Winter and summer, every night about six o'clock, a tall man, dressed in
blue, strode over the moor. Sometimes he looked on the ground for a long
time together, and seemed to be buried in deep thought. When he came to
the stream he always found another man waiting for him on the far side,
and this man was accompanied by a rough water-spaniel. The two friends,
who were both coastguards, held a little chat, and then the dog was told
to go over for the letters. The spaniel swam across, received the blue
despatches, and carried them to his master; then, with a cheery
good-night, the men turned back and went across the dark moor to their
homes.
In the morning the tall coastguard was astir very early. He walked along
the rock tops with his old telescope under his arm, and looked acutely
at the vessels that crept round the bay. During the middle of the day he
had little to do. In fine weather he would sit outside his door with a
book, and in bad weather he was always to be found, from ten to four
o'clock, on the long settle beside the great fire in his little cottage.
He was one of the old school, and had entered the service at the time
when civilians were admitted, so he had the utmost contempt for the new
school of boatmen who came from on board men-of-war. He was rarely
troubled with visits from inspecting officers; in fact, after a certain
memorable occurrence, the commander of the station let him alone. A very
shrewd officer wished to show his own cleverness, and to find out his
men's weakness; so one night, when thick clouds were flying across the
moon, he crept round the bay in a six-oared cutter, ran ashore on the
sand, hauled up half a dozen empty kegs, and told his men to bury them
in the sand. This ingenious captain proceeded as he fancied smugglers
would have done, and he intended to go round to the coastguard's cottage
and inform him of the trick in the morning. Just as the casks had been
triumphantly covered, a voice called sharply, "Who goes there?"
The clever officer was thrown off his guard, and was too confused to
speak.
The challenge was repeated, and presently a couple of bullets whizzed
sharply among the party. The coastguard had emptied both his pistols,
and one of the bullets cut through the officer's shoulder-knot.
The modern coastguardmen never expect to find such an animal as a
smuggler: all contraband business is done by dint of craft and not by
daring. Firemen and engineers scoop out coal from the bottom of a ship's
bunkers and fill the space up with tobacco. Sometimes a clever carpenter
will actually hollow out a beam in the forecastle or a block of wood
which is used as a stool; the whole article looks perfectly solid, and
the Custom-house officers are apt to pass it by. But our friend the
coastguard had been used to the old-fashioned smugglers--desperate men
who would let fly a ball on the very slightest provocation.
Before the piping times of peace came he had known what it was to charge
with a party right amongst a gang of desperate fellows who were bumping
kegs ashore.
When in the grey of the evening the low black lugger crept stealthily
towards the shore, the coastguard had been used to stalk the gliding
vessel like some wild beast. He could not row off and board her, because
the lugger would have spread her brown wings and flown away into the
uttermost dark. The coastguardsmen had to catch the smugglers in the act
of bringing their goods ashore, and in order to do this he had to
contend against a conspiracy of the villagers, who were always ready to
lend their horses and their labour to those who were cheating the king.
No amount of logic could ever persuade the small farmer that smuggling
was in any way immoral, so the coastguard had to combat the cunning of
the bold sailors who ran across from Cherbourg, and the still greater
cunning of the slouching fellows who signalled his movements from the
shore. This was his training, and when the time came for smuggling to be
given over entirely to merchant seamen instead of being carried on by
desperadoes, the change left the old officer still ready and resolute,
and quick with his pistol.
It was well for the Revenue that one at least of their servants retained
the habits and instincts of the ancient race of preventive-men.
One night, just as the tide was flowing, our friend stepped out of his
cottage and looked across the bay. Suddenly he saw a light, which
flashed for a short time and then was darkened; another flash came and
then another; the flood was pouring south in a sombre stream; there was
not a gleam on the water, and the whole sea looked like a huge dark
abyss. From the depths of the troubled blackness the coastguard saw
another light flash back in answer to the one which had been waved from
the shore; the seaward light was simply like the ordinary mast-head
lantern of a fishing-boat; but the coastguard noticed that it was waved
three times, as if in answer to a set signal. He did not quite like the
look of things, so he got out a pony from the stables at the Hall and
galloped around till he was near the place from which he guessed that
the flashes had come. He lay down amongst the long grass and waited in
an agony of expectation for something that might help him to solve the
puzzle. It turned out that a set of fellows had determined to go back to
the old ways, and the flash that the coastguard saw from the sea was
shown from an ordinary herring-boat which now lay perilously close to
the beach. He saw the black hull wavering like a shadow amid the
uncertain gloom and the solemn water. Presently a hand touched him, and
a terrible thrill of momentary terror shook his nerves. The man that
touched him gave a sharp cry and recoiled; before he could utter another
sound the coastguard was upon him, and the muzzle of a great
horse-pistol was clapped to his face. The coastguard said: "Tell me
where they are going to land?"
The prostrate man hesitated; whereupon his stern assailant said: "I'll
give you until I count three!"