Granet emerged from the Tregarten Hotel at St. Mary’s on the following
morning, about half-past eight, and strolled down the narrow strip of
lawn which bordered the village street. A couple of boatmen advanced at
once to meet him. Granet greeted them cheerily.
“Yes, I want a boat,” he admitted. “I’d like to do a bit of sailing.
A friend of mine was here and had a chap named Rowsell--Job Rowsell.
Either of you answer to that name, by chance?”
The elder of the two shook his head.
“My name’s Matthew Nichols,” he announced, “and this is my
brother-in-law, Joe Lethbridge. We’ve both of us got stout sailing craft
and all the recommendations a man need have. As for Job Rowsell, well,
he ain’t here--not just at this moment, so to speak.”
Granet considered the matter briefly.
“Well,” he decided, “it seems to me I must talk to this chap Rowsell
before I do anything. I’m under a sort of promise.”
The two boatmen looked at one another. The one who had addressed him
first turned a little away.
“Just as you like, sir,” he announced. “No doubt Rowsell will be up this
way towards afternoon.”
“Afternoon? But I want to go out at once,” Granet protested.
Matthew Nichols removed his pipe from his mouth and spat upon the ground
thoughtfully.
“I doubt whether you’ll get Job Rowsell to shift before mid-day. I’m
none so sure he’ll go out at all with this nor-wester blowing.”
“What’s the matter with him?” Granet asked. “Is he lazy?”
The man who as yet had scarcely spoken, swung round on his heel.
“He’s no lazy, sir,” he said. “That’s not the right word. But he’s come
into money some way or other, Job Rowsell has. There’s none of us knows
how, and it ain’t our business, but he spends most of his time in the
public-house and he seems to have taken a fancy for night sailing alone,
which to my mind, and there are others of us as say the same, ain’t none
too healthy an occupation. And that’s all there is to be said of Job
Rowsell, as I knows of.”
“It’s a good deal, too,” Granet remarked thoughtfully. “Where does he
live?”
“Fourth house on the left in yonder street,” Matthew Nichols replied,
pointing with his pipe. “Maybe he’ll come if you send for him, maybe he
won’t.”
“I must try to keep my word to my friend,” Granet decided. “If I don’t
find him, I’ll come back and look for you fellows again.”
He turned back to the little writing-room, scribbled a note and sent
it down by the boots. In about half an hour he was called once more out
into the garden. A huge, loose-jointed man was standing there, unshaven,
untidily dressed, and with the look in his eyes of a man who has been
drinking heavily.
“Are you Job Rowsell?” Granet inquired.
“That’s my name,” the man admitted. “Is there anything wrong with it?”
“Not that I know of,” Granet replied. “I want you to take me out
sailing. Is your boat ready?”
The man glanced up at the sky.
“I don’t know as I want to go,” he grumbled. “There’s dirty weather
about.”
“I think you’d better,” Granet urged. “I’m not a bad payer and I can
help with the boat. Let’s go and look at her any way.”
They walked together down to the harbour. Granet said very little, his
companion nothing at all. They stood on the jetty and gazed across to
where the sailing boats were anchored.
“That’s the Saucy Jane,” Job Rowsell indicated, stretching out a
forefinger.
Granet scrambled down into a small dinghy which was tied to the side of
the stone wall.
“We’d better be getting on board,” he suggested.
Rowsell stared at him for a moment but acquiesced. They pulled across
and boarded the Saucy Jane. A boy whom they found on the deck took the
boat back. Rowsell set his sails slowly but with precision. The moment
he stepped on board he seemed to become an altered man.
“Where might you be wanting to go?” he asked. “You’ll need them
oilskins, sure.”
“I want to run out to the Bishop Lighthouse,” Granet announced.
Rowsell shook his head.
“It’s no sort of a day to face the Atlantic, sir,” he declared. “We’ll
try a spin round St. Mary and White Island, if you like.”
Granet fastened his oilskins and stooped for a moment to alter one of
the sails.
“Look here,” he said, taking his seat at the tiller, “this is my show,
Job Rowsell. There’s a five pound note for you at the end of the day, if
you go where I tell you and nowhere else.”
The man eyed him sullenly. A few minutes later they were rushing out of
the harbour.
“It’s a poor job, sailing a pleasure boat,” he muttered. “Not many of us
as wouldn’t sell his soul for five pounds.”
They reached St. Agnes before they came round on the first tack. Then,
with the spray beating in their faces, they swung around and made for
the opening between the two islands. For a time the business of sailing
kept them both occupied. In two hours’ time they were standing out
towards Bishop Lighthouse. Job Rowsell took a long breath and filled a
pipe with tobacco. He was looking more himself now.
“I’ll bring her round the point there,” he said, “and we’ll come up the
Channel and home by Bryher.”
“You’ll do nothing of the sort,” Granet ordered. “Keep her head out for
the open sea till I tell you to swing round.”
Rowsell looked at his passenger with troubled face.
“Are you another of ‘em?” he asked abruptly.
“Don’t you mind who I am,” Granet answered. “I’m on a job I’m going to
see through. If a fiver isn’t enough for you, make it a tenner, but keep
her going where I put her.”
Rowsell obeyed but his face grew darker. He leaned towards his
passenger.
“What’s your game?” he demanded hoarsely. “There’s some of them on the
island’d have me by the throat if they only knew the things I could tell
‘em. What’s your game here, eh? Are you on the cross?”
“I am not,” Granet replied, “or I shouldn’t have needed to bring you to
sea. I know all about you, Job Rowsell. You’re doing very well and you
may do a bit better by and by. Now sit tight and keep a still tongue in
your head.”
They were in a queer part of the broken, rocky island group. There was a
great indenture in the rocks up which the sea came hissing; to the left,
round the corner, the lighthouse. Granet drew what looked to be a large
pocket-handkerchief from the inner pocket of his coat, pulled down
their pennant with nimble fingers, tied on another and hauled it up. Job
Rowsell stared at him.
“What’s that?”
“It’s the German flag, you fool,” Granet answered.
“I’ll have none of that on my boat,” the man declared surlily. “An odd
fiver for a kindness--”
“Shut up!” Granet snapped, drawing his revolver from his pocket. “You
run the boat and mind your own business, Rowsell. I’m not out here to be
fooled with.... My God!”
Almost at their side the periscope of a submarine had suddenly appeared.
Slowly it rose to the surface. An officer in German naval uniform
struggled up and called out. Granet spoke to him rapidly in German. Job
Rowsell started at them both, then he drew a flask from his pocket and
took a long pull. The submarine grew nearer and Granet tossed a small
roll of paper across the chasm of waters. All that passed between the
two men was to Job Rowsell unintelligible. The last few words, however,
the German repeated in English.
“The Princess Hilda from Southampton, tomorrow at midnight,” he repeated
thoughtfully. “Well, it’s a big business.”
“It’s worth it,” Granet assured him. “They may call it a hospital ship
but it isn’t. I am convinced that the one man who is more dangerous to
us than any other Englishman, will be on board.”
“It shall then be done,” the other promised. “So!”
He looked upward to the flag and saluted Granet. A great sea bore them a
little apart. Granet pulled down the German flag, tied up a stone inside
it and threw it into the next wave.
“You can take me back now,” he told the boatman.
They were four hours making the harbour. Three times they failed to get
round the last point, met at each time by clouds of hissing spray. When
at last they sailed in, there was a little crowd to watch them. Nichols
and Lethbridge stood on one side with gloomy faces.
“It’s a queer day for pleasure sailing,” Nicholas remarked to Job
Rowsell, as he came up the wet steps of the pier.
“It’s all I want of it for a bit, any way,” Rowsell muttered, pushing
his way along the quay. “If there’s any of you for a drink, I’m your
man. What-ho, Nichols?--Lethbridge?”
Lethbridge muttered something and turned away. Nichols, too, declined.
“I am not sure, Job Rowsell,” the latter declared, “that I like your
money nor the way you earn it.”
Job Rowsell stopped for a minute. There was an ugly look in his sullen
face.
“If you weren’t my own bother-in-law, Matthew Nichols,” he said, “I’d
shove those words down your throat.”
“And if you weren’t my sister’s husband,” Nichols retorted, turning
away, “I’d take a little trip over to Penzance and say a few words at
the Police Station there.”
Granet laughed good-humouredly.
“You fellows don’t need to get bad-tempered with one another,” he
observed. “Look here, I shall have three days here. I’ll take one of you
each day--make a fair thing of it, eh? You to-morrow, Nichols, and you
the next day Lethbridge. I’m not particular about the weather, as Job
Rowsell can tell you, and I’ve sailed a boat since I was a boy. I’m no
land-lubber, am I, Rowsell?”
“No, you can sail the boat all right,” Rowsell admitted, looking back
over his shoulder. “You’d sail it into Hell itself, if one’d let you.
Come on, you boys, if there’s any one of you as fancies to drink. I’m
wet to the skin.”
Nichols’ boat was duly prepared at nine o’clock on the following
morning. Lethbridge shouted to him from the rails.
“Gentleman’s changed his mind, I reckon. He went off on the eight
o’clock boat for Penzance.”
Nichols commenced stolidly to furl his sails again.
“It’s my thinking Lethbridge,” he said, as he clambered into the dinghy,
“that there’s things going on in this island which you and me don’t
understand. I’m for a few plain words with Job Rowsell, though he’s my
own sister’s husband.”
“Plain words is more than you’ll get from Job,” Lethbridge replied
gloomily. “He slept last night on the floor at the ‘Blue Crown,’ and
he’s there this morning, clamouring for brandy and pawing the air. He’s
got the blue devils, that’s what he’s got.”
“There’s money,” Nichols declared solemnly, “some money, that is, that
does no one any good.”