"Put your backs into it, my lads," cried Joe Cross, almost fiercely.
"Steady! Steady all, and look out that you don't have a smash. Pull!
Hard! Here, I shall be tugged out of the boat!"
For it seemed almost directly after that the dimly-seen hull of the brig
rose up out of the darkness close at hand, while from where he knelt--
fortunately for himself--the coxswain felt his arms being jerked out of
their sockets as he caught with the boat-hook at the brig's main chains.
"Stand by there!" he roared, as he held on. "Lend a hand here to help
the gentlemen on board! Somebody say it in French! Up with you!"
There was no need for the use of another tongue, for a lantern shed its
light down upon them, willing hands were ready, and the Count and Morny
scrambled aboard.
The next moment the Count was giving orders for a rope to be passed down
to the boat.
"Make fast, and come on board!" he shouted. "You'll never get back
to-night."
The order came too late, for as he spoke another order was given out by
Joe Cross, who had loosed the precarious hold he had with the boat-hook,
as he shouted while giving the boat a thrust away--
"Now for it, my lads! Pull for all you know!"
Almost the next moment Rodd dimly saw that they were clear, and as the
men tugged at their oars with all their might he dropped upon his knees
in front of stroke, clapped his hands against the oar, and swinging with
the man, thrust with all his force.
Five minutes of desperate tugging at the oars in the midst of darkness
which seemed to rapidly increase. The men had rowed with all their
force--not to get back to the schooner, but to reach the brig and one of
her ropes that they knew would be thrown to their help; but to Rodd, as
he strained his eyes from where he knelt striving to give force to the
stroke oar, it was like catching so many glimpses, first of the brig's
side, then of its stern, and then once more it was as if they were
standing still in the water and the brig was rushing away.
"Steady, my lads! Don't break your hearts!" cried Joe Cross firmly, his
voice ringing clearer out of the black silence. "It aren't to be done.
Mid-stream's our game. If we try to get ashore we shall be among the
branches, capsized in a moment, and--"
The sailor did not finish his speech then, but Rodd did to himself, and
hot though he was with his exertions, a cold shiver seemed to run
through him, as he mentally said--
"The crocodiles!"
"That's better, my lads. Just a steady pull, and I'll keep as I am with
the boat-hook. We mustn't have a capsize."
"What are you going to do, Joe?" cried Rodd.
"Don't know, sir," said the man gruffly. "Perhaps you can tell me."
"I? No," cried Rodd.
"Ah! That's awkward," said the man. "I don't know what the skipper was
about to set us on this job. That's the worst of being a sailor. They
trains us up to 'bey orders directly they're guv, and we does them, but
one never knows how to be right. I oughter ha' told the old man as this
was more'n men could do; 'cause I half thought it were. But then I says
to myself, the skipper knows best; and here we are in a nice hole."
"A nice hole!" cried Rodd angrily. "Why, we shall be swept out to sea."
"Looks like it, sir--I mean seems."
"But why not make for the shore, where we could catch hold of some of
the overhanging branches?"
"I telled you, sir. 'Cause we should be capsized before we had time to
wink. Steady, my lads--steady! It's no use to pull, Mr Rodd; four
times as many of us couldn't stem a stream like this."
"Will they come down after us? Yes, my uncle is sure to."
"Not he, sir. It would be just about mad to try it, and our old man
will be so wild at being caught like this that he won't let him stir.
'Sides that, sir, what are you talking about? How are they to know we
have been swept away?"
"Because we don't come back, of course," cried Rodd angrily.
"That won't do, sir. Skipper knows, of course, after the way we went
off, that it's just impossible."
"But the Count will tell him."
"Too far off for shouting, sir. You take my word for it that the
skipper will make up his mind that we are stopping on board the brig
till the tide runs slack again. If anything's done it will be by the
Frenchies, and I don't believe they'll try."
"Oh, but the Count would. His son would make him."
"No, sir. The Count's a fine naval officer who has seen service, and he
knows too well what he's about to send a boat's crew swirling down this
river to go nobody knows where. The only folks as can help us is--"
"Yes--who?" cried Rodd, for the man broke off in his speech.
"Ourselves, sir; and we shall find it precious hard."
"That's right, Joe," said one of the other sailors. "Better speak out,
mate, and say the worst on it."
"Say it yourselves," cried Joe Cross roughly.
"Yes, speak out," cried Rodd. "What do you think?"
"We can do nothing, sir, but keep her head straight and go down with the
tide, doing all we can to keep from being sucked into the shore among
the trees."
"But look here, Joe, aren't we very close in now?" cried Rodd, who had
just noticed in the darkness that the sailor he addressed was leaning
over the bows and straining his eyes in one particular direction.
For answer the man yelled to his messmates to pull with all their might.
The oars dipped, but at the second stroke there was a crashing rustling
sound of twigs, followed by a sharp crackling and snapping, as they were
swept in amongst the pendant branches of some huge forest tree, one
bough striking Rodd across the shoulders and holding him as it were
fast, so that the boat was being dragged from beneath him.
Then there was more grinding of the gunwale of the boat amongst the
boughs, the water came swishing in over the side, and directly after the
frail vessel partly turned over, with her keel lying sideways to the
rushing tide.
Then more crackling and rustling amongst the boughs, mingled with
shouting from the boat's crew, and from out of the confusion, and
somewhere above him in the pitchy darkness and low-lying night mist,
came the voice of Joe Cross--
"Now then, all of you! Where away?"
"Here!"
"Here!"
"All right, mate!"
"Lend a hand, some one!"
"Are you all here?" cried Joe Cross again.
"Ay, ay, ay, ay!" came in chorus.
"But I don't hear the young guvnor."
There was silence.
"Where's Mr Rodd?"