§ 1
The winter passed, vanishing slowly through a succession of fogs, and
once more the seas began to sleep and men to work. There was only what
might be called one winter casualty--an Englishman who had taken a house
near the Clos Jaon in May, and had so loved October, with the pale
lights on Derrible and the yellow calms of the sea, that he had vowed
Sark to be a heaven one could be happy in all the year round. The result
was that early in February he had been thrown aboard the Guernsey
steamer, rolling on her paddle-boxes beside Les Burons--accompanied by
such of his personal belongings as did not miss the deck and fall into
the sea--and in April had sent for his furniture to be brought to the
Gallic civilization of Jersey.
The Le Couteurs had the contract for the removal, as he preferred to
take the bigger risks of the quicker way rather than the involved and
age-long process of sending by Guernsey and the English mail. All three
motor-boats were required--the big _Allouette_ and the new two-cylinder
_Kitty Hamon_, as well as the little _Baleine_. Uncle Philip was to have
been in charge of the party, but he had a bad attack of rheumatism
shortly before the day fixed for sailing and delegated his command to
his eldest son, Philip Junior. This very much pleased the cousins--“We
have a good time in St. Helier,” said Peter to Daniel--“Oh, my Gar,
yes!”
On a fine, soft morning of late March the run was made. The wild
hyacinths on the cliffs were as blue as the sea, and the gorse in the
Dixcart valley was like a mirror of the rising sun. Daniel was in the
small boat with his cousins Peter and Eugene, carrying packages and
crates of china and soft goods. He had been eagerly looking forward to
the run. After the long imprisonment of winter, with all its dullness
and introspection, it was good to feel the wind in his hair, and blowing
through his jersey, drying the sweat of his lading. It was good to feel
the motion of the boat, running out like a hare into the Déroute. He was
looking forward to seeing Jersey, too. For nearly a year he had seen her
dim, whale-like shape lying in the south; and he felt that it was high
time that he set foot on her shores. The adventure of spring was upon
him--he was sick of his confinement in Sark’s three by one-and-a-half.
They were to land at Gorey, for Mr. Cleeves’s new house was at La
Rigondaine, so the little merchant fleet of the Le Couteurs steered
straight on the Dirouilles, and then on La Coupe by Rozel Bay. They left
the Paternosters to the north-west--Dan saw them standing out of the
sea, all knotty and dark with vraic--that rosary of death, of which Our
Fathers stand up above the water, while the Hail Marys lie coiled
beneath. The Jersey coast spread out before them in a panorama of sands
and cliffs and woods, while inland the sun was glittering on the
glasshouses.
The crossing had taken six hours, and there followed three more hours of
unloading and packing the stuff into the vans waiting to take it to La
Rigondaine. By the time their work was over all the Le Couteurs were
tired, and stretched themselves on the warm stones of Gorey Pier. There
they lay in a row--big men with red hair and little men with black, all
in their blue jerseys and bell-shaped trousers, with their peaked caps
over their eyes to keep out the sun. The stones were cold when they
awoke, and the sun had blurred into a fiery crimson scar which streaked
the black clouds behind Mont Orgueil.
“Too late to go home,” said Cousin Philip cheerfully, sitting up.
“There will be a moon to-night,” said Ernest Hamon.
“We go back to-morrow,” said Philip--“I have not been in Jersey for
twenty months. I want to see the place.”
“I want to see St. Helier,” said young Eugene.
“We go and have a drink first,” said Philip.
§ 2
They went and had some drinks at the Rozel Inn. Dan was beginning to
feel excited at finding himself in a town with inns and shops, though in
point of size Gorey was not much more than twice as big as Bullockdean.
His cousins began to talk about St. Helier, which sounded almost
metropolitan.
“Let us go there,” said Eugene and William. Ernest Hamon thought it
better not. “He has a wife,” said William. They all laughed. In the end
Ernest went with them, and Daniel found himself in a railway train for
the first time for a year.
It stood in relation to other trains very much as Gorey stood to other
towns, nevertheless the experience was exhilarating after so long an
abstinence. He had drunk a couple of brandies at the inn, and brandy was
stronger than armagnac. He sat in the little jogging train watching the
first stars appear in the grey sky, through the smoke of his cousins’
pipes. The coast was beginning to light up--the lighthouses were
kindled, and great eyes shone solemnly across the narrow tides of
Grouville Bay from the Ecureuil and the Azicot. There were other lights,
too, out at sea, and the coast of France twinkled afar off, with
lighthouses and beacons, and the dazzles of towns.
On through the solemn dusk ran the little train, past the martello
towers standing dark against the still, white sweep of the bay, over
Gorey Common and the sophistication of the golf-course, over La Roque
Point to the teased shoals of St. Clement’s Bay. Then at last they were
in St. Helier, with the harbour and the pier and the castle and the
streets and the lamps all alight and joyful.
They went first of all to an eating-house and had supper--a wonderful
supper of steak and kidney pudding, such as never was seen at the Pêche
à Agneau, where in winter one lived continuously on the ormers picked up
under Saignie and Tintageu, with a little tough mutton on Sundays. There
were some Breton sailors who knew Philip and Helier, and they came and
sat at the Le Couteurs’ table. It was they who suggested that afterwards
they should all go and dance.
Ha! ha! and Oh, my Gar!--it was a good idea, though nobody could dance.
That only made it all the funnier. Ernest Hamon began to talk once more
about going home by moonlight; but nobody would listen to him--they had
drunk a good deal of the sour claret stood them by the Breton
sailors--and Hamon had never been able to stand up to any of the Le
Couteurs, including his own wife, so they all went off together in a
string, laughing and singing along the Pier Road towards La Folle.
Daniel had only a dim idea as to where they actually went. The Bretons
knew the way and led them in and out of a multitude of little alleys, by
wharves and warehouses and marine taverns, till they came to a kind of
hall where a great many people were dancing to a mechanical orchestra.
There were sailors of all kinds from the ships in the harbour,
fishermen, a few townsmen, a soldier or two from the barracks, who
vanished soon and suddenly at a rumour of the military police, and an
inadequate number of women and girls.
These were in great demand, as the male dancers were so much in excess
of the female. Some of the men were dancing together--Daniel noticed a
big, dark, solemn-faced Breton dancing with a sailor off one of the
Great Western Railway Company’s boats. His cousins at once deserted him
in pursuit of partners, and he sat down on a bench against the wall,
feeling rather forlorn and shy.
He had danced sometimes as a soldier, and on one or two occasions when
Mr. Marchbanks had tried to rouse a little gaiety in his parish by
giving a dance at the parish room. But he had forgotten his steps--and
the present assembly was very different from the decorous “hops” of his
military and parochial experience. The air was full of dust and noise,
the scraping of feet, the clack of tongues in French and English and the
four various _patois_ of the four largest islands. There was a bar at
the end of the room, and most of the partnerless men were drinking
there. One of the Breton sailors who had come with the Le Couteurs
signalled to Daniel and offered him a drink. He could speak no English,
and Daniel’s nearest approach to French was a lame following of his
cousin’s bastard Norman, so there was not much conversation; but Dan had
his first glass of absinthe, which had the effect of making him think he
could dance.
Evidently the other understood the language of a tapping foot and a dark
eye roving in the direction of the dancers. Two girls had come up by
then, pretty pale creatures, arm in arm. The Breton stood them both
drinks, and in a few minutes had paired off with one of them, leaving
the other with Daniel’s arm round her waist.
“You want to dance?”
“Eh?”
He stared at her stupidly. He could hardly realize that he had been
spoken to in English.
“You want to dance?”
“Yes--I should like to.”
“You come on then.”
She was a little soft thing--soft and light--and it was quite easy to
swing her round in spite of his not knowing the steps. But he had an
uneasy consciousness of bumping her about rather badly, owing to his
defective steering. When the music stopped they were both breathless and
glad to sit down.
“How did you know I was English?” he asked.
“I guess.”
“Do I look English?”
“No--but I hear you speaking to your friends and you speak different.”
“How do you know I speak different?”
He had spoken only the Sark patois, which she, being a Jerseywoman,
would scarcely understand.
“Because I know how they speak in Sark. My father came from Sark. I am
a Falle--though here we call it Falla.”
“Oh, you know Sark?”
She shook her head.
“I was never there, but my father was there. I was born in Jersey--in
the parish of St. André. My name is Rose, after my mother, who die when
I was a baby.”
“Do you live with your father?”
She shook her head again.
“No, my father is dead--he die last summer.”
There were tears in her eyes and Daniel felt sorry he had asked the
question. It was a relief when the sudden bray of the mechanical
orchestra drowned all possibility of further talk. He suggested that
they should take the floor again, and she consented, though she must
have been feeling tired and bruised after their first performance.
They danced together the whole evening. He had no one else to dance
with, nor apparently had she, and rather than be alone she submitted to
his clumsiness. His cousins had found partners and were lost. He gave
her two more drinks at the bar, but they did not seem to affect her as
they affected him, perhaps because she had not had so many already. He
felt bemused and unsteady. After a time it made him giddy to dance, and
they sat down together hand in hand. His cousin Eugene came up to him.
“We meet to-morrow at Gorey Pier--eight o’clock--see?”
“Where are we going to spend the night?” asked Daniel, making a feeble
snatch at reality.
Eugene laughed.
“I leave that to you.”
Daniel half understood. He looked at Rose Falla, and then angrily at his
cousin, but Eugene stepped back among the dancers and was lost. Dan was
furious. How dare that Sarkie swine insult him and his girl? He must
have seen that she wasn’t that sort ... then suddenly he realized that
after all Eugene had a certain justification. After all, only one sort
of girl was likely to come to a low-down sailors’ joint like this. This
girl looked young and gentle, but she could not be so ignorant as to
imagine she was in a respectable place. She must have come deliberately,
knowing what it was. In fact, she must have come for the same purpose as
the other girls--to pick up a man, that was it--and he was the man she
had picked up. He was a fool not to have realized it. After all, it was
only kids who imagined that tarts were always flashy--he’d seen some
pretty quiet ones when he was in the army and they always got off
easiest ... think--he’d been two years in the army and yet he’d never
let himself in for anything like this. It was all part and parcel of his
forgetting his good English ways.... Well, he wasn’t really in for it
even now. He could still get out--and he would. It wasn’t at all the
sort of thing he wanted. He wanted something different.... Belle sitting
in a stable with her baby on her knees.... He rose unsteadily to his
feet.
“I’m going out--I’m going home.”
She stared at him, and at his rough words he saw the tears come back
into her eyes. At once he grew more gentle.
“Don’t be angry. I’m not saying anything against you--but you must let
me go. I--I’ve never been with a girl.”
“Nor I with a boy.”
For a moment they stood facing each other in a corner of the noisy,
crowded room. Then he exclaimed:
“But why are you here?”
She began to cry in earnest. No one took any notice. Tears and kisses,
all the private bitter-sweet of love, were common and public already in
that hall, where there was no shade to the glaring arc-lights but the
dust kicked up by the dancers’ feet.
“Why are you here?” he repeated, raising his voice so that she could
hear him above the jangling din of the orchestra.
“I come with my friend Simone.”
“But why?”
“Because I must live.”
His indignation nearly sobered him. But the fire of his absinthes and
cognacs was still in his head, driving thought and action together. He
took her by the arm and pulled her towards the door.
“Where are you taking me?”
“Outside. I can’t talk to you properly in here.”
“You aren’t angry with me? You won’t leave me?”
“Don’t you want me to leave you? I should have thought you did.”
She wept--“No.”
§ 3
He had shepherded her out into the road, which ran by the sea. He could
hear the lap and glug of water against piles, and all the great dark
emptiness before him was studded with the eyes of the rocks, winking and
turning in the blackness below the stars. He put his arm round his
companion and guided her to a seat against the wall of some marine
stores. Here they sat down again, he still holding her close to him for
warmth, for the air blew keenly.
“Now tell me why you’ve come here--you aren’t that sort--and why don’t
you want me to go?”
“You mustn’t go. If you go I’ve no one.”
“But your friend?”
“She’s found a boy--she doesn’t want me.”
“But where’s your home?--where do you live?”
“I live with Simone--the last two days. They turn me out of my room in
La Blanche, because I have no money. Simone still work where I used to
work.”
“You poor little thing--are you out of a job? Have you no one to take
care of you?”
“My father die after a long illness that take all our money, and we not
able to pay the insurance, so I get nothing. Then I work for Madame
Etienne, in the bodices, but trade is bad, and she have to send away
many girls. I go and Simone stay. I can get nothing. I have to go out of
my room. For two days I have nothing but bread and tea. Then Simone say
I come to her, but she have not enough money for both, as she get only
half-time at Madame’s. So she say I get a boy to take care of me. That
is the only way. She say I come with her here to-night and find a nice
boy. She say she will find me a nice boy. She say some boys very nice
and gentle and kind and not like the others.”
Tears choked her breathless flow of words, and he melted into a furious
pity.
“You poor little soul! What a life for you to start on! What a shame!”
“I always been good till now.”
“Why, you’d never stand the racket! Simone’s a bad lot. You must promise
me never, never to go back to that place.”
“How can I promise? If you leave me I must go back and find another
boy--a rough boy, not like you. When I see you so quiet I felt so glad
and I thought I not mind so much. But now you will not have me, and I
must go back.”
“Go back? By God, you shan’t!”
His brain was still fiery with drink, and he saw himself as this poor
little thing’s protector, rescuing her from an evil life, establishing
her in ease and virtue. He would save her. There was only one thing to
do--take her right away--take her back with him to Sark, to the Pêche à
Agneau. Alice Hamon would look after her--she could help in the house
and on the farm. So cognac and excitement smoothed out his plan. He saw
no difficulties in the way--beyond a sudden vision of his six cousins
standing between him and the boat, saying: “You no bring her--oh, my
Gar, no.” He would have to get her across without his cousins knowing
it--that was all.... He could take her over himself in the little
_Baleine_. He could manage the _Baleine_ by himself--she was such a
small affair. Besides, this girl was island bred, and could probably
give him a hand if he wanted it. Anyway, it was the only thing to do.
He couldn’t let her go back to that hell--and he couldn’t take her
anywhere in Jersey. He must face the dangers of the Sark crossing for
her sake, and no doubt a Providence, which approved of pure women and
brave men, would take care of them both.... He stood up, dragging his
companion to her feet.
“You’re to come with me.”
“Where?”
“Home--I’ll take you over to Sark.”
“But--but----”
“I tell you it’s the only thing to do. I can’t leave you here by
yourself, or with a girl like Simone. If you come to Sark, there’ll be
plenty of work for you to do in my uncle’s house. You can help my
cousin, Alice Hamon, look after the children--anyways, you can’t stop
here.”
“But we can’t start now.”
“Yes, we can--we must, or maybe that swine Eugene ull stop us. The moon
ull be up in half an hour, and the sea’s as calm as a lake. I’ve got a
little boat we can easily manage ourselves. Come along at once.”
She was evidently of a yielding disposition. That dependence which had
made her submit to Simone’s judgment and attempt escape by way of
prostitution, now made her submit to Daniel’s and attempt her escape by
way of an unknown sea. She seemed equally willing to risk either her
soul or her body at another’s behest. Dan hurried her along the sea road
out of the town, too fuddled and elated either to feel fatigue himself
or be conscious of hers. They would have to reach the harbour before it
was light, and they would have to do the whole distance on foot, as the
trains had long ceased running. Nevertheless, he was not dismayed.
Rose clung to Daniel’s arm, her feet dragging. She had danced most of
the evening with a clumsy partner, and her shoes were cheap high-heeled
affairs, absolutely unsuited to the road; but as long as he led, she
would follow. Already he was princely in her sight; and when either
fatigue or fear or bewilderment seemed likely to overwhelm her, she
would lift her swimming eyes to his face and love his short defiant nose
and English mouth, and his eyes which were wild with drink and
moonlight. The moon had risen as they came to Roque Lavrons, huge and
primrose-coloured, gleaming on the wet surfaces of sand in Azette Bay.
They crossed the desolation of Samarès Marsh, and came to Grouville and
the golf course, from which they could see the lights of Gorey Harbour
and Mont Orgueil. Daniel wondered if he should have much difficulty in
getting hold of the _Baleine_. There would, of course, be a watchman on
the harbour. Perhaps he would not acknowledge Daniel’s right to her. He
must not let him know he was going to sea ... he would pretend he was
hungry and that he and his companion had come for a feast ... he knew
there was food on board, some biscuits and tinned beef.
§ 4
“Hullo! _Qui va là?_”
“Le Couteur--_pour la Baleine_.”
“What do you want her for now?”
“We’re hungry, and she’s got food on board.”
The watchman came out of his hut, sleepy and grumbling, to undo the gate
for the English Le Couteur and his girl. Daniel wondered a little at the
ease with which he was allowed to pass--it was not until some time
afterwards that he realized that the watchman would never imagine that
even an Englishman could be such a fool as to put out to sea at one
o’clock in the morning.
The sea was plopping against the quay, and out beyond the bar Daniel
could see the little white horses galloping from France. He found the
three Le Couteur boats beside the steps, and helping Rose Falla through
the big _Allouette_ and the _Kitty Hamon_, he reached at last the little
_Baleine_. Here they found a tin of beef and biscuits under a bit of
sacking, and crouching together in the bottom of the boat, they ate
their meal with a hunger that surprised him, for hitherto he had not
thought of food except as a pretext for getting on board. Rose’s thin
shoes were now in pieces, rags of kid held together by mud. Her little
face was dabbled with sweat and her clothes were sticking to her. She
was worn out after the dancing and her tramp from St. Helier, and though
the food revived her a little she still lay huddled at his feet, while
Dan prepared for their stealthy putting to sea. In the heat of his
knight errantry he did not notice that his lady had already had enough.
He unknotted the salt, sticky rope that held the _Baleine_ to the _Kitty
Hamon_. Gosh! But his cousins would be mad when they found out what had
happened. Never mind--he would be over in Sark before they could make
any fuss. He took the paddle and silently manœuvred his craft under the
quay walls. He would not start his engine till he was well away.
The moonlight, gleaming between the piles, fell on Rose Falla’s face,
showing him for a moment its dreadful whiteness.
“Are you afraid?” he asked.
“Oh, no--not afraid. I often go to sea with my father.”
That was good--she would be able to help him. He ought to make Sark
easily. The sea was calm, and both wind and tide were in his favour. He
had passed the green light at the harbour’s end, steering by the
spar-buoy at the Azicot. The moonlight was almost dazzling on the water,
and he could see all the rocks standing up out of it, and the spar-buoys
at Les Arches and Les Guillemots. For the first time he began to feel a
little afraid, as the sea-wind cleared the fogs from his brain. But he
reassured himself--they were quite safe in a boat like this, nothing but
a converted row-boat, of the shallowest draught. He needn’t start her
engine till they were out past the five-fathom line.
The lights of Gorey Harbour now seemed far away--he was able to see the
north side of Mont Orgueil, with the red light of the Archirondel Tower
shining on Havre de Fer. He was surrounded by _demies_ and _grunes_ and
the roar of water. The _Baleine_ drifted between two rocks, and he saw
the points of another beneath her. This both terrified and reassured
him, for he knew that though her course was dangerous yet her draught
was shallow. He would be all right in another ten minutes and could
start the engine. What was that red light which had appeared round the
point?--it might be Le Fara, which they had passed on their way to
Jersey.
He had started his engine and drew a tiny ribbon of foam with him out to
sea. Almost impudently the little _Baleine_ ran out into the mightiness
of La Déroute. The wind blew keenly, and there was a big movement under
the surface of the waves, which gleamed with phosphorescent patches. But
the rocks had been left behind, and Daniel had lost his fear--or,
rather, it had been changed. He no longer felt uneasy about the physical
risks of his adventure, but for the first time he saw that it bristled
with dangers of another kind. The sea-wind had blown him sober, and he
began to see his madness soberly.
He looked at Rose Falla crouching for warmth beside the engine, and he
wondered what had made him so mad as to bring this girl away. The folly
of the voyage was nothing to the folly of bringing her with him.... The
Paternosters waiting in the north-west were not to be dreaded half so
much as the future he had built for himself in that drunken hour. What
should he do with Rose Falla? Would his cousins take her? And if they
wouldn’t, what could he do? He had only a very little money, having sent
nearly all his summer’s earnings home. He couldn’t keep her in Sark if
his cousins would not take her in--and was there anything in his whole
experience of them to give him even a reasonable hope of their doing
so? Moreover, how did he know she had told him the truth? She might be
only a bad lot. Or she might have friends, relations in Jersey, who
would have the law on him for taking her away like this. Oh, Gosh! he
was properly in for it!... that was the sort of thing you got for
drinking too much and going to bad places. It served him right. He’d
been well brought up, so there was no excuse. Neither was there any way
of getting out of it as far as he could see. He could not put back for
Gorey now. He must go on and hope for the best--and in that hour of
sober disillusion the best he could hope for seemed that they should hit
something and go, the pair of them, to the bottom of the sea.