck settled in his own mind that, if it were not the kerchief Tom had torn from his neck to wind round the smuggler’s wound, it was as like it as could be.It did not look a nice thing to take up and handle, but the lad bent lower, before rising up to say, decisively:“It must be, I’m sure, for I almost seem to know the holes. Then Eben must have been here this morning watching for the press-gang people.”Another thought flashed across the lad’s brain directly:“Perhaps he’s close by somewhere, watching me.”This thought produced a very uncomfortable feeling, and Aleck was divided between two forces which pulled different ways. One was to—as Tom Bodger called it—look out for squalls, the other to sit down quite calm and unconcerned to watch the vessels.“I can’t help it if Eben does fancy I’m watching his proceedings; he must feel that I should be longing to know what is going on. No, after last night I’m sure he won’t think I should make signals to the ships. Why should I? There’s nothing to signal about.”He focussed and re-focussed the glass, and held its larger end towards the sloop and placed one eye at the little orifice; but the left would not close and the right would not look at the sloop, but persisted in rolling about in every direction in search of Eben, who, the boy felt certain now, must be crouching back in one of the rugged clefts watching every movement he made.Aleck did the best he could to look calm and unconcerned, but anyone who had seen him from near at hand would have pronounced it as being a dismal failure.Then all at once he started. Down went the glass, and he craned forward towards the edge of the shelf to look down, for all at once there was a hoarse rumbling sound and a tremendous plash and crash as if a mass of rock had fallen from somewhere beneath him right into the rock-strewn gully below.He could not resist the desire to lie down upon his breast and edge himself forward till his face was over the edge and he could look right down into the water, which was all in motion, swaying and eddying, foaming round the half-submerged blocks of weed-hung stone, and behaving generally according to its custom as the tide went and came, for these chasms displayed little change, the water being very deep and never leaving any part of the bottom bare.There was nothing fresh to see, and after a time the lad drew back, to resume his old attitude with the glass to his eye.But he had hardly settled down again before he experienced a slight quivering sensation, as if the cliff had suddenly received a blow, while directly after there was a deep roar as of stones falling along some vast slope. Then once more silence, with the water whispering and gurgling far below.“Part of the cliff given way,” thought Aleck, as he called to mind places here and there where masses of the rocky rampart which guarded the western shores had evidently fallen, and about which he had heard traditionary stories. But these falls had taken place in far distant times. No one that he had heard speak of them could go farther back than chronicling the event as something of which “my grandfather heered tell.”Aleck thought no more of the sounds and went on watching the two vessels, till suddenly they seemed to be doing something in the way of action. A boat was lowered from each, and the lad’s glass was powerful enough to enable him to make out the faces of the officers in the stern-sheets, one of whom was the midshipman who had charge of the boat at Rockabie pier.Aleck watched the boats rowing shoreward and separating after a time, one of the sloop’s making for the Eilygugg cove, the other rowing in the direction of the gap which led up to the depression in which lay the Den.Feeling that he would like to be at home if the boat entered their private chasm, as the lad dubbed it, he turned back along the cliff and reached the garden so as to descend to the mooring-place just in time to see the cutter’s boat framed in the opening, the dark rocks round and above, and the little craft floating upon a background of opalescent sea and sky.“They can’t have come right in,” thought Aleck, and after a time he made for the cliff again to get near the edge and look down, in time to see that both boats were being rowed back to their respective vessels.An hour after they were slowly gliding away in the direction of Rockabie, their examination having been of the most perfunctory kind.
The next morning one of the first things that saluted Aleck’s eyes on making his way up to the look-out on the cliff, was the sloop-of-war about a couple of miles out, sailing very slowly along, followed at a short distance by the Revenue cutter, and the lad had not been watching five minutes before he became aware of the fact that Ness Dunning’s work in the garden was at a standstill, that individual being laid flat upon his chest watching the vessels’ movements through a piece of pipe.
Away to the right on the cliffs, dotted about which lay Eilygugg, there was a white speck here and a blue speck there, and a little more intent gazing proved to the lad that there was another speck upon the edge of the farthest cliff in view.
“Women on the look-out to give warning to the smugglers,” thought Aleck, and he hurried back to see if his uncle was down, and if he were not to return to the cliff-top with the glass.
But the captain was just descending, and his first words were:
“That’s right, my boy; let’s have breakfast. By the way, did you get my paper?”
This started the lad, who was crammed with his news, which he hurriedly made known.
“Humph!” said the old man. “Rather a lively experience for you, my lad; but you must be careful, for I don’t want to have you in trouble over helping smugglers to escape.”
“No, uncle, of course not,” said Aleck; “but do you think I did wrong?”
“Certainly, my boy. This fellow—ill-conditioned fellow Megg—was fighting against the law. He was doubtless there on some business connected with smuggling, and nearly got caught by the press-gang—an institution I do not admire, but those in authority consider it a necessity for the supply of the Navy. Keep away from all these worries, and as much as possible from Rockabie and its young ruffians.”
“Yes, uncle; but I really did not seek to be amongst all that business in Rockabie yesterday,” pleaded Aleck.
“Of course not, my boy, and you need not look so penitent. The law’s the law, of course, but I’m afraid if I had been appealed to as you were last night I should have done the same, and given the scoundrel a good talking to as I brought him away. There, have no more to do with it, and keep out of sight if there are boats landed, as there most probably will be, to make a search.”
“But suppose the officers land and know me again, uncle?”
“There, there, I’m just in the midst of a tiresomely intricate chapter of my book, and don’t want to have my attention taken off.”
“No, uncle, of course not; but if the officers and men know me again?”
“Why, let them, my lad. You were doing no harm, and they can do you none. Now let’s finish our breakfast.”
“Shall I stay in, uncle?” said Aleck. “Tom Bodger slept down in the boat last night, and I wanted to take him some breakfast.”
“Go and take it then, of course.”
“And then stay in?”
“No, no; nonsense. Now don’t bother me any more.”
“I won’t get into any trouble,” Aleck said to himself, as he hurried out, armed with two huge sandwiches and a mug of well-sweetened coffee, with which he got on pretty well going through the garden, hardly spilling a drop, till he was startled by the voice of the gardener, saying, from the other side, in anticipation:
“Thankye, Master Aleck. That’s very good of yer.”
That startling made the lad half stop, and about a tablespoonful of the hot preparation flew out on to the path. But Aleck paid no attention, not even turning his head, but increasing his pace, with the mug troubling him a good deal in his efforts to preserve the liquid in a state of equilibrium in a rapidly descending and very slippery and uneven rocky path.
“I daresay you’d like it,” muttered Aleck, as he hurried on, followed directly after by:
“I’m over here, Master Aleck.”
“Thank you for the information, Ness, but they say none are so deaf as those who will not hear.”
At the next zigzag of the path he was out of sight and hearing, and a few minutes later close upon the niche devoted to his boat, with the big sandwiches complete, and quite three parts of the coffee in the mug.
“Sorry to have been so long, Tom,” he cried, breathlessly, “but here you—”
Aleck was going to sayare, but he felt that it would not be correct, for Tom was not there, nor anywhere within sight down the narrow waterway in the direction of the sea. He had left tokens of his presence in the shape of tidy touches, for the boat tackle had all been taken out and stowed away in the overhanging cavernous part, and the boat lay ready for any amount of necessary repairs, for, in spite of the sailor’s declaration the previous evening, she had been leaking to such an extent during the night since she had been tied up, that she was one quarter full of water.
“Why, he ought to have stopped to mend the hole properly. Seen the men-o’-war coming, I suppose, and gone back to Rockabie so as not to be found if the sailors come searching here. But how stupid! What am I to do with this coffee and bacon?”
A moment was sufficient for his decision, and he turned and hurried back, made straight for the tool-house, where he placed the mug on the bench, with the sandwiches carefully balanced across. Then, carefully keeping out of the gardener’s sight till the last minute, he turned down a path which led him near, and then, putting his hands to his lips, he shouted:
“Ness!”
“Yes, Master Aleck,” came directly from where the man was making believe to have been busy for hours.
“I’ve put some coffee and something to eat in the tool-shed,” bellowed Aleck. “Let him think what he likes,” he muttered, as he ran back indoors, obtained the glass, and was off again to make for the cliff and watch the proceedings of the men-o’-war.
Their proceedings seemed to be nil, for both vessels were hove to, and after watching them for a few minutes by means of the glass, Aleck closed it, and hung about, undecided what to do.
A minute later he had made up his mind, for the cave in which the smugglers’ boats lay drawn up attracted him, and he was level with the cottages and preparing to descend when it occurred to him that he had better not go, for if Eben had been suspicious of his visit and ready to think him guilty of giving information to the press-gang people and Revenue men, it was quite possible that others there might be the same, while doubtless the women who had lost son, husband, or father during the past night would be in no pleasant temper to encounter.
So instead of descending, Aleck went on in the direction of the great gap in the cliff where he had had so exciting an encounter with the smuggler, intending to make for the shelf again so as to sit down and watch the sloop and cutter, but only to find when he reached the place, that the view in that direction was cut off by towering rocks.
Consequently he climbed back, went round the head of the deep combe, and crept round to the other side, mounted to the top, and then stood looking down into another of the great rifts in the coast-line, one which had perpendicular sides, the haunt of wild fowl, going sheer down to the water, which here came several hundred yards right into the land.
There were plenty of capital places here where a strong-headed person could go and perch and excite no more notice than a sea-bird. They were what ordinary inshore folk would have called “terribly dangerous,” but such an idea never occurred to Aleck, who selected one of the most risky, in a spot where the vast wall where he stood was gashed by a great crack, which allowed of a descent of some thirty feet to a broad ledge littered by the preenings of the sea-birds, which seemed, though none were present, to have made it their home.
It was a delightful spot for anyone who could climb to it without growing giddy; but there was no going farther, for the angle of the ledge was quite straight, and when the lad peered over he was looking straight into the gurgling, foaming and fretting water a hundred feet below.
“What a boat cove that would have made,” he thought, “if there were not so many sharp rocks rising from the bottom! I shouldn’t like to try and take my kittiwake in there, big as it is.”
The gloomy place, with its black shadowy niches and caves at the surface of the water, had a strange fascination for him. In fact, with its solemn twilight and irregular crag, arch and hollow, it looked quite an ideal entrance to some mermaid city such as is described by the poets who deal in fable.
But there were the two little men-o’-war to watch, and Aleck drew back a step or two from the edge to select a comfortable seat, where the colour of the rock which rose up behind was likely to assimilate with his garments and not throw him up as a plainly-seen watcher if a telescope were directed shoreward from one of the vessels.
“I wonder whether the smugglers ever come here,” thought Aleck, as he looked at the face of the rock in a spot that just suited his purpose; and then he laughed to himself and felt no doubt at all, for there, just level with his face, and about eighteen inches within a crack in the rock, a shabby old horn lanthorn was wedged, and just below it was a tinder-box and a square wide-mouthed bottle, well corked, evidently to protect its contents from the spray which would come rushing up from below in a storm, the contents being so many thin slips of wood, whose sharply-pointed ends had been dipped in molten brimstone.
“One of their look-outs,” he said to himself, as he turned again to sit down, but only to start and crouch upon his knees in surprise; for close up to the rock wall, half hidden by a tuft of sea-pink and grey sea holly, was a very old ragged black silk neckerchief, folded and creased as if lately torn off, and bearing strange rusty dark stains, dry and unpleasant-looking, and with very little consideration Aleck settled in his own mind that, if it were not the kerchief Tom had torn from his neck to wind round the smuggler’s wound, it was as like it as could be.
It did not look a nice thing to take up and handle, but the lad bent lower, before rising up to say, decisively:
“It must be, I’m sure, for I almost seem to know the holes. Then Eben must have been here this morning watching for the press-gang people.”
Another thought flashed across the lad’s brain directly:
“Perhaps he’s close by somewhere, watching me.”
This thought produced a very uncomfortable feeling, and Aleck was divided between two forces which pulled different ways. One was to—as Tom Bodger called it—look out for squalls, the other to sit down quite calm and unconcerned to watch the vessels.
“I can’t help it if Eben does fancy I’m watching his proceedings; he must feel that I should be longing to know what is going on. No, after last night I’m sure he won’t think I should make signals to the ships. Why should I? There’s nothing to signal about.”
He focussed and re-focussed the glass, and held its larger end towards the sloop and placed one eye at the little orifice; but the left would not close and the right would not look at the sloop, but persisted in rolling about in every direction in search of Eben, who, the boy felt certain now, must be crouching back in one of the rugged clefts watching every movement he made.
Aleck did the best he could to look calm and unconcerned, but anyone who had seen him from near at hand would have pronounced it as being a dismal failure.
Then all at once he started. Down went the glass, and he craned forward towards the edge of the shelf to look down, for all at once there was a hoarse rumbling sound and a tremendous plash and crash as if a mass of rock had fallen from somewhere beneath him right into the rock-strewn gully below.
He could not resist the desire to lie down upon his breast and edge himself forward till his face was over the edge and he could look right down into the water, which was all in motion, swaying and eddying, foaming round the half-submerged blocks of weed-hung stone, and behaving generally according to its custom as the tide went and came, for these chasms displayed little change, the water being very deep and never leaving any part of the bottom bare.
There was nothing fresh to see, and after a time the lad drew back, to resume his old attitude with the glass to his eye.
But he had hardly settled down again before he experienced a slight quivering sensation, as if the cliff had suddenly received a blow, while directly after there was a deep roar as of stones falling along some vast slope. Then once more silence, with the water whispering and gurgling far below.
“Part of the cliff given way,” thought Aleck, as he called to mind places here and there where masses of the rocky rampart which guarded the western shores had evidently fallen, and about which he had heard traditionary stories. But these falls had taken place in far distant times. No one that he had heard speak of them could go farther back than chronicling the event as something of which “my grandfather heered tell.”
Aleck thought no more of the sounds and went on watching the two vessels, till suddenly they seemed to be doing something in the way of action. A boat was lowered from each, and the lad’s glass was powerful enough to enable him to make out the faces of the officers in the stern-sheets, one of whom was the midshipman who had charge of the boat at Rockabie pier.
Aleck watched the boats rowing shoreward and separating after a time, one of the sloop’s making for the Eilygugg cove, the other rowing in the direction of the gap which led up to the depression in which lay the Den.
Feeling that he would like to be at home if the boat entered their private chasm, as the lad dubbed it, he turned back along the cliff and reached the garden so as to descend to the mooring-place just in time to see the cutter’s boat framed in the opening, the dark rocks round and above, and the little craft floating upon a background of opalescent sea and sky.
“They can’t have come right in,” thought Aleck, and after a time he made for the cliff again to get near the edge and look down, in time to see that both boats were being rowed back to their respective vessels.
An hour after they were slowly gliding away in the direction of Rockabie, their examination having been of the most perfunctory kind.
Chapter Eighteen.“No, Master Aleck, not gone, as you may say, right off,” replied Tom Bodger, a few days later, as he adzed and planed and hammered away at the kittiwake down in front of the natural boat-house. “They’re a-dodging of it, strikes me. King’s skippers is artful when they wants men. They just got enough of that smuggling lot aboard the sloop to make the cap’n hungry for more, and, you mark my words, he’ll keep away so as to make the likely ones think they’re safe, and then there’ll come a night when they’ll find they arn’t.”“Oh, I don’t think so, Tom,” said Aleck, opening a fresh packet of glistening golden-hued copper nails. “I don’t believe the press-gang will come again.”“All right, Master Aleck, you go on thinking they won’t, and I’ll go on thinking they will, and let’s see who’s right.”“But what makes you suspicious, Tom?”“Old sperience, sir,” said the man, with a grim smile. “I ’member how we used to pick ’em up aboard the Hajax—‘our Jacks,’ as the lads used to call her. That’s just how our old skipper used to work it; and if I were Eben Megg and didn’t want to go to sea I should give up smuggling and take to an inland job, where he warn’t known, and then he’d be safe. Ha! Them’s the sort,” he said, taking the fresh nails. “No rusting about them coppery nails.”“No; but uncle says you’re to be careful and not use so many, for they’re expensive, and you do seem to like to drive in as many as you can.”“Now, you lookye here, Master Aleck,” said the sailor, solemnly; “a copper nail may mean a man’s life. You put in a hiron one and after a bit the sea water eats it all away. Soon as the nail’s eat away up starts a plank, in goes the water, and before you knows where you are down goes your boat and a man’s drowned. Copper nail costs a ha’penny, p’raps, and if it’s a big ’un, a penny. Well, arn’t a man’s life worth more’n that?”“Of course; but how long shall you be before you’ve done?”“Finish this week, sir; and then she’ll last for years. You know how it was; soon as I ripped off that patch we found that a lot of her streaks under the pitch was rotten, and there was nothing for it but to cut a lot away and make a good job of it. Well, sir, we’re making a good job of it, and she’ll be like a noo boat when I’ve done.”“Of course,” said Aleck; “and uncle said you were to do it thoroughly.”“And thorough it is,” said Tom. “I’ve took a lot o’ time, but there’s been every bit to make good. Let’s see; this makes a week and three days I’ve been coming over reg’lar.”“Yes, Tom,” said Aleck, laughing; “and what do you think Ness says?”“Dunno, Master Aleck,” said the sailor, passing his hand, as if lovingly, over the well-smoothed sweet-smelling wood he was putting into the boat. “Wants some beer?”“Oh, of course,” said Aleck; “but he said he could have mended the boat up in half the time.”“Ah, he would,” said Tom, drily. “Done it in two days, maybe, and first time she was out in bad weather the sea would undo all his work in quarter the time. Won’t do, Master Aleck; boat-building’s boat-building, and it’s all the same as ship-building—it means men’s lives, and them who scamps work like this ought to be flogged. Our old chips aboard the Hajax, as I worked with as mate, used to say precious ugly things about bad boat-building, and he’d say what he’d do to him as risked men’s lives by bad work. He taught me, Master Aleck, and I feel like him. I’d rather be paid a score o’ shillings for doing a fortnight’s good work than have it for doing a week’s; and I’m going to drive in as many o’ these here best copper nails as I thinks’ll be good for the boat, and you’re going to hold my big hammer agen their heads while I clinch ’em. Then I shall feel as the boat’s as safe as hands can make it. And, as I said afore, if I was Eben Megg, I’d drop the smuggling and go inland for a bit. That there sloop’ll come into harbour some night when she arn’t expected; you see if she don’t! They was fine young men the skipper got the other night, and I say he’ll try for another haul.”“And I say,” cried Aleck, “that if he does send his men he’ll be disappointed, for Eben and the other smugglers will be too foxy to let themselves be surrounded as the men were at Rockabie the other night.”“Well, Master Aleck, so much the better for them.”Then Tom began hammering and clinching the soft copper nails as if he loved his work, and as soon as the sun went down started off to trudge across the moor to Rockabie, taking his time over the task and looking as cheerful at the end as he did at the beginning of the long day.Aleck had worked pretty hard, too, in the hot sun, and he was so drowsy that night that he was glad enough to see his uncle, wearied out with the writing, which seemed as if it would never come to an end, begin to nod and doze, and suddenly rise up and say:“Let’s go to bed!”Aleck hardly knew how he got undressed, but he did afterwards recall going to the fully-open window and looking out at the dull night, as he drank in the soft cool air, which seemed so welcome after a still, sultry day.Then he was asleep, dreaming of nothing, till about midnight, when his brain became active and he fancied that he was back in the darkness by the unlaunched boat at Rockabie, growing wildly excited as he listened to the shouting and scuffling up one of the narrow lanes, followed by firing and what seemed to be either an order or a cry for help.The next moment the sleeper was wide awake, listening to what was undoubtedly a shout, and it was followed by another, both far away, but sounding clear on the night air, while from time to time came a dull murmur as of several voices together.“They’re landing a cargo,” thought Aleck, and with his mind full of luggers lying off the coast, with boats going to and fro to fetch kegs, chests and bales, he hurried on his clothes, dropped from his bedroom window, hurried down the garden to the cliff path, and began to climb up the zigzag.The landing-place would no doubt be away to the west and below Eilygugg, where the smugglers’ fishing-boats lay, and as soon as he was up out of the depression on to the level down, Aleck went off at a trot to get right at the edge of the cliff, where, unseen, he calculated upon getting a good view of what was going on by the light of, as he expected, many lanthorns.Before he was half way to the edge a thrill ran through him, for a wild shrieking arose, beginning with one voice, and turning to that of several.“Oh, it’s a wreck!” cried the lad, wildly, and he hurried on, hoping to reach the way down to the boats and be of some use before it was too late.But as he ran on with throbbing heart and his breath growing short it gradually dawned upon him that the shrieks were those of angry women raging and storming, and this was soon confirmed, for there was the gruff burr of men’s voices in the distance, followed by a shout or two, which sounded like the orders he had heard in his dream.“Why, it’s a fight,” he cried, half aloud. “Tom Bodger’s right; the press-gang has landed again, but, instead of going to Rockabie, they’ve come here.”He was as right as Tom Bodger, for at last when he made his way to the edge of the cliff it was to look down on the lanthorns carried by three boats, which were close up to the shingly patch of beach from which the fishing craft put off.As far as he could make out in the darkness, badly illumined by the lanthorns, there was a desperate struggle going on in the shallow water lying between the shingle and the boats.For the first few moments it seemed to Aleck in his excitement that the press-gang was being beaten off by the smugglers. Then he was puzzled, for he could hear hoarse shouts and laughter, mingled with shrieks and what seemed to be loud abuse in women’s voices, followed by splashing in the water as of struggles going on again and again.After the last of these encounters the lights began to move outward in obedience to an order given loudly from one of the boats; the regulardip-dipof oars came up, and then there was a rushing sound and a wild passionate chorus of cries from the shore.“I know,” panted Aleck, with a feeling of angry indignation attacking him. “They’ve taken and are carrying off some of the men, and the women have been fighting to try and rescue them. Poor things, how horrible, but how brave!”He had confirmation of his surmises directly after, for there now rose up to his ears a burst of sobbing cries in a woman’s voice, followed by confused eager talk from quite a party, who seemed to be trying to comfort the weeping woman.For a few moments there was a pause, during which in the deep silence there was the regular dip of oars, and the lanthorns gently rose and fell upon the smooth rollers of the tide. Then there was a cry which went straight to Aleck’s heart, so piteous and wailing were its tones:“Oh, Eben! Eben! Come back, dear; come back!”It reached him for whom it was intended, and was answered directly from one of the boats in words which reached Aleck more clearly perhaps then the listeners below him on the shore.“All right, lass. Cheer up!”The order had its effect, for a cheer given heartily in women’s voices was the result; but the lad’s thoughts were active.“Cheer up!” he said to himself. “How can the woman be cheerful with her husband dragged away like that?”The lights in the boats gradually grew more distant, while Aleck lay thinking what he had better do, for the low eager murmur of voices down below raised a feeling of commiseration in his breast, which made him feel disposed to go down and try to say a few words of comfort to the bereaved women, who had evidently been trying hard to save their husbands. But he felt that he would only be able to act in a poor bungling way and that the smugglers’ people might look upon him as an intruder and a spy. For though the Den was so short a distance from Eilygugg, there had been very little intercourse, and that merely at times when the help of the captain was sought in connection with some injury or disease.“They would likely enough turn on and begin fiercely at me,” he thought. “I can do no good;” and he lay still, wanting to get away, but afraid to stir lest he should be heard.“They’ll go soon,” he thought; and he waited patiently, watching the lights gradually getting fainter and fainter as their distance from the shore increased.But the poor women seemed to have seated themselves just beyond reach of the lapping waves, which kept on breaking regularly in the little cove, and they, too, were watching the boat-lights till the last gleam had died away and all was darkness as far as they could see.Then a low sobbing was heard, half drowned at times by many voices raised in angry protest, and mingled with threats.This went on and on, rising, falling, and quite dying out at times, but only to break out again, having a strange effect upon Aleck, who would have given anything to get away unnoticed; but every now and then the silence was so perfect that he felt confident of being heard if he made the slightest movement, and consequently lay still.“They’d be sure to look upon me as an intruder,” he muttered, “and be ready to resent my being here.”At last though the silence was broken by the trampling of feet amongst the loose shingle, accompanied by a low murmured conversation, which was continued up the gap and died out finally high up towards the cottages, leaving the way for the listener clear.Aleck took advantage of this, and, sad at heart, he was going slowly back towards the Den, when suddenly became aware of steps coming from the direction of the smugglers’ scattered patch of cottages.Whoever it was had approached so near and had come upon him so suddenly that he obeyed his first impulse, which was to say, sharply:“Who’s that?”“Eh? That you, Master Aleck?”“Yes, it is I, Ness. What are you doing out here at this time of night?”“Mornin’, arn’t it, sir? Same as you, I s’pose. Who was to stop in bed with press-gangs coming and dragging folkses off to sea?”“Then you heard them?”“Heerd ’em, yes, sir! I was that feared o’ being took myself that I got into hiding.”“You were not fighting, then?”“Me? Fight? Not me! I lay low and listened.”“The press-gang landed and surprised the smugglers, then?”“Yes, sir, and they’ve nabbed Eben Megg and six of his mates. Did yer hear the women giving it to the sailors?”“I heard something of it.”“They was fighting savage like to save their men, and the sailor chaps was glad enough to get back to their boats; but they took Eben Megg and half a dozen more along with ’em.”“You seem to know all about it, Ness,” said Aleck, suspiciously.“Me, Master Aleck? Well, you see, being such near neighbours like I can’t help hearing a deal. But it’s bad work smuggling, and I keep as clear of the folk as I can. Going home to bed?”“Yes.”“That’s right, sir. Best place, too, of a night. But how did you know the press-gang was coming?”“I didn’t know they were coming.”“But you were theer?” said the old gardener, suspiciously.“I was there?” said Aleck, “because the noise woke me, coming through my open window.”“Oh!” said the gardener. “I see.”The next minute their ways diverged, and Aleck soon after climbed up to his bedroom window, to drop off into a sleep disturbed by fights with press-gangs and smugglers all mixed up into a strange confusion, from which he was glad to awaken and find that he had hardly time to get dressed before his uncle would be down.
“No, Master Aleck, not gone, as you may say, right off,” replied Tom Bodger, a few days later, as he adzed and planed and hammered away at the kittiwake down in front of the natural boat-house. “They’re a-dodging of it, strikes me. King’s skippers is artful when they wants men. They just got enough of that smuggling lot aboard the sloop to make the cap’n hungry for more, and, you mark my words, he’ll keep away so as to make the likely ones think they’re safe, and then there’ll come a night when they’ll find they arn’t.”
“Oh, I don’t think so, Tom,” said Aleck, opening a fresh packet of glistening golden-hued copper nails. “I don’t believe the press-gang will come again.”
“All right, Master Aleck, you go on thinking they won’t, and I’ll go on thinking they will, and let’s see who’s right.”
“But what makes you suspicious, Tom?”
“Old sperience, sir,” said the man, with a grim smile. “I ’member how we used to pick ’em up aboard the Hajax—‘our Jacks,’ as the lads used to call her. That’s just how our old skipper used to work it; and if I were Eben Megg and didn’t want to go to sea I should give up smuggling and take to an inland job, where he warn’t known, and then he’d be safe. Ha! Them’s the sort,” he said, taking the fresh nails. “No rusting about them coppery nails.”
“No; but uncle says you’re to be careful and not use so many, for they’re expensive, and you do seem to like to drive in as many as you can.”
“Now, you lookye here, Master Aleck,” said the sailor, solemnly; “a copper nail may mean a man’s life. You put in a hiron one and after a bit the sea water eats it all away. Soon as the nail’s eat away up starts a plank, in goes the water, and before you knows where you are down goes your boat and a man’s drowned. Copper nail costs a ha’penny, p’raps, and if it’s a big ’un, a penny. Well, arn’t a man’s life worth more’n that?”
“Of course; but how long shall you be before you’ve done?”
“Finish this week, sir; and then she’ll last for years. You know how it was; soon as I ripped off that patch we found that a lot of her streaks under the pitch was rotten, and there was nothing for it but to cut a lot away and make a good job of it. Well, sir, we’re making a good job of it, and she’ll be like a noo boat when I’ve done.”
“Of course,” said Aleck; “and uncle said you were to do it thoroughly.”
“And thorough it is,” said Tom. “I’ve took a lot o’ time, but there’s been every bit to make good. Let’s see; this makes a week and three days I’ve been coming over reg’lar.”
“Yes, Tom,” said Aleck, laughing; “and what do you think Ness says?”
“Dunno, Master Aleck,” said the sailor, passing his hand, as if lovingly, over the well-smoothed sweet-smelling wood he was putting into the boat. “Wants some beer?”
“Oh, of course,” said Aleck; “but he said he could have mended the boat up in half the time.”
“Ah, he would,” said Tom, drily. “Done it in two days, maybe, and first time she was out in bad weather the sea would undo all his work in quarter the time. Won’t do, Master Aleck; boat-building’s boat-building, and it’s all the same as ship-building—it means men’s lives, and them who scamps work like this ought to be flogged. Our old chips aboard the Hajax, as I worked with as mate, used to say precious ugly things about bad boat-building, and he’d say what he’d do to him as risked men’s lives by bad work. He taught me, Master Aleck, and I feel like him. I’d rather be paid a score o’ shillings for doing a fortnight’s good work than have it for doing a week’s; and I’m going to drive in as many o’ these here best copper nails as I thinks’ll be good for the boat, and you’re going to hold my big hammer agen their heads while I clinch ’em. Then I shall feel as the boat’s as safe as hands can make it. And, as I said afore, if I was Eben Megg, I’d drop the smuggling and go inland for a bit. That there sloop’ll come into harbour some night when she arn’t expected; you see if she don’t! They was fine young men the skipper got the other night, and I say he’ll try for another haul.”
“And I say,” cried Aleck, “that if he does send his men he’ll be disappointed, for Eben and the other smugglers will be too foxy to let themselves be surrounded as the men were at Rockabie the other night.”
“Well, Master Aleck, so much the better for them.”
Then Tom began hammering and clinching the soft copper nails as if he loved his work, and as soon as the sun went down started off to trudge across the moor to Rockabie, taking his time over the task and looking as cheerful at the end as he did at the beginning of the long day.
Aleck had worked pretty hard, too, in the hot sun, and he was so drowsy that night that he was glad enough to see his uncle, wearied out with the writing, which seemed as if it would never come to an end, begin to nod and doze, and suddenly rise up and say:
“Let’s go to bed!”
Aleck hardly knew how he got undressed, but he did afterwards recall going to the fully-open window and looking out at the dull night, as he drank in the soft cool air, which seemed so welcome after a still, sultry day.
Then he was asleep, dreaming of nothing, till about midnight, when his brain became active and he fancied that he was back in the darkness by the unlaunched boat at Rockabie, growing wildly excited as he listened to the shouting and scuffling up one of the narrow lanes, followed by firing and what seemed to be either an order or a cry for help.
The next moment the sleeper was wide awake, listening to what was undoubtedly a shout, and it was followed by another, both far away, but sounding clear on the night air, while from time to time came a dull murmur as of several voices together.
“They’re landing a cargo,” thought Aleck, and with his mind full of luggers lying off the coast, with boats going to and fro to fetch kegs, chests and bales, he hurried on his clothes, dropped from his bedroom window, hurried down the garden to the cliff path, and began to climb up the zigzag.
The landing-place would no doubt be away to the west and below Eilygugg, where the smugglers’ fishing-boats lay, and as soon as he was up out of the depression on to the level down, Aleck went off at a trot to get right at the edge of the cliff, where, unseen, he calculated upon getting a good view of what was going on by the light of, as he expected, many lanthorns.
Before he was half way to the edge a thrill ran through him, for a wild shrieking arose, beginning with one voice, and turning to that of several.
“Oh, it’s a wreck!” cried the lad, wildly, and he hurried on, hoping to reach the way down to the boats and be of some use before it was too late.
But as he ran on with throbbing heart and his breath growing short it gradually dawned upon him that the shrieks were those of angry women raging and storming, and this was soon confirmed, for there was the gruff burr of men’s voices in the distance, followed by a shout or two, which sounded like the orders he had heard in his dream.
“Why, it’s a fight,” he cried, half aloud. “Tom Bodger’s right; the press-gang has landed again, but, instead of going to Rockabie, they’ve come here.”
He was as right as Tom Bodger, for at last when he made his way to the edge of the cliff it was to look down on the lanthorns carried by three boats, which were close up to the shingly patch of beach from which the fishing craft put off.
As far as he could make out in the darkness, badly illumined by the lanthorns, there was a desperate struggle going on in the shallow water lying between the shingle and the boats.
For the first few moments it seemed to Aleck in his excitement that the press-gang was being beaten off by the smugglers. Then he was puzzled, for he could hear hoarse shouts and laughter, mingled with shrieks and what seemed to be loud abuse in women’s voices, followed by splashing in the water as of struggles going on again and again.
After the last of these encounters the lights began to move outward in obedience to an order given loudly from one of the boats; the regulardip-dipof oars came up, and then there was a rushing sound and a wild passionate chorus of cries from the shore.
“I know,” panted Aleck, with a feeling of angry indignation attacking him. “They’ve taken and are carrying off some of the men, and the women have been fighting to try and rescue them. Poor things, how horrible, but how brave!”
He had confirmation of his surmises directly after, for there now rose up to his ears a burst of sobbing cries in a woman’s voice, followed by confused eager talk from quite a party, who seemed to be trying to comfort the weeping woman.
For a few moments there was a pause, during which in the deep silence there was the regular dip of oars, and the lanthorns gently rose and fell upon the smooth rollers of the tide. Then there was a cry which went straight to Aleck’s heart, so piteous and wailing were its tones:
“Oh, Eben! Eben! Come back, dear; come back!”
It reached him for whom it was intended, and was answered directly from one of the boats in words which reached Aleck more clearly perhaps then the listeners below him on the shore.
“All right, lass. Cheer up!”
The order had its effect, for a cheer given heartily in women’s voices was the result; but the lad’s thoughts were active.
“Cheer up!” he said to himself. “How can the woman be cheerful with her husband dragged away like that?”
The lights in the boats gradually grew more distant, while Aleck lay thinking what he had better do, for the low eager murmur of voices down below raised a feeling of commiseration in his breast, which made him feel disposed to go down and try to say a few words of comfort to the bereaved women, who had evidently been trying hard to save their husbands. But he felt that he would only be able to act in a poor bungling way and that the smugglers’ people might look upon him as an intruder and a spy. For though the Den was so short a distance from Eilygugg, there had been very little intercourse, and that merely at times when the help of the captain was sought in connection with some injury or disease.
“They would likely enough turn on and begin fiercely at me,” he thought. “I can do no good;” and he lay still, wanting to get away, but afraid to stir lest he should be heard.
“They’ll go soon,” he thought; and he waited patiently, watching the lights gradually getting fainter and fainter as their distance from the shore increased.
But the poor women seemed to have seated themselves just beyond reach of the lapping waves, which kept on breaking regularly in the little cove, and they, too, were watching the boat-lights till the last gleam had died away and all was darkness as far as they could see.
Then a low sobbing was heard, half drowned at times by many voices raised in angry protest, and mingled with threats.
This went on and on, rising, falling, and quite dying out at times, but only to break out again, having a strange effect upon Aleck, who would have given anything to get away unnoticed; but every now and then the silence was so perfect that he felt confident of being heard if he made the slightest movement, and consequently lay still.
“They’d be sure to look upon me as an intruder,” he muttered, “and be ready to resent my being here.”
At last though the silence was broken by the trampling of feet amongst the loose shingle, accompanied by a low murmured conversation, which was continued up the gap and died out finally high up towards the cottages, leaving the way for the listener clear.
Aleck took advantage of this, and, sad at heart, he was going slowly back towards the Den, when suddenly became aware of steps coming from the direction of the smugglers’ scattered patch of cottages.
Whoever it was had approached so near and had come upon him so suddenly that he obeyed his first impulse, which was to say, sharply:
“Who’s that?”
“Eh? That you, Master Aleck?”
“Yes, it is I, Ness. What are you doing out here at this time of night?”
“Mornin’, arn’t it, sir? Same as you, I s’pose. Who was to stop in bed with press-gangs coming and dragging folkses off to sea?”
“Then you heard them?”
“Heerd ’em, yes, sir! I was that feared o’ being took myself that I got into hiding.”
“You were not fighting, then?”
“Me? Fight? Not me! I lay low and listened.”
“The press-gang landed and surprised the smugglers, then?”
“Yes, sir, and they’ve nabbed Eben Megg and six of his mates. Did yer hear the women giving it to the sailors?”
“I heard something of it.”
“They was fighting savage like to save their men, and the sailor chaps was glad enough to get back to their boats; but they took Eben Megg and half a dozen more along with ’em.”
“You seem to know all about it, Ness,” said Aleck, suspiciously.
“Me, Master Aleck? Well, you see, being such near neighbours like I can’t help hearing a deal. But it’s bad work smuggling, and I keep as clear of the folk as I can. Going home to bed?”
“Yes.”
“That’s right, sir. Best place, too, of a night. But how did you know the press-gang was coming?”
“I didn’t know they were coming.”
“But you were theer?” said the old gardener, suspiciously.
“I was there?” said Aleck, “because the noise woke me, coming through my open window.”
“Oh!” said the gardener. “I see.”
The next minute their ways diverged, and Aleck soon after climbed up to his bedroom window, to drop off into a sleep disturbed by fights with press-gangs and smugglers all mixed up into a strange confusion, from which he was glad to awaken and find that he had hardly time to get dressed before his uncle would be down.
Chapter Nineteen.Captain Lawrence listened with knitted brows to his nephew’s narration of all that had taken place in the night, and shook his head.“It’s miserable work, my boy,” he said; “so piteous for the poor women. Well, perhaps good will come out of evil, and it may be the breaking up of a notorious smuggling gang.”It was just as Aleck was finishing his third cup of coffee, which he set down sharply in the saucer, startled by the sudden rush of the gardener to the open window, through which he thrust his head without ceremony.“Here’s—” he began, excitedly. “Oh!”For a big heavy hand appeared upon his shoulder, clutching him hard and snatching him away.“What is the meaning of this, boy?” cried the captain.Aleck’s head was already out of the window, and he drew it back again to answer:“A lot of sailors, uncle, and their officer.”The lad’s words were followed by the appearance of Jane, whose eyes were wide open and staring, her mouth following suit to some extent, so that she had to close her lips before saying:“Plee, sir, orficer, sir. To see you, sir.”The captain nodded shortly and rose to go, followed by Aleck, out into the little ball, at whose door a naval officer and a boat’s crew of men were waiting.“Good morning,” said the officer, shortly; and then turning upon Aleck, “Hallo, young man, I’ve seen you before!”“Yes, in Rockabie harbour,” said the lad, looking at him wonderingly, while his heart began to beat fast as he glanced at the party of sturdy sailors.“Ah, to be sure,” said the officer; then to the captain again, “You are aware, I suppose, that we made a descent last night upon your nest of smugglers here.”“I have just learned, sir, what took place,” said the captain, coldly.“Of course. Well, sir, in the struggle and after trouble with the women, who resented the taking away of the men, the young officer of the second boat was missed.”“Not the midshipman who was with your boat the other day?” said Aleck, eagerly.“Eh? Yes,” cried the officer. “What do you know about him?”“Only that we had a few words together.”“And you know that he was missed?”“I did not know till you told me,” said Aleck.“Didn’t know, I suppose, that there was that struggle over yonder by the cove last night, eh?”“Yes,” said Aleck, frankly; “I saw some of it.”“Ah! Then you were with the smugglers, eh?”“No,” replied Aleck; and he briefly related his experience, including his being awakened by shots.“Ah, to be sure,” said the officer; “they’re a nice daring set of scoundrels—fired on the King’s men; but we got the rascals who did. Well, sir, what’s become of our officer?”“How should I know?” said Aleck, staring.“You must have seen something of what went on after we started back.”“No,” said Aleck. “There seemed to be no one there but the women.”“But you saw them and heard what they said? You heard them talking about him?”“No, I did not go near the women.”“Why?” said the officer, sharply.“Because I was afraid they would think I had something to do with the press-gang coming.”“Well, he must be found. He’s here somewhere.”“Is there any possibility of the poor young fellow having been knocked overboard during the struggle?”“Not the slightest,” replied the officer, shortly. “He may have been knocked down somewhere on the way between the cottages, where we pounced upon the men, and the landing-place. Well, he must be found.”“Of course,” said the captain, quietly. “You will go up, then, and search the smugglers’ cottages—fishermen they call themselves?”“We have searched them thoroughly,” said the officer, “and we’ve come across now, sir, to search your place—what do they call it?—the Den.”Aleck glanced at his uncle’s face, and could see the blood gathering in his cheeks.“Search my house, sir?” he said. “Are you so mad as to suppose that I should entrap one of the King’s officers?”“Possibly, sir,” replied the visitor, “on thequid pro quoprinciple, to hold on ransom. We’ve got some of your friends; you have snatched at one of ours.”“This is the first time, sir, that I’ve been led to suppose that I was a friend to the smugglers. Eh, Aleck?”“What nonsense, uncle!” cried the lad, indignantly.“Oh, indeed, young gentleman!” said the officer, turning upon him sharply. “No friends of yours neither?”“Certainly not,” cried Aleck.“Ho! Then, perhaps you will be good enough to explain how it is that the gardener here is the smugglers’ chief assistant in signalling, spying, and warning them?”“He isn’t,” said Aleck, sharply.“He is,” said the officer. “What is more, I found that cargoes are run down here in a cove or rift upon your coast, where a handy boat is kept.”“We’ve got a boat down the rift,” said Aleck.“Exactly; one that runs to and fro between here and Rockabie.”“Yes,” said Aleck, mockingly; “to fetch fishing-tackle and grocery—and writing paper; eh, uncle?”The captain nodded, while the young lieutenant went on:“And to take messages from here to Rockabie.”“No,” cried Aleck; but the officer went on, quietly:“Look here, sir, I am credibly informed that it was your boat that rescued one of the most daring of the smugglers on the night of an encounter we had there—a man whom I was holding with my own hands till I was savagely struck down. It is quite likely that this may be examined into later on, but my business now is to find my messmate. Look here, it will save a good deal of trouble, and make things much easier for you, if you put me up to the place where the prisoner is hidden.”“Perhaps it would,” said Aleck, firmly now; “but I tell you I know nothing whatever about your young midshipman. If you think he is hidden somewhere here you are quite wrong.”“Perhaps so,” said the officer, sternly, “but we shall see.”Then, turning to the captain, he said, shortly:“I shall have to search your place, sir,” and then rather jeeringly, as if suggesting that it would not matter in the least if the captain objected, he added: “I presume that you will not put difficulties in my way?”“None whatever, sir,” said the captain. “And as an old commissioned officer in his Majesty’s service should feel it my duty to help in any way I could.”“Eh? Oh, thank you,” said the officer, changing his manner. “I beg your pardon. I heard the people called you captain, but I supposed that you were captain of some fishing or trading boat.”The captain bowed coldly.“Aleck,” he said, “do you know anything about Dunning being intimate with the smugglers?”“Yes, uncle; I have been suspecting it lately.”“Oh, Master Aleck!” came from outside. “Me? How can you say such a word! When did you ever know me smuggle anything? Oh, my dear lad, tell the truth; when did you—whenever did you know me smuggle anything?”“Often,” said Aleck, bluntly.“What; tea and sperrits and ’bacco and silk?”“No,” said Aleck; “but fruit.”“Oh, fruit!” said the gardener, contemptuously. “What’s a bit of fruit?”“Perhaps you will have my house and grounds searched at once, sir,” said the captain, waving the gardener back. “The house is small, and—”“Stop a moment, sir,” said the young lieutenant, for such he proved to be; “will you give me your word of honour as an officer and a gentleman that my brother officer is not concealed about your premises?”“Certainly,” said the captain. “I give you my word of honour that he is not; and I add to it that I have never had any dealings with the smugglers.”“That is enough, sir. Now, will you tell me where we are to find their hiding-places, for they must have some stowages for the goods they run.”“I assure you, sir, that I have not the slightest knowledge of any such places. I have often suspected the existence of a cave or caves. Aleck, my boy, do you know of any?”Aleck turned sharply to speak, and as he did so he caught the gardener’s eyes fixed upon him with a peculiar glare that might have been threatening or imploring, the lad could not tell which; but he spoke out frankly at once:“No, uncle. I’ve often wondered whether there was a smuggler’s cave, but I never found one.”“Humph! That seems strange,” said the officer. “You have a boat?”“Yes, I have a boat.”“And go coasting and fishing about close in. Do you mean to tell me you never found anything of the kind?”“Yes.”“And you never saw a cargo being landed—I mean a cargo of smuggled goods?”“Never,” said Aleck.“Then you must have been very unobservant, young gentleman. I presume that you have seen smugglers about here?”Aleck’s face lit up, and he once more caught Ness’s eyes fixed upon him as he spoke.“Oh, yes,” he said; “several.”“And you could direct us to their cottages?”“I could,” said Aleck, “but I’m not going to.”“Well done, Master Aleck!” shouted the gardener.“Silence, sir,” said the captain, sternly. “Go on, Aleck.”“I’ve no more to say, uncle,” replied the lad, “only that I’m not going to lead people to take and press men by force for sailors. Besides, the lieutenant does not need showing—he has been to the men’s cottages, and taken some of them.”“To be sure,” said the officer, good-humouredly; “and I don’t want to be hard on you. It is not the thing to ask a gentleman to do. But please understand, sir, that I am not seeking for men to press now, but to find my brother officer who is missing. Can you help me in that?”“I’m afraid I can’t,” said Aleck, frankly; “but I will do all I can.”“Thank you; that’s right,” said the officer. “Come, Captain Lawrence, we are making some progress after all.”“I’m glad of it, sir,” replied the captain; “but, tell me, you pressed some men last night?”“Yes, we got seven sturdy fellows to the boats, in spite of a vigorous resistance.”“Seven?” said the captain. “Well, surely that must be quite as many as we have living in the little cluster of cliff cottages! Of course there are their wives and children!”“Yes,” said the lieutenant, drily; “we learned to our cost that they had wives, and strapping daughters too.”“Then how can it be possible that your brother officer can be here? There is no one to keep him a prisoner.”“Well, it doesn’t seem likely,” said the officer, in a disappointed tone. “Unless,” he added, “these viragoes of women are keeping him, out of spite.”“There’s not the slightest probability of that,” said the captain. “I’m afraid, sir, that you will find an accident has befallen him.”The lieutenant shook his head, and then turned to Aleck.“You have a boat and a wonderfully retired nook where you keep her! Where is it—down below here?”“Your men came to the mouth of it last time you were here.”“What, last night?”“No, no; a fortnight ago.”“Ah, yes, I remember. You mean that narrow split in the rock; but surely no boat could go in there?”“Mine goes in, and out too,” said Aleck; “and it’s nearly as big as yours. But what of that?”“Is it likely that my brother officer, finding himself left behind, may have hidden himself there?”“Not a bit likely,” said Aleck; “but, let’s go and see!”“By all means,” said the captain; and Aleck led them off at once through the sunken garden and down to the slope which led into the chasm.“My word, what a place!” said the officer, in his admiration. “Wonderful! And this is your boat-house, eh?” he added, when, followed by his boat’s crew, they reached sea level and gazed into the great niche in which the kittiwake was securely moored.“Not a bad place,” said Aleck; “and it’s easy enough to get in and out when you know how.”“One moment,” said the officer; “here are plenty of cracks and crevices in the sides of this rift or cave, or whatever you call it, where a fellow might hide. Here, my lads, give a good loud hail or two! Raven—ahoy!”The hail rang out, the men shouting together, their powerful voices raising up a broadside of echoes as if the shout ran along zigzag to the mouth of the place before the hail passed out to sea, while at the first roar a multitude of sea-birds flung themselves off the shelf and flew up to the surface and away over the cliffs, shrieking and screaming in hundreds to add to the din.The men shouted again, and as soon as the echoes had died out sent forth a louder roar than ever; but there was no answering cry, and the lieutenant turned disappointed away.“He is evidently not here,” he said. “Forward, my lads, back up to the house. We’re on the wrong tack, squire,” he continued, speaking to Aleck. “Look here; I’m going back to our boat in the smugglers’ cove to coast along each way as close in as we can get for the rocks. He may have gone off a rock into deep water during one of the scuffles and then swum to some nook or cavern, out of which he can’t get on account of deep water.”“That seems likely,” said Aleck. “Like me to come and show you some of the caves?”“Smugglers’ caves?”“Oh, no; little places where you couldn’t row in, but where anyone might hide.”“Ah, that’s better,” said the officer. “You’ll do that?”“Of course I will,” said Aleck; and after a short visit to the house Aleck led the boat’s crew and their leader across the cliff and down the rough descent, feeling greatly relieved on finding that there was not a fisherman’s wife in sight, for he was pretty certain that his appearance in company with their enemies might prove to be a very uncomfortable thing.In due time the beach was reached, and the keepers of the sloop’s boat backed in to allow the officer and crew to get aboard, after which there was an order or two given, and then they rowed out a short distance and, keeping in as close as possible, visited cave and crevice for about half a mile, landing wherever it was possible, sometimes climbing over weed-hung slimy rocks, sometimes wading, and then returning to continue the search in the opposite direction far past the entrance to the Den, before rowing back after an exhaustive search.The officer gave the word to stop as the entrance to Aleck’s boat haven was reached, and, under guidance, rowed and poled up till he could land.“Thank you for all you’ve done, youngster,” said the lieutenant; “it has been a barren search, but I shall give up for to-day. Maybe I shall look you up again. Meantime I hope you’ll keep your ears open, and if you can pick up anything worth having hoist a white tablecloth or sheet on your boat’s mast on the top of the cliff, if it’s by day, and if it’s night, burn one of the blue lights I’ll leave with you. Neither of these things will be fighting against your neighbours the smugglers, but only helping us to find our midshipman and making more friends than you know. You’ll do this for us?”“Of course,” said Aleck, eagerly.“Hand out three of those blue lights, coxswain! Next time we come, squire, I’ll bring you a rocket or two. There; thankye, and good day!”“Good day,” said Aleck; “but can you make your way out?”“My lads will, never fear,” said the lieutenant, and Aleck stood with the blue lights in his hand, watching the boat till it passed round one of the angles and was out of sight, when he turned round, to find that he was not alone.“You here, Tom?” he said to the sailor, who was standing in the shadow of the boat haven, close up to the dark rocks.“Me it is, sir.”“What is it—any news?”“Me, sir? No; on’y what I got when I come across to see what was going on about the press-gang coming here. Say, Master Aleck, I told yer so.”“Yes, Tom, you told me so,” replied the lad, warmly. “There, I’m fagged out; let’s get up to the house. I want some dinner. You want some too, don’t you?”“Oh, I dunno, sir! I had my braxfus.”“So did I, Tom, hours and hours ago. What time is it?”“’Bout four, sir.”“Late as that? Come and have some dinner with me. It’s a horrible business about that poor midshipman.”“Ay, ’tis, sir. Smart lad as ever I see.”“Where do you think he can be?”“Carried out by the tide, I should say, sir.”“Oh! Horrible! Then you don’t think the smugglers can have taken him prisoner?”“Tchah! What could they do with prisoners, Master Aleck? May have given him a crack on the head and knocked him into the water. Easy done in a scrimmage, and nobody none the wiser.”“But mightn’t he be hid in the smugglers’ cave?”“Well, he might be, sir, if there is one. If he is he’s shut up tight and they’ve took away them as knows how to get in.”“Yes,” said Aleck, as they reached the garden and caught sight of the gardener watching them. “I say, Tom, there must be a big cavern somewhere.”“Very like, sir.”“You don’t know where it is?”“Not me, sir.”“Don’t look that way, but tell me what you think. Isn’t old Ness likely to know?”“Very likely, sir; but if he did know he wouldn’t tell.”“Then you think he is mixed up with the smuggling gang?”“That’s so, sir.”“Then I’ll make him tell me,” said Aleck, between his teeth.“Do, sir, for I should like us to find the young gen’leman, he being an officer and me an old Navy man. Make old Ness tell yer. You are good friends with him, arn’t yer?”“Yes, of course,” said Aleck. “No, of course not,” he cried, angrily, for like a flash came the recollection of the scene that morning, when the gardener had protested against being suspected of having any dealings with such outlawed men. “Oh, Tom, what an unlucky fellow I am!”“Feel like that, sir?”“Yes.”“That’s because you wants yer dinner very bad, Master Aleck. You get indoors and have your salt beef and biscuit, or whatever your Jane has stowed away, and you’ll feel like a noo man.”
Captain Lawrence listened with knitted brows to his nephew’s narration of all that had taken place in the night, and shook his head.
“It’s miserable work, my boy,” he said; “so piteous for the poor women. Well, perhaps good will come out of evil, and it may be the breaking up of a notorious smuggling gang.”
It was just as Aleck was finishing his third cup of coffee, which he set down sharply in the saucer, startled by the sudden rush of the gardener to the open window, through which he thrust his head without ceremony.
“Here’s—” he began, excitedly. “Oh!”
For a big heavy hand appeared upon his shoulder, clutching him hard and snatching him away.
“What is the meaning of this, boy?” cried the captain.
Aleck’s head was already out of the window, and he drew it back again to answer:
“A lot of sailors, uncle, and their officer.”
The lad’s words were followed by the appearance of Jane, whose eyes were wide open and staring, her mouth following suit to some extent, so that she had to close her lips before saying:
“Plee, sir, orficer, sir. To see you, sir.”
The captain nodded shortly and rose to go, followed by Aleck, out into the little ball, at whose door a naval officer and a boat’s crew of men were waiting.
“Good morning,” said the officer, shortly; and then turning upon Aleck, “Hallo, young man, I’ve seen you before!”
“Yes, in Rockabie harbour,” said the lad, looking at him wonderingly, while his heart began to beat fast as he glanced at the party of sturdy sailors.
“Ah, to be sure,” said the officer; then to the captain again, “You are aware, I suppose, that we made a descent last night upon your nest of smugglers here.”
“I have just learned, sir, what took place,” said the captain, coldly.
“Of course. Well, sir, in the struggle and after trouble with the women, who resented the taking away of the men, the young officer of the second boat was missed.”
“Not the midshipman who was with your boat the other day?” said Aleck, eagerly.
“Eh? Yes,” cried the officer. “What do you know about him?”
“Only that we had a few words together.”
“And you know that he was missed?”
“I did not know till you told me,” said Aleck.
“Didn’t know, I suppose, that there was that struggle over yonder by the cove last night, eh?”
“Yes,” said Aleck, frankly; “I saw some of it.”
“Ah! Then you were with the smugglers, eh?”
“No,” replied Aleck; and he briefly related his experience, including his being awakened by shots.
“Ah, to be sure,” said the officer; “they’re a nice daring set of scoundrels—fired on the King’s men; but we got the rascals who did. Well, sir, what’s become of our officer?”
“How should I know?” said Aleck, staring.
“You must have seen something of what went on after we started back.”
“No,” said Aleck. “There seemed to be no one there but the women.”
“But you saw them and heard what they said? You heard them talking about him?”
“No, I did not go near the women.”
“Why?” said the officer, sharply.
“Because I was afraid they would think I had something to do with the press-gang coming.”
“Well, he must be found. He’s here somewhere.”
“Is there any possibility of the poor young fellow having been knocked overboard during the struggle?”
“Not the slightest,” replied the officer, shortly. “He may have been knocked down somewhere on the way between the cottages, where we pounced upon the men, and the landing-place. Well, he must be found.”
“Of course,” said the captain, quietly. “You will go up, then, and search the smugglers’ cottages—fishermen they call themselves?”
“We have searched them thoroughly,” said the officer, “and we’ve come across now, sir, to search your place—what do they call it?—the Den.”
Aleck glanced at his uncle’s face, and could see the blood gathering in his cheeks.
“Search my house, sir?” he said. “Are you so mad as to suppose that I should entrap one of the King’s officers?”
“Possibly, sir,” replied the visitor, “on thequid pro quoprinciple, to hold on ransom. We’ve got some of your friends; you have snatched at one of ours.”
“This is the first time, sir, that I’ve been led to suppose that I was a friend to the smugglers. Eh, Aleck?”
“What nonsense, uncle!” cried the lad, indignantly.
“Oh, indeed, young gentleman!” said the officer, turning upon him sharply. “No friends of yours neither?”
“Certainly not,” cried Aleck.
“Ho! Then, perhaps you will be good enough to explain how it is that the gardener here is the smugglers’ chief assistant in signalling, spying, and warning them?”
“He isn’t,” said Aleck, sharply.
“He is,” said the officer. “What is more, I found that cargoes are run down here in a cove or rift upon your coast, where a handy boat is kept.”
“We’ve got a boat down the rift,” said Aleck.
“Exactly; one that runs to and fro between here and Rockabie.”
“Yes,” said Aleck, mockingly; “to fetch fishing-tackle and grocery—and writing paper; eh, uncle?”
The captain nodded, while the young lieutenant went on:
“And to take messages from here to Rockabie.”
“No,” cried Aleck; but the officer went on, quietly:
“Look here, sir, I am credibly informed that it was your boat that rescued one of the most daring of the smugglers on the night of an encounter we had there—a man whom I was holding with my own hands till I was savagely struck down. It is quite likely that this may be examined into later on, but my business now is to find my messmate. Look here, it will save a good deal of trouble, and make things much easier for you, if you put me up to the place where the prisoner is hidden.”
“Perhaps it would,” said Aleck, firmly now; “but I tell you I know nothing whatever about your young midshipman. If you think he is hidden somewhere here you are quite wrong.”
“Perhaps so,” said the officer, sternly, “but we shall see.”
Then, turning to the captain, he said, shortly:
“I shall have to search your place, sir,” and then rather jeeringly, as if suggesting that it would not matter in the least if the captain objected, he added: “I presume that you will not put difficulties in my way?”
“None whatever, sir,” said the captain. “And as an old commissioned officer in his Majesty’s service should feel it my duty to help in any way I could.”
“Eh? Oh, thank you,” said the officer, changing his manner. “I beg your pardon. I heard the people called you captain, but I supposed that you were captain of some fishing or trading boat.”
The captain bowed coldly.
“Aleck,” he said, “do you know anything about Dunning being intimate with the smugglers?”
“Yes, uncle; I have been suspecting it lately.”
“Oh, Master Aleck!” came from outside. “Me? How can you say such a word! When did you ever know me smuggle anything? Oh, my dear lad, tell the truth; when did you—whenever did you know me smuggle anything?”
“Often,” said Aleck, bluntly.
“What; tea and sperrits and ’bacco and silk?”
“No,” said Aleck; “but fruit.”
“Oh, fruit!” said the gardener, contemptuously. “What’s a bit of fruit?”
“Perhaps you will have my house and grounds searched at once, sir,” said the captain, waving the gardener back. “The house is small, and—”
“Stop a moment, sir,” said the young lieutenant, for such he proved to be; “will you give me your word of honour as an officer and a gentleman that my brother officer is not concealed about your premises?”
“Certainly,” said the captain. “I give you my word of honour that he is not; and I add to it that I have never had any dealings with the smugglers.”
“That is enough, sir. Now, will you tell me where we are to find their hiding-places, for they must have some stowages for the goods they run.”
“I assure you, sir, that I have not the slightest knowledge of any such places. I have often suspected the existence of a cave or caves. Aleck, my boy, do you know of any?”
Aleck turned sharply to speak, and as he did so he caught the gardener’s eyes fixed upon him with a peculiar glare that might have been threatening or imploring, the lad could not tell which; but he spoke out frankly at once:
“No, uncle. I’ve often wondered whether there was a smuggler’s cave, but I never found one.”
“Humph! That seems strange,” said the officer. “You have a boat?”
“Yes, I have a boat.”
“And go coasting and fishing about close in. Do you mean to tell me you never found anything of the kind?”
“Yes.”
“And you never saw a cargo being landed—I mean a cargo of smuggled goods?”
“Never,” said Aleck.
“Then you must have been very unobservant, young gentleman. I presume that you have seen smugglers about here?”
Aleck’s face lit up, and he once more caught Ness’s eyes fixed upon him as he spoke.
“Oh, yes,” he said; “several.”
“And you could direct us to their cottages?”
“I could,” said Aleck, “but I’m not going to.”
“Well done, Master Aleck!” shouted the gardener.
“Silence, sir,” said the captain, sternly. “Go on, Aleck.”
“I’ve no more to say, uncle,” replied the lad, “only that I’m not going to lead people to take and press men by force for sailors. Besides, the lieutenant does not need showing—he has been to the men’s cottages, and taken some of them.”
“To be sure,” said the officer, good-humouredly; “and I don’t want to be hard on you. It is not the thing to ask a gentleman to do. But please understand, sir, that I am not seeking for men to press now, but to find my brother officer who is missing. Can you help me in that?”
“I’m afraid I can’t,” said Aleck, frankly; “but I will do all I can.”
“Thank you; that’s right,” said the officer. “Come, Captain Lawrence, we are making some progress after all.”
“I’m glad of it, sir,” replied the captain; “but, tell me, you pressed some men last night?”
“Yes, we got seven sturdy fellows to the boats, in spite of a vigorous resistance.”
“Seven?” said the captain. “Well, surely that must be quite as many as we have living in the little cluster of cliff cottages! Of course there are their wives and children!”
“Yes,” said the lieutenant, drily; “we learned to our cost that they had wives, and strapping daughters too.”
“Then how can it be possible that your brother officer can be here? There is no one to keep him a prisoner.”
“Well, it doesn’t seem likely,” said the officer, in a disappointed tone. “Unless,” he added, “these viragoes of women are keeping him, out of spite.”
“There’s not the slightest probability of that,” said the captain. “I’m afraid, sir, that you will find an accident has befallen him.”
The lieutenant shook his head, and then turned to Aleck.
“You have a boat and a wonderfully retired nook where you keep her! Where is it—down below here?”
“Your men came to the mouth of it last time you were here.”
“What, last night?”
“No, no; a fortnight ago.”
“Ah, yes, I remember. You mean that narrow split in the rock; but surely no boat could go in there?”
“Mine goes in, and out too,” said Aleck; “and it’s nearly as big as yours. But what of that?”
“Is it likely that my brother officer, finding himself left behind, may have hidden himself there?”
“Not a bit likely,” said Aleck; “but, let’s go and see!”
“By all means,” said the captain; and Aleck led them off at once through the sunken garden and down to the slope which led into the chasm.
“My word, what a place!” said the officer, in his admiration. “Wonderful! And this is your boat-house, eh?” he added, when, followed by his boat’s crew, they reached sea level and gazed into the great niche in which the kittiwake was securely moored.
“Not a bad place,” said Aleck; “and it’s easy enough to get in and out when you know how.”
“One moment,” said the officer; “here are plenty of cracks and crevices in the sides of this rift or cave, or whatever you call it, where a fellow might hide. Here, my lads, give a good loud hail or two! Raven—ahoy!”
The hail rang out, the men shouting together, their powerful voices raising up a broadside of echoes as if the shout ran along zigzag to the mouth of the place before the hail passed out to sea, while at the first roar a multitude of sea-birds flung themselves off the shelf and flew up to the surface and away over the cliffs, shrieking and screaming in hundreds to add to the din.
The men shouted again, and as soon as the echoes had died out sent forth a louder roar than ever; but there was no answering cry, and the lieutenant turned disappointed away.
“He is evidently not here,” he said. “Forward, my lads, back up to the house. We’re on the wrong tack, squire,” he continued, speaking to Aleck. “Look here; I’m going back to our boat in the smugglers’ cove to coast along each way as close in as we can get for the rocks. He may have gone off a rock into deep water during one of the scuffles and then swum to some nook or cavern, out of which he can’t get on account of deep water.”
“That seems likely,” said Aleck. “Like me to come and show you some of the caves?”
“Smugglers’ caves?”
“Oh, no; little places where you couldn’t row in, but where anyone might hide.”
“Ah, that’s better,” said the officer. “You’ll do that?”
“Of course I will,” said Aleck; and after a short visit to the house Aleck led the boat’s crew and their leader across the cliff and down the rough descent, feeling greatly relieved on finding that there was not a fisherman’s wife in sight, for he was pretty certain that his appearance in company with their enemies might prove to be a very uncomfortable thing.
In due time the beach was reached, and the keepers of the sloop’s boat backed in to allow the officer and crew to get aboard, after which there was an order or two given, and then they rowed out a short distance and, keeping in as close as possible, visited cave and crevice for about half a mile, landing wherever it was possible, sometimes climbing over weed-hung slimy rocks, sometimes wading, and then returning to continue the search in the opposite direction far past the entrance to the Den, before rowing back after an exhaustive search.
The officer gave the word to stop as the entrance to Aleck’s boat haven was reached, and, under guidance, rowed and poled up till he could land.
“Thank you for all you’ve done, youngster,” said the lieutenant; “it has been a barren search, but I shall give up for to-day. Maybe I shall look you up again. Meantime I hope you’ll keep your ears open, and if you can pick up anything worth having hoist a white tablecloth or sheet on your boat’s mast on the top of the cliff, if it’s by day, and if it’s night, burn one of the blue lights I’ll leave with you. Neither of these things will be fighting against your neighbours the smugglers, but only helping us to find our midshipman and making more friends than you know. You’ll do this for us?”
“Of course,” said Aleck, eagerly.
“Hand out three of those blue lights, coxswain! Next time we come, squire, I’ll bring you a rocket or two. There; thankye, and good day!”
“Good day,” said Aleck; “but can you make your way out?”
“My lads will, never fear,” said the lieutenant, and Aleck stood with the blue lights in his hand, watching the boat till it passed round one of the angles and was out of sight, when he turned round, to find that he was not alone.
“You here, Tom?” he said to the sailor, who was standing in the shadow of the boat haven, close up to the dark rocks.
“Me it is, sir.”
“What is it—any news?”
“Me, sir? No; on’y what I got when I come across to see what was going on about the press-gang coming here. Say, Master Aleck, I told yer so.”
“Yes, Tom, you told me so,” replied the lad, warmly. “There, I’m fagged out; let’s get up to the house. I want some dinner. You want some too, don’t you?”
“Oh, I dunno, sir! I had my braxfus.”
“So did I, Tom, hours and hours ago. What time is it?”
“’Bout four, sir.”
“Late as that? Come and have some dinner with me. It’s a horrible business about that poor midshipman.”
“Ay, ’tis, sir. Smart lad as ever I see.”
“Where do you think he can be?”
“Carried out by the tide, I should say, sir.”
“Oh! Horrible! Then you don’t think the smugglers can have taken him prisoner?”
“Tchah! What could they do with prisoners, Master Aleck? May have given him a crack on the head and knocked him into the water. Easy done in a scrimmage, and nobody none the wiser.”
“But mightn’t he be hid in the smugglers’ cave?”
“Well, he might be, sir, if there is one. If he is he’s shut up tight and they’ve took away them as knows how to get in.”
“Yes,” said Aleck, as they reached the garden and caught sight of the gardener watching them. “I say, Tom, there must be a big cavern somewhere.”
“Very like, sir.”
“You don’t know where it is?”
“Not me, sir.”
“Don’t look that way, but tell me what you think. Isn’t old Ness likely to know?”
“Very likely, sir; but if he did know he wouldn’t tell.”
“Then you think he is mixed up with the smuggling gang?”
“That’s so, sir.”
“Then I’ll make him tell me,” said Aleck, between his teeth.
“Do, sir, for I should like us to find the young gen’leman, he being an officer and me an old Navy man. Make old Ness tell yer. You are good friends with him, arn’t yer?”
“Yes, of course,” said Aleck. “No, of course not,” he cried, angrily, for like a flash came the recollection of the scene that morning, when the gardener had protested against being suspected of having any dealings with such outlawed men. “Oh, Tom, what an unlucky fellow I am!”
“Feel like that, sir?”
“Yes.”
“That’s because you wants yer dinner very bad, Master Aleck. You get indoors and have your salt beef and biscuit, or whatever your Jane has stowed away, and you’ll feel like a noo man.”
Chapter Twenty.The party from the sloop-of-war came twice, led by the lieutenant, and had long and patient searches with Aleck in their boat ready to follow or lead the men into one or other of the openings in the rocks where the waves ran in with a peculiarly hollow echoing rush at low water, but which were covered deeply at half tide. These chasms were examined diligently, for the lieutenant had noted that the tide was very low when the attack was made. But nothing was discovered.Aleck noted that the young officer looked very despondent on the second occasion, and the next morning when the lad went down to the smugglers’ cove to meet the boat, which he had sighted from his look-out place on the cliff, where with Tom’s help he had set up a spar ready for signalling, he found another officer in command of a fresh set of men.The lad met them as a matter of course, feeling that his services would be welcome, but encountered a short, sharp rebuff in the shape of an enquiry as to who he was, and, upon explaining, he was told sharply to go about his business.“Look here, sir,” said the officer, “I don’t want any natives to lead me on a false scent.”“Very well,” said Aleck, quietly, and he climbed up the cliff again, and after noting which way the boat’s head was turned he went off beyond the smugglers’ cove and reached the great gap, where he descended to the shelf where he had found the lanthorn and tinder-box.He had just reached it, when a figure started up and began to hurry inland, just giving him a glimpse of her face before she disappeared among the rocks, and he recognised Eben Megg’s wife.“Been looking out to sea, poor thing!” thought Aleck. “I’m afraid she’ll watch for a long time before she sees him coming back.”He forgot the woman again directly in the business of watching the boat, which kept on coming into sight far below and disappearing again, drawing forth the mental remark from Aleck, “Labour in vain,” for he felt that all the openings below where he stood had been thoroughly searched.Aleck hung about till the afternoon, and saw the boat shoot off from beyond one of the points in the direction of the sloop lying at anchor, and then went home.The next morning, when he went up to his signalling spar to direct the glass at the sloop, she was not there; but the cutter, which had been absent, lay in about the same place, and after a time the lad made out another boat coming towards the smugglers’ cove.“A fresh party,” he said to himself. “Well, I should like to help them find the poor fellow, but if they want help they must come and ask me; I’m not going to be snubbed again.”He closed his glass and struck off by the shortest way across the head of the smugglers’ cove, making once more for the high ground beyond, for it commanded the coast in two directions. But long before he reached his favourite spot he again caught sight of the fluttering blue petticoat of a woman, and saw her hurrying inland.“Poor woman!” thought Aleck. “She needn’t be afraid of me.”He kept an eye upon her till she disappeared, and then went on to the niche in the rock face, settled himself down with his glass, and watched the cutter’s boat, which was steadily pulling in. The birds meanwhile kept on flitting down from where they sat in rows along the inaccessible shelves, skimmed over the water, dived, and came up again with small fishes in their beaks, to return to feed the young, which often enough had been carried off by some great gull, one of the many which glided here and there, uttering their peculiarly querulous, mournful cries, so different in tone from the sharp, hearty calls of the larger inland birds.There were a good many sailing about overhead, Aleck noted, and they were more noisy than usual, and this, judging from old lore which he had picked up from Tom Bodger and the fishermen, he attributed to a coming change in the weather, wind perhaps, when the sea, instead of being soft blue and calm, might be lashed by a storm to send the waves thundering in upon the rocks, to break up into cataracts of broken water and send the glittering foam whirling aloft in clouds.“No more hunts then,” thought Aleck; and then aloud to a great white-breasted gull which floated overhead, watching him curiously, “Well, what are you looking at? I’ve not come egging now.”The gull uttered a mournful cry and glided off seaward, to dive down directly after beyond the cliff, its cry sounding distant and faint.The boat came on nearer and nearer till it, too, disappeared, being hidden by the great bluff to his left.Then half a dozen more gulls rose up and came skimming along the rugged trough-like depression towards where he sat, with bird-covered ledges to left and right. When they caught sight of him they rose higher with a graceful curve, and began wheeling round, uttering their discordant cries, some of the more daring coming nearer and nearer upon their widespread spotless wings, white almost as snow, till a sway would send one wing down, the other up, giving the looker-on a glimpse of the soft bluish grey of their backs, save in the cases of the larger birds—the great thieves and pirates among the young—which were often black.There was no boat to watch now, so Aleck, after sweeping the horizon in search of the sloop-of-war, gradually turned the end of his glass inland over the sweep of down and wild moor, till, just as he was in the act of lowering it, he caught sight, some distance off and directly inland, of some object which looked like a short, pudgy, black and white bird sitting upon a rock.“What’s that?” he said, steadying the glass which had given him the glimpse in passing over it; but, try he would, he could not catch the object again.“Couldn’t have been a rabbit,” he muttered. “Fancy, perhaps,” and he lowered the glass, to begin closing it as he trusted to his unaided vision and looked in the direction of the grey weathered rocks.“Why, there it is!” he cried. “It’s a black bird with a white breast. It must be some big kind of puffin sitting with its feathers stuck-up to dry.”He began to focus the glass once more, and raised it to his eye; but he could not get the object in the field of the glass again, nor yet when he lowered it catch a glimpse of that which he sought with his naked eye.Turning away to look down the deep depression, he began to watch the birds again, when he was impressed by the cry of one which seemed to have settled, after passing overhead, somewhere on the open beyond the ridge in which lay the niche containing the old lanthorn.“Ahoy-oy-oy!” he cried, softly, trying to imitate, but with very poor success, the gull’s querulous cry.“Tah! tah! That’s a jackdaw,” said Aleck, half aloud. “Plain enough; but that mournful wail! It must be a different kind of gull. Black-backed perhaps, with a bad cold through getting wet. I wonder whether a gull could be taught to talk! I don’t see why not. Let’s see, parrots can be taught, of course, and cockatoos learn to say a few words. So do jackdaws and starlings, but very few. Oh, yes! then there’s the raven. Uncle said he knew of one at an old country inn that used to say ‘Coming, sir,’ whenever anyone called for the ostler. Then there are those Indian birds they call Mynahs. Uncle says that some of them talk beautifully. Hallo! There he goes again! It’s just like ‘Ahoy–oy–oy–oy!’ Plain enough to deceive anyone if it came off the sea. I’ll wait till I catch sight of the gull that makes that noise, and next nesting-time I’ll watch for some of the same kind and get two or three of the young ones to bring up. If they can say what sounds something like ‘Ahoy!’ so plainly it ought to be possible to teach one to say more.”Aleck sat and mused again, running over in his mind such gulls as he knew, and coming to the conclusion that unless it was some unusual specimen, of great vocal powers, it could not be the black-backed nor the lesser black-backed, nor the black-headed herring gull or kittiwake.“I don’t know what it is,” he said, “but, whatever it may be, it’s a good one to talk,” and as he listened he heard the peculiar, weird, wailing cry again, sounding something like “Ahoy!”“Gone now,” said Aleck, half aloud, as he keenly watched in the direction of the cry, which had now ceased. “It might as well have flown over this way instead of down over the cliff. Hooray! There it goes!”He shaded his eyes to follow the steady regular course of a large bronze black bird flying close down the trough-like depression, as close to the bottom as it could keep clear of the rocks, till it reached the end, where it dipped down towards the sea and disappeared.“Well, I’m a clever one,” cried the lad, with a scornful laugh; “lived ever since I can remember close to the sea, and been told the name of every bird that comes here in the winter and in the summer to nest, and didn’t know the cry of an old shag. Well, say that cry, for it was very different from the regular croak I know. He had been fishing, having a regular gorge, and ended by swallowing a weevil. The little wretch set up its spines, I suppose, as it was going down and stuck, making the old shag come up there to sit and cough to get rid of it. If ever I’m along with anyone who hears that noise and wants to know what it is I can tell him it’s a shag or a cormorant suffering from sore throat.”Aleck began to use the glass again, for the cutter’s boat came into sight for a few minutes, before gliding along close in once more, to be hidden by the perpendicular cliffs.“Gone,” he said to himself. “Well, they will not find the poor fellow, for I don’t believe they can search any better than we did. It’s very dreadful. Nice, good-looking chap; as clever as clever. Cocky and stuck-up; but what of that? Fellow gets into a uniform and has a cocked hat and a sword, it makes him feel that he is someone of consequence. How horrible, though! Comes along with the boat ashore over that press-gang kidnapping business, and the boat goes back without him. I wonder whether he was better off than I am, with a father and mother! They’ll have to know soon, and then I wonder what they’ll say!”Aleck gave another look round, sweeping the sea, and carrying his gaze round to the land, and then starting.“There it is again!” he said, eagerly, as his eyes rested upon the distant black and white object inland. “Come, I can get a shot at you this time,” he muttered, as, carefully keeping his eyes fixed upon the squat-looking object amongst the rocks, he slowly raised the glass. “I believe it must be a black and white rabbit. There are brown and white ones sometimes, for I’ve seen them, so I don’t see why there shouldn’t be black and white. Got you at last, my fine fellow. Ha, ha, ha,” he laughed. “How absurd! Why, it’s Eben Megg’s wife; just her face with the patch of black hair showing above that bit of rock she’s hiding behind. Why, she must be watching me. I know; poor thing, she’s watching for me to go away so that she can come and look out to sea again for poor Eben.”Aleck closed his glass and rose to make his way back along the cliff and leave the place clear, a feeling of gentlemanly delicacy urging him to go right off and not intrude his presence upon one who must be suffering terribly from anxiety and pain.“It seems so dreadful,” he mused, as he went right on without once turning his head in the woman’s direction; “but somehow it only seems fair that both sides should suffer. She’s all in misery because her husband has been dragged away. Yes, he said he’d come back to her, but it’s a great chance if she ever sees him again, and it’s as great a chance whether that poor young middy’s friends ever see him again. I don’t like it, and it’s a great pity there’s so much trouble in the world. Look at poor uncle! Why, I don’t know what real trouble is. I might have gone off to sea all in a huff after what uncle said, and then might have come back as badly off as poor old Double Dot. Well, I’m very, very sorry for poor Eben’s wife, and—there I go again with my poor Eben. Why should I talk like that about a man who has the character of being a wrecker as well as a smuggler? He was never friendly to me and I quite hate him. But whether the King wants men or whether he doesn’t, I just hate Eben so much that if he wanted to escape back to his wife and asked me to help him I’d do it; and just the same, if the smugglers had caught that young middy and were going to ill-use him—kill him perhaps—why, I’d help him too. It’s very stupid to be like that perhaps, sort of Jack o’ both sides, but I suppose it’s how I was made, and it isn’t my fault. Why, I say, it must be near dinner-time. How hungry I do feel!”The coast was clear for Eben Megg’s wife, and as soon as the lad was out of sight she once more made her way towards the cliff.
The party from the sloop-of-war came twice, led by the lieutenant, and had long and patient searches with Aleck in their boat ready to follow or lead the men into one or other of the openings in the rocks where the waves ran in with a peculiarly hollow echoing rush at low water, but which were covered deeply at half tide. These chasms were examined diligently, for the lieutenant had noted that the tide was very low when the attack was made. But nothing was discovered.
Aleck noted that the young officer looked very despondent on the second occasion, and the next morning when the lad went down to the smugglers’ cove to meet the boat, which he had sighted from his look-out place on the cliff, where with Tom’s help he had set up a spar ready for signalling, he found another officer in command of a fresh set of men.
The lad met them as a matter of course, feeling that his services would be welcome, but encountered a short, sharp rebuff in the shape of an enquiry as to who he was, and, upon explaining, he was told sharply to go about his business.
“Look here, sir,” said the officer, “I don’t want any natives to lead me on a false scent.”
“Very well,” said Aleck, quietly, and he climbed up the cliff again, and after noting which way the boat’s head was turned he went off beyond the smugglers’ cove and reached the great gap, where he descended to the shelf where he had found the lanthorn and tinder-box.
He had just reached it, when a figure started up and began to hurry inland, just giving him a glimpse of her face before she disappeared among the rocks, and he recognised Eben Megg’s wife.
“Been looking out to sea, poor thing!” thought Aleck. “I’m afraid she’ll watch for a long time before she sees him coming back.”
He forgot the woman again directly in the business of watching the boat, which kept on coming into sight far below and disappearing again, drawing forth the mental remark from Aleck, “Labour in vain,” for he felt that all the openings below where he stood had been thoroughly searched.
Aleck hung about till the afternoon, and saw the boat shoot off from beyond one of the points in the direction of the sloop lying at anchor, and then went home.
The next morning, when he went up to his signalling spar to direct the glass at the sloop, she was not there; but the cutter, which had been absent, lay in about the same place, and after a time the lad made out another boat coming towards the smugglers’ cove.
“A fresh party,” he said to himself. “Well, I should like to help them find the poor fellow, but if they want help they must come and ask me; I’m not going to be snubbed again.”
He closed his glass and struck off by the shortest way across the head of the smugglers’ cove, making once more for the high ground beyond, for it commanded the coast in two directions. But long before he reached his favourite spot he again caught sight of the fluttering blue petticoat of a woman, and saw her hurrying inland.
“Poor woman!” thought Aleck. “She needn’t be afraid of me.”
He kept an eye upon her till she disappeared, and then went on to the niche in the rock face, settled himself down with his glass, and watched the cutter’s boat, which was steadily pulling in. The birds meanwhile kept on flitting down from where they sat in rows along the inaccessible shelves, skimmed over the water, dived, and came up again with small fishes in their beaks, to return to feed the young, which often enough had been carried off by some great gull, one of the many which glided here and there, uttering their peculiarly querulous, mournful cries, so different in tone from the sharp, hearty calls of the larger inland birds.
There were a good many sailing about overhead, Aleck noted, and they were more noisy than usual, and this, judging from old lore which he had picked up from Tom Bodger and the fishermen, he attributed to a coming change in the weather, wind perhaps, when the sea, instead of being soft blue and calm, might be lashed by a storm to send the waves thundering in upon the rocks, to break up into cataracts of broken water and send the glittering foam whirling aloft in clouds.
“No more hunts then,” thought Aleck; and then aloud to a great white-breasted gull which floated overhead, watching him curiously, “Well, what are you looking at? I’ve not come egging now.”
The gull uttered a mournful cry and glided off seaward, to dive down directly after beyond the cliff, its cry sounding distant and faint.
The boat came on nearer and nearer till it, too, disappeared, being hidden by the great bluff to his left.
Then half a dozen more gulls rose up and came skimming along the rugged trough-like depression towards where he sat, with bird-covered ledges to left and right. When they caught sight of him they rose higher with a graceful curve, and began wheeling round, uttering their discordant cries, some of the more daring coming nearer and nearer upon their widespread spotless wings, white almost as snow, till a sway would send one wing down, the other up, giving the looker-on a glimpse of the soft bluish grey of their backs, save in the cases of the larger birds—the great thieves and pirates among the young—which were often black.
There was no boat to watch now, so Aleck, after sweeping the horizon in search of the sloop-of-war, gradually turned the end of his glass inland over the sweep of down and wild moor, till, just as he was in the act of lowering it, he caught sight, some distance off and directly inland, of some object which looked like a short, pudgy, black and white bird sitting upon a rock.
“What’s that?” he said, steadying the glass which had given him the glimpse in passing over it; but, try he would, he could not catch the object again.
“Couldn’t have been a rabbit,” he muttered. “Fancy, perhaps,” and he lowered the glass, to begin closing it as he trusted to his unaided vision and looked in the direction of the grey weathered rocks.
“Why, there it is!” he cried. “It’s a black bird with a white breast. It must be some big kind of puffin sitting with its feathers stuck-up to dry.”
He began to focus the glass once more, and raised it to his eye; but he could not get the object in the field of the glass again, nor yet when he lowered it catch a glimpse of that which he sought with his naked eye.
Turning away to look down the deep depression, he began to watch the birds again, when he was impressed by the cry of one which seemed to have settled, after passing overhead, somewhere on the open beyond the ridge in which lay the niche containing the old lanthorn.
“Ahoy-oy-oy!” he cried, softly, trying to imitate, but with very poor success, the gull’s querulous cry.
“Tah! tah! That’s a jackdaw,” said Aleck, half aloud. “Plain enough; but that mournful wail! It must be a different kind of gull. Black-backed perhaps, with a bad cold through getting wet. I wonder whether a gull could be taught to talk! I don’t see why not. Let’s see, parrots can be taught, of course, and cockatoos learn to say a few words. So do jackdaws and starlings, but very few. Oh, yes! then there’s the raven. Uncle said he knew of one at an old country inn that used to say ‘Coming, sir,’ whenever anyone called for the ostler. Then there are those Indian birds they call Mynahs. Uncle says that some of them talk beautifully. Hallo! There he goes again! It’s just like ‘Ahoy–oy–oy–oy!’ Plain enough to deceive anyone if it came off the sea. I’ll wait till I catch sight of the gull that makes that noise, and next nesting-time I’ll watch for some of the same kind and get two or three of the young ones to bring up. If they can say what sounds something like ‘Ahoy!’ so plainly it ought to be possible to teach one to say more.”
Aleck sat and mused again, running over in his mind such gulls as he knew, and coming to the conclusion that unless it was some unusual specimen, of great vocal powers, it could not be the black-backed nor the lesser black-backed, nor the black-headed herring gull or kittiwake.
“I don’t know what it is,” he said, “but, whatever it may be, it’s a good one to talk,” and as he listened he heard the peculiar, weird, wailing cry again, sounding something like “Ahoy!”
“Gone now,” said Aleck, half aloud, as he keenly watched in the direction of the cry, which had now ceased. “It might as well have flown over this way instead of down over the cliff. Hooray! There it goes!”
He shaded his eyes to follow the steady regular course of a large bronze black bird flying close down the trough-like depression, as close to the bottom as it could keep clear of the rocks, till it reached the end, where it dipped down towards the sea and disappeared.
“Well, I’m a clever one,” cried the lad, with a scornful laugh; “lived ever since I can remember close to the sea, and been told the name of every bird that comes here in the winter and in the summer to nest, and didn’t know the cry of an old shag. Well, say that cry, for it was very different from the regular croak I know. He had been fishing, having a regular gorge, and ended by swallowing a weevil. The little wretch set up its spines, I suppose, as it was going down and stuck, making the old shag come up there to sit and cough to get rid of it. If ever I’m along with anyone who hears that noise and wants to know what it is I can tell him it’s a shag or a cormorant suffering from sore throat.”
Aleck began to use the glass again, for the cutter’s boat came into sight for a few minutes, before gliding along close in once more, to be hidden by the perpendicular cliffs.
“Gone,” he said to himself. “Well, they will not find the poor fellow, for I don’t believe they can search any better than we did. It’s very dreadful. Nice, good-looking chap; as clever as clever. Cocky and stuck-up; but what of that? Fellow gets into a uniform and has a cocked hat and a sword, it makes him feel that he is someone of consequence. How horrible, though! Comes along with the boat ashore over that press-gang kidnapping business, and the boat goes back without him. I wonder whether he was better off than I am, with a father and mother! They’ll have to know soon, and then I wonder what they’ll say!”
Aleck gave another look round, sweeping the sea, and carrying his gaze round to the land, and then starting.
“There it is again!” he said, eagerly, as his eyes rested upon the distant black and white object inland. “Come, I can get a shot at you this time,” he muttered, as, carefully keeping his eyes fixed upon the squat-looking object amongst the rocks, he slowly raised the glass. “I believe it must be a black and white rabbit. There are brown and white ones sometimes, for I’ve seen them, so I don’t see why there shouldn’t be black and white. Got you at last, my fine fellow. Ha, ha, ha,” he laughed. “How absurd! Why, it’s Eben Megg’s wife; just her face with the patch of black hair showing above that bit of rock she’s hiding behind. Why, she must be watching me. I know; poor thing, she’s watching for me to go away so that she can come and look out to sea again for poor Eben.”
Aleck closed his glass and rose to make his way back along the cliff and leave the place clear, a feeling of gentlemanly delicacy urging him to go right off and not intrude his presence upon one who must be suffering terribly from anxiety and pain.
“It seems so dreadful,” he mused, as he went right on without once turning his head in the woman’s direction; “but somehow it only seems fair that both sides should suffer. She’s all in misery because her husband has been dragged away. Yes, he said he’d come back to her, but it’s a great chance if she ever sees him again, and it’s as great a chance whether that poor young middy’s friends ever see him again. I don’t like it, and it’s a great pity there’s so much trouble in the world. Look at poor uncle! Why, I don’t know what real trouble is. I might have gone off to sea all in a huff after what uncle said, and then might have come back as badly off as poor old Double Dot. Well, I’m very, very sorry for poor Eben’s wife, and—there I go again with my poor Eben. Why should I talk like that about a man who has the character of being a wrecker as well as a smuggler? He was never friendly to me and I quite hate him. But whether the King wants men or whether he doesn’t, I just hate Eben so much that if he wanted to escape back to his wife and asked me to help him I’d do it; and just the same, if the smugglers had caught that young middy and were going to ill-use him—kill him perhaps—why, I’d help him too. It’s very stupid to be like that perhaps, sort of Jack o’ both sides, but I suppose it’s how I was made, and it isn’t my fault. Why, I say, it must be near dinner-time. How hungry I do feel!”
The coast was clear for Eben Megg’s wife, and as soon as the lad was out of sight she once more made her way towards the cliff.