Lieutenant Lipscombe's eye had grown rapidly better, and his temper
rapidly worse. He had grumbled at Chips for being so long over his task
of repairing the deck and hatchway, and Chips had responded by leaving
off to sharpen his tools, after which he had diligently set traps to
catch his superior officer, who never went near the carpenter without
running risks of laming himself by treading upon nails half buried in
the deck, or being knocked down by pieces of wood delicately poised upon
one end so that the slightest touch would send them over with a crash.
Chips never trod upon the upright nails, cut himself against the tools,
or touched the pieces of wood or planks to make them fall. He moved
about slowly, like a bear, and somehow seemed to be charmed; but it was
different with the lieutenant: he never went near to grumble without
putting his foot straight upon the first upright clout-nail, or leaning
his arm or hand upon some ticklishly-balanced piece of plank. The
consequences were that he was several times a good deal hurt, and then
Chips seemed exceedingly sorry, and said he was.
But the lieutenant forgot his little accidents next day, and went
straight to the carpenter, bullied him again, and after bearing it for
awhile Chips's adze would become so blunt that he was obliged to go off
to the grindstone, where he would stop for a couple of hours, a good
deal of which time was spent in oiling the spindle before he began.
At last, though he was obliged to finish his task, and after waiting for
the deck to be done as the time when he would go straight into harbour
and report Hilary's desertion, as he persisted in calling it, Lieutenant
Lipscombe concluded that he would not go, but give the young officer a
chance to come back.
Meanwhile he had cruised about, chased and boarded vessels without there
being the slightest necessity, put in at one or two places where he
heard rumours that the Young Pretender was expected to land off the
coast somewhere close at hand, heard the report contradicted at the next
place he touched at, and then went cruising up and down once more.
One day he chased and boarded a lugger that bore despatches from France
to certain emissaries in England; but the lieutenant did not find the
despatches, only some dried fish, which he captured and had conveyed on
board the cutter.
His men grumbled, and said that Master Leigh ought to be found, and
there was some talk of petitioning the lieutenant to form another
expedition in search of the missing man; but the lieutenant had no
intention of going ashore in the dark to get his men knocked about by
invisible foes without the prospect of a grand haul of prize-money at
the end; so he turned a deaf ear to all suggestions for such a
proceeding, and kept on cruising up and down.
"I tell you what it is," said Tom Tully on the evening of Hilary's
escape, as the men were all grouped together in the forecastle enjoying
a smoke and a yarn or two, "it strikes me as we're doing a wonderful lot
o' good upon this here station. What do you say, Jack Brown?"
"Wonderful!" said the boatswain, falling into the speaker's sarcastic
vein.
"Ah!" said Chips, "we shall never get all our prize-money spent, boys."
"No," said the corporal of marines, "never. I say, speaking as a
orsifer, oughtn't we to have another one in place of Master Leigh?"
"No," said Tom Tully. "We couldn't get another like he."
"That's a true word, Tommy," said Billy Waters, who did not often agree
with the big sailor. "We couldn't get another now he's lost."
"But that's all werry well," said Chips; "but it won't do. If I lost my
adze or caulking-hammer overboard, I must have another, mustn't I?" No
one answered, and he continued:
"If you lost the rammer of the big gun, Billy Waters, or the corporal
here hadn't got his bayonet, he'd want a new one; so why shouldn't we
have a new orsifer?"
"Don't know," said Billy Waters gruffly; and as the carpenter looked at
each in turn, the men all shook their heads, and then they all smoked in
silence.
"I wishes as we could find him again," said Tom Tully; "and as he'd
chuck the skipper overboard, or send him afloat in the dinghy, and
command the cutter hisself, and I don't kear who tells the luff as I
said it."
"No one ain't going to tell on you, Tommy," said Billy Waters
reprovingly; for the big sailor had looked defiantly round, and ended by
staring him defiantly in the face. "We all wishes as the young chap
could be found, and that he was back aboard; and I think as it ought to
be all reported and another expedition sent."
There was a growl of approval at this as there had been before when
similar ideas were promulgated; but the lieutenant sat in his cabin, and
nothing was done.
The lights were burning brightly, and as it was a dead calm the anchor
had been let go, so that the cutter should not be swept along the coast
by the racing tide. The night had come on very dark since the moon had
set, and the watch scanned the surface of the sea in an idle mood, that
task being soon done, for there was very little sea visible to scan,
and, coming to the conclusion that it was a night when they would be
able to watch just as well with their ears, they made themselves
comfortable and gazed longingly at the shore.
There was nothing to tempt them there but that it _was_ shore, and they
would have preferred being there to loitering on shipboard, though there
was not so much as a cottage light to be seen from where they lay.
A large lugger propelled by a dozen sweeps passed them in the darkness,
but so silently that they did not hear so much as the splash of an oar,
and a drowsy feeling seemed to pervade the whole crew.
"I'll be bound to say if we was to set up a song with a good rattling
chorus he'd kick up a row," said Billy Waters, getting up from where he
was seated upon the deck, going to the side, and leaning over. "For my
part I'd--Hullo! Lookye here, Jack Brown; what do you make of them
there lights?"
He pointed as he spoke to a couple of dim stars high up on the cliff and
placed diagonally.
"Signal," said the boatswain decidedly.
"For us?" said Tom Tully.
"No," said the gunner; "for some smuggling craft. Beg pardon, your
honour," he continued as the lieutenant came forward, "but what do you
make o' them there lights?"
The lieutenant had a long look, and then, with a display of energy that
was unusual with him, he exclaimed, "It is a signal for boats; there's a
landing going on."
His words seemed to electrify everyone on board, and the men watched the
lights on shore with intense eagerness, seeing prize-money in them, as
they did in every boat sent from the cutter; while, to test the lights
ashore as to whether they really formed a signal, or were only an
accidental arrangement of a shepherd's lanterns, the lieutenant had the
two riding lamps suddenly lowered and covered.
Then there were a few moments of intense excitement, every eye being
directed to the dim diagonally-placed stars on the cliff, both of which
suddenly disappeared.
"Right," said the lieutenant. "Up with our lights again. That's either
Mr Leigh signalling to be fetched off or else there's going to be a
cargo run. Man the two boats! Gunner, serve out arms! No pipe,
boatswain. Quietly, every man, and muffle the oars!"
The men needed no pipe to call them to their places, for every man was
in a state of intense excitement, and ready to execute a kind of
war-dance on the deck, till the lieutenant, who had been to fetch his
sword and pistols, returned on deck in a dubious state of mind.
"I don't know," he said. "Perhaps it is only a dodge to get us away.
Somebody is tricking us; and while we are going one way they'll run a
cargo in another direction."
The men dared not murmur, but they grumbled in silence.
"Give up your arms again, my men," said the lieutenant, "and we'll be
watchful where we are. I'm tired of being tricked."
The men were unwillingly giving up their weapons when, as Billy Waters
put it, the wind veered round again.
"Serve out the arms, my man! Now then, be smart! Tumble into the
boats!"
For fear their commander should change his mind again the men did
literally tumble into the boats, and, giving the boatswain charge of the
vessel and putting the gunner in charge of the smaller boat, the
lieutenant descended into the other, gave orders that not a word should
be spoken, and they pushed off into the black night.
"When we land," whispered the lieutenant, "two men are to stop in the
boats and keep off a dozen or so yards from the shore. No getting them
stove-in, or--"
He did not finish his sentence, and in its mutilated form it was passed
to the other boat, which was close behind.
For the first part of the distance they rowed pretty swiftly, but when
they were about halfway the lieutenant slackened speed, and, after
nearly running into them, the second followed the example, and they went
softly on.
It seemed to grow darker and darker, and but for the fact that they
could hear the wash of the water upon the shore, and see the lights of
the cutter, it would have been impossible to tell which way to go. They
steered, however, straight for the land, every ear being attent, and the
men so anxious to make the present expedition a success that their oars
dipped without a sound.
All at once, as it seemed to them, they could hear something above the
soft wash of the water that made every man's heart beat, and roused the
lieutenant to an intense state of excitement. For, plainly enough,
there came from out of the pitchy darkness right ahead the tramp of feet
hurrying to and fro across the sands, and there could be only one
interpretation of such a sound, namely, the fact that a party of men
were unloading a boat.
The lieutenant ordered his men to wait so that the second boat might
come up alongside, and then they advanced together in perfect silence,
with the keenest-eyed men in the bows, ready to signal by touch if they
saw anything ahead.
The sound was still going on upon the beach, and the people were
evidently very busy, when, at the same moment, the crews of the two
boats caught sight of a large lugger run ashore, and not twenty yards
away.
The lieutenant's orders to the gunner were short and sharp.
"Board her on the larboard side; I'll take this! Off; give way, my
lads! Close in; out cutlasses and up and have her!"
Softly as his whisper was uttered it was heard upon the lugger by the
watchful smugglers. A shrill whistle rang out; there was a rush of feet
to get back aboard, and men sprang to their arms.
But the _Kestrels_ were too close in this time. The boats were run one
on either side; the crews pulled out their cutlasses and sprang up,
racing as to who should be first on board; and after a short sharp
struggle the smugglers were beaten down, and the lugger was taken.
"Now, Waters, make sure of the prisoners, and don't trust them below!"
cried the lieutenant. "Come, my lads. Crew of the first boat head for
the shore."
"Would you like lanterns, sir?" said the gunner.
"What! to show the rascals where to shoot!" said the lieutenant. "No,
sir. We could take the lugger in the dark, and now we'll have the rest
of the gang and the cargo. Look here, my men," he said, turning to the
prisoners, "fifty pounds and a free pardon to the man who will act as
guide and show us the way to the place where the lugger's cargo has been
placed."
There was no answer.
"Do you hear there, my men? Don't be afraid to speak. Fifty pounds,
liberty, and my protection to the man who will act as guide."
Still no answer.
"A hundred pounds, then," said the lieutenant, eagerly.
"Come, be quick; there is no time to lose."
There was not the slightest notice taken of the offer.
"Look here," cried the lieutenant, "I promise you that the man who will
tell where the cargo is carried shall be amply protected."
Still no reply.
"Come, come, come!" cried the lieutenant; "who is going to earn this
money? There, time is valuable; I'll give two hundred pounds if we
capture the rest of the cargo."
"If you'll give me two hundred pounds I'll tell you where it is," said a
voice out of the darkness; and a groan and a hiss arose from the
prisoners.
"Bravo! my lad," cried the lieutenant. "I give you my word of honour
you shall have the two hundred pounds. Now, then; where is it? Which
way shall we go? Quick! where is it?"
"Where you and your lot won't never find it," said the man; and there
was a tremendous roar of laughter.
"Come, my lads," said the lieutenant angrily, "follow me."
As the men followed him down into the boat another shrill chirruping
whistle rang out upon the dark night-air, a whistle which the lieutenant
knew well enough to be a warning to the men ashore that there was
danger.
"Never mind," he said; "we shall find the bags this time, and with
plenty of honey too, my lads. Let's see, who was here last and went up
among the rocks?"
"Me, your honour," said Tom Tully. "I can show you the way."
"Come to my side, then," said the lieutenant, leaping ashore. Tom Tully
ranged up alongside, and together they hurried over the sand and
shingle.
There was no doubt about their being upon the right track, for they
stumbled first against a keg, directly after upon a package, then upon
another and another, just as the smugglers had thrown them down to race
back and defend the lugger; and with these for their guides they made
right for the rocks, where, after a little hesitation, Tom Tully led the
party through a narrow opening.
"I should know the place, sir," he said, "for I got a hawful polt o' the
side of the head somewheres about here; and--ah! this here's right, for
there's another little keg o' spirits."
He had kicked against the little vessel, and, to endorse his opinion, he
had come upon a small package, which, with the keg, was placed upon a
block of rock ready for their return.
But in spite of his recollection of the blows he had received in the
struggle amongst the rocks Tom Tully's guidance was not very good. It
was horribly dark, and, but for the scuffling noise they kept hearing in
front and beyond the chaos of rocks amongst which they were, the
lieutenant would have ordered his men back, and tried some other way, or
else, in spite of the risks, have waited while some of his men went back
for lights.
There was, however, always the noise in front, and partly by climbing
and dragging one another up over the rocks they managed to get nearer
and nearer without once hitting upon the narrow and comparatively easy
but maze-like track that was the regular way, and which was so familiar
to the smuggling party that they ran along it and surmounted the various
barriers with the greatest ease.
"Come, come, Tully, are you asleep?" cried the lieutenant impatiently;
"push on."
"That's just what I am a doing of, your honour," said the great fellow;
"but they seem to have been a moving the rocks, and altering the place
since we was here last, and its so plaguy dark, too, I don't seem to hit
it at all."
"Give way, there, and let another man come to the front," said the
lieutenant.
Tom Tully did give way, and another and another tried, but made worse of
it, for the big fellow did blunder on somehow, no matter what obstacles
presented themselves; and at last, quite in despair, just as the sounds
in front were dying right away, almost the last man being up the cliff,
the great sailor clambered over a huge block of rock and uttered a shout
of joy.
"Here's the place, your honour, here's the place!" he shouted, and the
lieutenant and the men scrambled to his side.
"Well," cried the lieutenant, "what have you found? Where are we?"
"We're here, your honour," cried Tom Tully eagerly. "We're all right.
Oh lor', look out! what's that 'ere?"
For just at that moment there was the whizz made by a running out rope,
a rushing sound, a heavy body came plump on Tom Tully's shoulders, and
he was dashed to the ground.