THE SMUGGLER'S CAVE
Joe Markham had, as soon as he arrived, told the French smugglers that
he had shot the magistrate who had for the last five or six years given
them so much trouble and caused them so much loss, and who had, as the
last affair showed, become more dangerous than ever, as he could only
have obtained information as to the exact point of landing by having
bribed someone connected with them.
"It was a case of his life or our business," he said. "If he had not
been got out of the way we must have given up the trade altogether on
this part of the coast; besides, he has been the cause, not only of
several seizures of cargoes, but of the death of eight or ten of our
comrades and of the imprisonment of many others. Now that he is out of
the way we shall find things a great deal easier."
"It served him right," the leader of the party said, "and you have
rendered good service; but what are you going to do? Do you think that
any suspicion will fall upon you?"
"Yes; I have put myself in an awkward position, I am afraid. I thought
that the job had been so well managed that it could never be traced to
me, but when I got up to the top of the hill I saw a fellow just
starting from the bottom. I did not think much of it at the time, but he
came up so quickly after me that he must have run all the way up. He has
chased me hard, and as he got nearer I could see that he had a gun too.
He was not more than a quarter of a mile away when I got to the
trap-door."
"Why didn't you hide yourself in the bushes and put a bullet into him,
Markham?"
"For several reasons. In the first place, the gun might have been heard
by some of those cussed revenue men. Then there would be an inquiry and
a search. They would have seen by the direction he had been going, that
he must have been shot from the bushes, and as no one would have been in
sight when they ran up, the thing would have been such a puzzle to them
that you may be sure they would have suspected there must be some hidden
way out of the clump. Besides, they would probably have hunted every
inch of the ground to see if they could find anything that would give
them a clue as to who had fired the shot. That is one reason."
"And quite good enough without any others," the Frenchman said.
"Well, there was another one that went for almost as much with me. I
shot down Faulkner because he was a curse to us all. He had imprisoned
several of my pals, and done a lot of damage to the trade, and was
likely to break it up altogether, besides which I had a big grudge
against him on my own account. But I should not have liked to shoot down
this fellow in cold blood. I had no feeling against him; he has done me
no harm; I did not even know who he was. If he had overtaken me in the
open, you may be sure that I should have made a fight of it, for it
would have been my life against his. I don't pretend to be soft; there
is little enough of that about me, and I have fought hard several times
in the old days when we were surprised; but I could not have shot down
that fellow without giving him a chance of his life. If there had not
been the trap-door to escape by I should have stood up, given him fair
warning, and fought it out man to man. As it was--" at this point the
conversation had been arrested by the sudden entrance of Julian.
"Who is he?" the chief of the smugglers asked Joe when he had finished
his conversation with the prisoner. "Is he a spy?"
"No; he is a young chap as lives down in the town. He is a pal of some
of our friends there, and has been with them at the landings of goods.
He was caught in that last affair, but got off because they could not
prove that he was actually engaged in the business. He is an enemy of
Faulkner's too; they had a row there, and Faulkner hit him in the face.
You can see the mark still; and he would have thrown Faulkner on to the
bonfire they had lit if he had not been prevented by some of the
coast-guards. It is through what he had heard from our friends of this
cavern, and there being an entrance to it somewhere, that he came to
look for the trap-door. I certainly pushed the bolt forward when I came
down, but I was in a hurry, so I suppose it could not have caught
rightly."
"Well, what is to be done, Joe?"
"I don't know. You see he knows about my shooting Faulkner. I would
trust him not to peach about this cavern or the trap-door, but I don't
know as I would about the other thing. It seems to me that he is just as
likely to be suspected of having a hand in it as I am. His row with
Faulkner is the talk of the place, and when Faulkner is found with a
bullet in him, he will be the first fellow to be suspected. Well, if
that was so, and you see he would not be able to account for himself for
three or four hours afterwards, he might be driven to peach on me to
save his own life, and he would be obliged to give all the story about
following me and coming down here. There would be an end of the best
hiding-place in the country, and I should not be able to show my face on
this side of the Channel again."
"I should say the safest plan would be to cut his throat and chuck him
into the sea, and have done with it."
"No, I won't have that," the poacher said positively. "Your lugger will
be in to-night, and we will take him across with us to France."
"That is all very well," one of the men said; "but what is to prevent
his coming back again?"
"We could prevent it somehow or other. We could get up a tale that he
was an English sailor we had picked up at sea, and hand him over to the
authorities, and tell them his story was, that he had fallen overboard
from an English ship of war. Then they would send him away to some place
in the interior where they keep English prisoners of war, and there he
might lie for years; perhaps never get back again. He does not know a
word of French, as you saw when you spoke to him, so he can't contradict
any story we may tell, and if by chance any questions should be asked, I
can just say what suits us."
"He might ruin us all if he came back," the smuggler growled.
"It ain't likely that he will come back," the poacher said. "I have
heard that they die off like flies in those prisons of yours; and,
besides, I will guarantee if he does, he will never split about this
place. He is a gentleman, and I will get him to swear to me, and you may
be sure he will not break his oath."
"But how about yourself?"
"Well, as he won't come back for some years, I will take my chance of
that. He has got no evidence against me; it would be his word against
mine. He would tell his story and I should tell mine, and mine would be
the most likely. I should say I met him on the hills with his gun, and,
knowing who I was, and what cause I had got to hate Faulkner, he told me
that he had shot him, and asked me to get him on board a smuggler craft
and across the Channel, and that I had done so: and that is all I should
know about it. No, I am not afraid of anything he might say when he
comes back again."
Julian had watched the speakers anxiously during this conversation. He
was wholly ignorant of French, but from the tone and manner of the
speakers, he gathered that the poacher was speaking in his favour. He
had expected no mercy; his life was nothing to these French smugglers;
and he was surprised to find the man, whose life he thought he held in
his hand if released, apparently pleading his cause.
"Look here, young fellow!" the poacher said, turning towards him. "In
the first place, these men are afraid that you may betray the existence
of this place, and their opinion is that the best thing to make us safe
would be to cut your throat and throw you out of the mouth of the cave
into the sea. I told them that you knew of the cave from one of our
friends, and could be trusted to keep the secret; at any rate they
demand, in the first place, that you shall take an oath never to split
about it."
"I will do that willingly enough," Julian said, with a great feeling of
relief.
Joe Markham then dictated a terrible oath, which had been always taken
by all those made acquainted with the existence of the cave, and this
Julian repeated after him. The poacher then told the smugglers what
Julian had sworn to.
"Now, young fellow, I may tell you that we are going to take you over to
France to-night. You may think I shall be asking you to take another
oath, like that, not to say anything against me, but I ain't going to. I
shot the man, and I don't pretend to be sorry for it. He was a hard, bad
chap, and he got what he deserved. I owed him a long score, not only for
myself, but for others, and if I had not shot him, someone else would
have done so sooner or later. I shall do what I can to prevent you
coming back here, though I don't think you will say anything against me
when you do come back. In the first place, like enough I shall take to
the sea again, and may be settled in France before you return. In the
next place, I may be dead; and, most of all, you have got no evidence
against me. If I were here, and you told the story, of course I should
say that it was a lie, and that you had shot the man yourself, and I
had got you out of the way by sending you across to France in a lugger,
so I think you will see that it is best to keep a quiet tongue in your
head; anyhow I am ready to take my chance of it."
"They will be horribly alarmed when I don't get home to-night," Julian
said.
"Well, they must be alarmed," the poacher said carelessly. "You have
interfered in this business, which was none of yours, and you have got
to take the consequences; you may think yourself a lucky fellow that you
are not by this time drifting about on the tideway."
"I feel that," Julian said; "and though I did not understand a word of
what you said, I am sure that it was owing to you that I am not there. I
could not have promised that I would never say a word to anyone about
you, because one can never tell how one may be placed; but, after what
you have done, I think that I can safely promise that I will never go
out of my way to denounce you."
"I don't want any promise about it," the poacher replied. "I have made
up my mind to leave Weymouth, for, after having been in jail two years,
I shall always have the constables as well as the revenue men keeping
their eye on me, so I had intended all along to take to the lugger
again, and live on board her as I did before, and I only stayed here
until I could settle accounts with Faulkner. I have no doubt that they
will suspect me of this business. There are plenty of men who know that
I had sworn to be even with him, and my disappearance is sure to be put
down to that. Now, in the next place, will you promise not to try to
escape, because if you do, I will get them to take these ropes off you?
I dare say you have been thinking that if you could get free you would
make a run for the mouth of the cave and dive in, for it is about high
water now."
Julian had, in fact, been thinking so, but as he saw that unless he gave
his promise he would have to remain in the cords that were cutting into
his wrists, he at once took the required oath. Joe told the Frenchmen,
and they then unfastened Julian's cords.
"We may as well carry up the bales at once," their leader said, "before
it gets dark. It is no use giving anyone at sea a chance of seeing a
light. Tell him to take one and come up with us. I am not going to leave
him here by himself, promise or no promise."
The poacher translated the order to Julian. Some bales were taken out
from beneath a tarpaulin at the end of the cave, and, each shouldering
one, they proceeded up the passage until they reached the foot of the
ladder. Here they laid the bales down, and then returned to the cave.
"Is that all?" Julian asked.
"Yes, those bales are worth a lot of money. There is fifteen hundred
pounds worth of lace in one of them. The others are silks and satins,
and worth another five hundred. To-night, when we hear the signal, I and
three of the Frenchmen will go up. We shall find two men there, and
shall carry the bales to a place a mile and a half away, where they will
be hidden until it is convenient to send them up to London, or wherever
they are going to dispose of them--that is their business; ours is
finished when they hand us over the money for them. They will come at
eight o'clock, and at ten the lugger will be off the coast here and send
a boat ashore for us. So you have got five or six hours yet, and I
should say the best thing you can do is to turn in and sleep till then.
There are plenty of blankets in that corner and a pile of sheep-skins
that you can sleep on."
Julian nodded, threw two or three of the sheep-skins down in a corner,
rolled another up for a pillow, drew a blanket over him, and for the
first time looked round the cave. It was lighted only by a small hole
used as a look-out; at present a blanket hung before this. There was a
door similar to that by which he had entered from above leading to the
lower cave. How far that lower entrance might be below them Julian had
no means of knowing, but from the view he had obtained of the sea
through a large loop-hole he had passed in his descent, he did not think
that the cavern he was in could be less than seventy or eighty feet
above the water. The sole ventilation, as far as he could see, was the
current of air that found its way in through the door from below, and
passed up through that above, and what could come in through the
loop-hole seawards. Doubtless in warmer weather both the doors stood
open, but were now closed more for warmth than for any other purpose,
although he had noticed that the lower one had been bolted and locked
after he had been first captured.
As he lay down he wondered how it was all going to end. His position was
at once perilous and uncertain. He had, so far, escaped better than he
could have expected, for from the looks the Frenchmen had given him, he
had no doubt what his fate would have been had not the man he had been
chasing spoken in his favour. His life therefore seemed for the present
safe, but the future was very dark. The poacher had spoken as if he was
not likely to return for some years. They surely could not intend to
keep him on board ship all that time. Could they mean to put him upon
some vessel sailing abroad? What a way Frank and his aunt would be in!
They would learn that he had started for home early in the afternoon,
and it would be absolutely certain that he could not have strayed from
the road nor met with any accident coming along the valley. It would
certainly be awkward his being missed on the same day Faulkner had been
shot, especially as, according to the time he had started for home, he
would have come along the road somewhere about the time the magistrate
was shot.
It was a horrible thought that suspicion might fall upon him. Those who
knew him would be sure that he could have had nothing whatever to do
with the murder; still, the more he thought of it the more he felt that
suspicions were certain to rise, and that he would find it extremely
difficult to explain matters on his return. The memory of his quarrel
with the magistrate was fresh in everybody's mind, and even his friends
might well consider it singular that his words to Faulkner should so
soon have been carried into effect. It is true that Joe Markham would be
missing too, and that the man's own acquaintances would have no great
difficulty in guessing that he had carried out his threats against
Faulkner, but they would certainly not communicate their opinion to the
constables, and the latter might not think of the man in connection with
the murder, nor notice that he was no longer to be seen about the town.
Even were he himself free to leave the cave now and return to Weymouth,
he would find himself in a most awkward position. There was, of course,
no shadow of evidence against him save that he was known to have
quarrelled with Faulkner, and must have been very near the spot the
moment he was killed, but how could he explain six or seven hours'
absence? He could but say that he had caught sight of a man in the
plantation and followed him for miles among the hills, and had lost
sight of him at last. He had not a shadow of evidence to produce in
confirmation of his story; in fact there was no direct evidence either
way. There could be no doubt he would have to remain under a cloud of
suspicion. It was bad enough before, but this would be altogether
intolerable, and it was perhaps best, after all, that he was to be taken
away, and his future decided for him.
He should have gone anyhow, and no doubt he would be able to get some
opportunity of writing to Frank and setting his mind at rest as to his
safety, and telling him something about what had happened, and that he
had been kidnapped and carried over to France. He had acted like a fool,
no doubt, but Frank would understand why he had followed his first
impulse and gone alone after the man who committed the murder, instead
of going to the constables and telling them that some unknown man had
killed the magistrate. One thing seemed certain, he should never be able
to go back to Weymouth again unless the affair was cleared up, and he
did not see how that ever could be.
At this point Julian's thoughts became confused. The voices of the men
talking at the table seemed to get further and further away, and then he
was conscious of nothing more until he heard a bell tinkle faintly
somewhere overhead. There was a movement in the cave, and he sat up. All
the men went out by the upper door. When they had left he got up and
went to see if the lower door was so fastened that he could not open it.
He had no idea of breaking his word, but did so out of curiosity rather
than from any other feeling. He found that the bolts could be pulled
back, but that the lock was a very strong one, and the jamb was, at the
point where the bolt shot into it, covered with a piece of iron, so that
no instrument could be used for forcing back the bolt.
"It may be," he thought, "that some other prisoner has been confined
here at some time or other, or possibly this has been done in order that
if the trap-door above should be found, and the revenue men come down
that way, the smugglers in their flight might lock the door behind them
and so have time to get away in a boat or along at the foot of the
cliffs before their pursuers could get down to the lower entrance and
open fire upon them."
Then he lay down again. He wondered whether the pull of the bell he had
heard could be hidden in the grass like the handle of the trap. It might
only be a very small knob, but he had looked so closely among the
bushes that he wondered it had escaped him. In three or four minutes the
French captain came down again, and walked across to where he was lying:
"_Pauvre diable!_" he muttered, and then went back to the table, filled
himself a glass of spirits and water, and lit his pipe. A moment later a
thought seemed to strike him, and he came across to Julian again and
touched him. He at once sat up. The Frenchman motioned him to come to
the table, went to a cupboard, brought out a wooden platter with a large
lump of cold beef and a loaf of bread and some cheese, poured him out a
horn of brandy and water, and motioned him to eat. Julian attacked the
food vigorously. He had had some lunch with his friends before starting
for his walk back to Weymouth, but that had been nearly seven hours
before, and his run across the hills in the keen air had given him a
sharp appetite, so he did full justice to the food.
"This is not a bad fellow after all," he said to himself, as the
smuggler, when he had finished, brought out a box of cigars and placed
it before him. "He would have knocked me on the head without
compunction, in the way of business; but now when he has concluded that
I am not dangerous, he comes out as a good fellow." He nodded pleasantly
to the Frenchman as he lit the cigar, which was an excellent one, and
far better than any Julian had been accustomed to smoke with his
associates in the billiard room.
The Frenchman's thoughts were not dissimilar to his own. "He is a brave
_garçon_," he said to himself, "and makes the best of things. He is a
fine-looking fellow, too, and will be a big man in another year or two.
It is a misfortune that we have got to take him and shut him up in
prison. Why did he mix himself up in this affair of Markham? That is the
way with boys. Instead of being grateful to the man that had killed his
enemy, he must needs run after him as if he had done him an injury.
Well, it can't be helped now; but, at least, I will make him as
comfortable as I can as long as he is on board the lugger."
In another half hour Joe Markham returned with the French sailors.
"There is a big stir down in Weymouth," he said to Julian. "I heard from
our friend that the place is like a hive of bees. I tell you, Mr. Wyatt,
that it is a lucky thing for you that you found the trap-door and came
down here. You mayn't like being our prisoner; but it is a lot better
than being in a cell down in Weymouth with a charge of murder hanging
over you, which you would have been if you had gone straight back
again."
"A charge of murder!" Julian repeated, springing to his feet. "How could
such a charge be brought? It could not have been known so soon that I
was missing. I must go back and face it. If I run away, now I have been
openly accused, everyone will make sure of my guilt."
"Well, sir, I should say it is a sight better that they should suspect
you, and you safely over in France, than that they should suspect you
with you in their hands; but at any rate, you see you have no choice in
the matter. You could only clear yourself by bringing me into it; though
I doubt, as things have turned out, that that would help you a bit."
"I warn you that I shall make my escape, and come back again as soon as
I can," Julian said passionately.
"Well, sir, if you have a fancy for hanging, of course you can do so;
but from what I hear, hanging it would be, as sure as you stand there.
There is a warrant out against you, and the constables are scouring all
the country."
"But what possible ground can they have to go upon except that smuggling
affair?"
"Well, if what our friend told me is true, they have very good grounds,
as they think, to go on. He was talking with one of the constables, and
he told him that Faulkner is not dead yet, though he ain't expected to
last till morning. His servants came out to look for him when the horse
came back to the house without him. A man rode into Weymouth for the
doctor, and another went to Colonel Chambers and Mr. Harrington. By the
time they got there Faulkner was conscious, and they took his dying
deposition. He said that he had had a row with you a short distance
before he had got to his gate, and that you said you would be even with
him. As he was riding up through the wood to his house, he suddenly
heard a gun and at the same moment fell from his horse. A minute later
you came out from the wood at the point where the shot had been fired.
You had a gun in your hand. Feeling sure that your intention was to
ascertain if he was done for, and to finish him off if you found that he
was not, he shut his eyes and pretended to be dead. You stooped over
him, and then made off at full speed. Now, sir, that will be awkward
evidence to get over, and you must see that you will be a long way safer
in France than you would in Weymouth."
Julian sank down, crushed by the blow. He saw that what the poacher said
was true. What would his unsupported assertion go for as against the
dying man's deposition? No doubt Faulkner had stated what he believed to
be the truth, though he might not have given quite a fair account of
what had taken place in the road; still, there would be no
cross-examining him as to what had passed there, and his statement would
stand unchallenged. As things now stood, Julian's own story that he had
pursued a man over the hills, and had lost him, would, wholly
unsupported as it was, be received with absolute incredulity. He had
been at the spot certainly at the time. He had had words with Faulkner;
he had had a gun in his hands; he had come out and leaned over the
wounded man within less than a minute of the shot being fired. The chain
of evidence against him seemed to be complete, and he sat appalled at
the position in which he found himself.
"Look here, youngster," the poacher said, "it is a bad job, and I don't
say it isn't. I am sorry for you, but I ain't so sorry as to go and give
myself up and get hung in your place; but I'll tell you what I will do.
When I get across to France I will draw up a statement and swear it
before a magistrate, giving an account of the whole affair, and I will
put it in a tin case and always carry it about with me. I will direct it
to Colonel Chambers, and whenever anything happens to me it shall be
sent to him. I am five-and-twenty years older than you are, and the life
I lead ain't likely to give me old age. To make matters safer, I will
have two copies made of my statement--one I will leave in the hands of
one of our friends here. The craft I am in may be wrecked some day, or
sunk by one of the cutters; anyhow, whichever way it comes, he is
certain to hear of my death, and I shall tell him that when he hears of
it he is to send that letter to Chambers."
"Thank you," Julian said earnestly. "It may not come for a long time,
but it will be something for me to know that some day or other my name
will be cleared of this horrible accusation; but I would rather have
gone and faced it out now."
"It would be just suicide," the man said. "Weymouth ain't the only place
in the world; and it is better for you to live out of it, and know you
will get cleared some day, than to get hung, with only the consolation
that perhaps twenty years hence they may find out they have made a
mistake."
"It isn't so much myself I am thinking of as my brother and aunt. My
going away and never sending them a word will be like confessing my
guilt. It will ruin my brother's life, and kill my aunt."
"Well, I'll tell you what I will do," Markham said. "You shall write a
letter to your brother, and tell him your story, except, of course,
about this cave. You can say you followed me, and that I and some
smugglers sprang on you and captured you, and have carried you across to
France. All the rest you can tell just as it happened. I don't know as
it will do me any harm. Your folks may believe it, but no one else is
likely to do so. I don't mean to go back to Weymouth again, and if I did
that letter would not be evidence that anyone would send me to trial on.
Anyhow, I will risk that."
"Thank you, with all my heart," Julian said gratefully. "I shall not so
much mind, if Frank and Aunt get my story. I know that they will believe
it if no one else does, and they can move away from Weymouth to some
place where it will not follow them. It won't be so hard for me to bear
then, especially if some day the truth gets to be known. Only please
direct your letters to 'Colonel Chambers, or the Chairman of the
Weymouth magistrates,' because he is at least ten years older than you
are, and might die long before you, and the letter might never be opened
if directed only to him."
"Right you are, lad. I will see to that."
Just at this moment one of the sailors came down from the look-out
above, and said that the signal had just been made from the offing, and
that the lugger's boat would be below in a quarter of an hour. All
prepared for departure; the lower door was unbolted, the lights
extinguished, and they went down to the lower entrance. It was reached
by a staircase cut in the chalk, and coming down into a long and narrow
passage, at the further end of which was the opening Julian had seen
from the sea. The party gathered at the entrance. In a few minutes a
boat with muffled oars approached silently; a rope was lowered, a noose
at its upper end being placed over a short iron bar projecting three or
four inches from the chalk a foot or two inside the entrance.
The French captain went down first. Julian was told to follow. The
sailors and Markham then descended. A sharp jerk shook the rope off the
bar, and the boat then rowed out to the smuggler, which was lying half a
mile from shore. As soon as they were on board the sails were sheeted
home, and the craft began to steal quietly through the water, towing the
boat behind it. The whole operation had been conducted in perfect
silence. The men were accustomed to their work; there was no occasion
for orders, and it was not until they were another mile out that a word
was spoken.
"All has gone off well," the captain then said. "We got the laces and
silks safely away, and the money has been paid for them. The revenue
cutter started early this morning, and was off Lyme Regis this
afternoon, so we shall have a clear run out. We will keep on the course
we are laying till we are well beyond the race, and then make for the
west. We have sent word for them to be on the look-out for us at the old
place near Dartmouth to-morrow night, and if we are not there then, the
night after; if there is danger, they are to send up a rocket from the
hill inland."
The wind was but light, and keeping a smart look-out for British
cruisers, and lowering their sails down once or twice when a suspicious
sail was seen in the distance, they approached the rocky shore some two
miles east of the entrance to the bay at ten o'clock on the second
evening after starting. A lantern was raised twice above the bulwark,
kept there for an instant, and then lowered.
"I expect it is all right," the captain said, "or they would have sent
up a rocket before this. Half-past eight is the time arranged, and I
think we are about off the landing place. Ah, yes, there is the signal!"
he broke off as a light was shown for a moment close down to the water's
edge. "Yes, there it is again! Lower the anchor gently; don't let it
splash."
A light anchor attached to a hawser was silently let down into the
water.
"Now, off with the hatches; get up the kegs."
While some of the men were engaged at this work, others lowered the
second boat, and this, and the one towing behind, were brought round to
the side. Julian saw that all the men were armed with cutlasses, and had
pistols in their belts. Rapidly the kegs were brought up on deck and
lowered into the boat.
"Ah, here comes Thompson," the captain said, as a very small boat rowed
up silently out of the darkness. "Well, my friend, is all safe?" he
asked in broken English as the boat came alongside.
"Safe enough, captain. Most of the revenue men have gone round from here
to the other side of the bay, where they got news, as they thought, that
a cargo was going to be run. The man on duty here has been squared, and
will be away at the other end of his beat. The carts are ready, a
quarter of a mile away. I made you out with my glass just before sunset,
and sent round word at once to our friends to be in readiness."
The boats started as soon as their cargoes were on board, and the work
went on uninterruptedly for the next two hours, by which time the last
keg was on shore, and the boats returned to the lugger. The men were in
high spirits. The cargo had been a valuable one, and the whole had been
got rid of without interruption. The boats were at once hoisted up, the
anchor weighed, and the lugger made her way out to sea.
"What port do you land at?" Julian asked Markham.
"We shall go up the Loire to Nantes," he replied; "she hails from there.
To-morrow morning you had best put on that sailor suit I gave you
to-day. Unless the wind freshens a good deal we sha'n't be there for
three or four days, but I fancy, from the look of the sky, that it will
blow up before morning, and, as likely as not, we shall get more than we
want by evening. There is generally a cruiser or two off the mouth of
the river. In a light wind we can show them our heels easily enough, but
if it is blowing at all their weight tells. I am glad to be at sea
again, lad, after being cooped up in that cursed prison for two years.
It seems to make a new man of one. I don't know but that I am sorry I
shot that fellow. I don't say that he didn't deserve it, for he did; but
I don't see it quite so strongly as I did when I was living on bread and
water, and with nothing to do but to think of how I could get even with
him when I got out; besides, I never calculated upon getting anyone else
into a mess, and I am downright sorry that I got you into one, Mr.
Wyatt. However, the job is done, and it is no use crying over spilt
milk."
Markham's prediction turned out correct. A fresh wind was blowing by the
morning, and two days later the lugger was running along, close under
the coast, fifteen miles south of the mouth of the Loire, having kept
that course in order to avoid any British cruisers that might be off the
mouth of the river. Before morning they had passed St. Nazaire, and were
running up the Loire.