After my father had finished his story it was arranged that watch should
be set, and the arrangement made was that Bob Chowne and I should take
the first spell, and it was to last as long as we liked--that is to say,
we were to watch until we were tired, and then call my father and
Bigley, who would watch for the rest of the night.
Bigley said he should not sleep, but he followed my father's example and
lay down, while in a few minutes his regular breathing told that he had
gone off; and before long, as Bob Chowne and I sat talking in a low
tone, we knew that my father was asleep as well.
And there we two lads sat on the shelf of rock listening to the sobbing
and sighing of the tide, and staring out to sea. Sometimes we talked in
a low voice about how uncomfortable some people would be about us, and
Bob said it was like my luck--that I had my father with me, while his
and Bigley Uggleston's would be in a terrible way.
"And a nice row there'll be about it," he said dolefully. "There never
was such an unlucky chap as I am."
"And Big?"
"Oh, Big! Pooh! His father never takes any notice about him."
Then we talked about the drilling, and the silver mine and my father's
success, and what a fine thing it was for me; and about school-days, and
what it would cost to get a new boat for old Jonas, and about Bob going
up to London to be a doctor; and we were prosing on, but this gave him a
chance to become a little animated.
"I don't want to be a doctor," he said fiercely; "but I'll serve some of
'em out if I'm obliged to be. I'll let them know!"
"What stuff!" I said. "Why, I should like to be a doctor, and if I was
I'd go in for being surgeon on board a ship."
"Why?" said Bob.
"So as to go all round the world, and see what there is to see."
"Ah!" said Bob, "I hadn't thought about that; but it isn't half so good
as having a mine of your own, as you'll have some day. I wish we could
change fathers, but I suppose we couldn't do that."
We did not argue out that question, but went on talking in a low prosy
tone, as we sat there with our backs supported against the cliff; and I
suppose it must have been Bob's low muttering voice, mingled with the
darkness, the natural hour for sleep, and the murmuring of the waves,
that had so curious and lulling an effect upon me, for all at once it
seemed that the water was running down from the mine shaft where it was
being pumped up, the big pump giving its peculiar beats as it worked,
and the splash and rush of the water sounding very soft and clear.
Then I seemed to be down in the mine, and it was very dark and cold, and
I climbed up again and sat down on the ground to listen to the washing
of the water, the hurrying of the stream, and the regular beat of the
pump; and then I was awake again, staring out into the darkness that
hung over the sea. For a few minutes I was so confused that I could not
make out where I was. It was cold and I was shivering, and the rushing
of the water and the beat of the pump was going on still.
No, it was not; for I was up there on the shelf of rock miles away from
our mine, and I had been set to keep watch with Bob Chowne; and here was
he, close by me, breathing heavily, fast asleep.
I felt miserable and disgraced to think that I should have been so
wanting in my sense of duty as to have slept, and Bob was no better.
"Bob! Bob!" I whispered, shaking him.
"Yes," he said with a start; "I know--I wasn't asleep."
"Hush! Listen!" I said. "What's that noise?"
We both listened, and my heart throbbed as I heard a regular plash and
thud from off the sea.
"Boat," said Bob decidedly. "Shall I hail it?"
"No," I replied quickly.
"Why not? It's a boat coming to fetch us."
I could not think that it was, and creeping to where my father lay I
shook him.
"Yes. Time to watch?" he said quietly.
"Hush! Listen!" I said.
He sat up:
"Boat," he said, "close in."
"Is it coming to fetch us, father?" I whispered.
"No, boy; if it were, those on board would hail."
"What shall we do--shout?" I asked him.
"Certainly not. Here, Bigley, sit up, my lad! All keep perfectly still
and wait. We do not know whose boat it may be."
He was our leader, and we neither of us thought of saying a word, but
sat and listened to the low plash and roll of the oars of some big boat
that seemed to be very close in; and so it proved, for at the end of a
few minutes we could distinctly see something large and black looming up
out of the darkness, and before long make out that it was quite a large
vessel that was being worked with sweeps or large oars till it was close
in; and then there was the noise of the oars being laid inboard, and the
sound of orders being given in a low firm voice.
"Keep perfectly still," my father whispered to us; but it was
unnecessary, and we sat together there on the rock shelf, the projecting
portion making our resting-place quite black, as we watched and listened
to what was going on.
Then for about three hours there was a busy scene below us. Men seemed
to have dropped down into the water from both sides of the vessel. Some
went up to the cliff-face away to our left where the caverns lay, and at
the end of a minute the light of a couple of lanthorns gleamed out and
then disappeared in the cave.
Hardly a word was spoken save on board the vessel, where those upon deck
seemed from time to time to be doing something with poles to keep her
from getting aground as the tide fell.
It must, I say, have been for nearly three hours that the busy scene
lasted, and a large body of men kept on plashing to and fro with loads
from the vessel to the cavern and back empty-handed. Everything seemed
to be done as quietly as if the men were well accustomed to the task.
Not a word was spoken, except by one who seemed to be leader, and the
only sounds we heard were the tramping upon the slate-sprinkled sand and
the splashing as they waded in to reach the vessel's side.
It was evident enough that they were landing quite a store of something
of another from the vessel, and I knew enough of such matters to be sure
that it was a smuggler running a cargo. For the first few minutes I
felt that it must be the French coming to take us unawares; but the
French would have landed men, not packages and little barrels.
It was a smuggler sure enough, and hence my father's strict order to be
silent, for the smugglers had not a very good character in our parts,
and ugly tales were told of how they had not scrupled to kill people who
had interfered with them when busy over their dangerous work.
I was watching them eagerly, when, all at once, I turned cold and
shivered, for it had suddenly struck me that old Jonas was away with his
lugger, and that this must be it landing its cargo, while all the time,
so close to me that I could have stretched out my hand and touched him,
there lay my school-fellow--the old smuggler's son.
"He must suspect him," I said to myself; and then, "What must he feel?"
And all the while there below us was the busy scene--the men coming and
going and the cargo being landed, till all at once there was a
cessation. Those who returned from the cave stayed about the vessel,
and seemed, as far as we could make out, to be climbing on board, and as
I suddenly seemed to be making out their figures a little more clearly,
my father whispered, "Lie down, boys, or you will be seen. The day is
beginning to dawn."
We obeyed him silently, and lay watching, seeing every minute more
clearly that the dark-looking vessel, which loomed up very big, was
being thrust out with long oars, and beginning to glide slowly away in a
thick mist which hung over the sea a hundred yards or so from shore.
Then as it reached and began to fade, as it were, into the mist, first
one then another dark patch rose from the deck.
"Hoisting sail," I said to myself. "Two big lug-sails. It is the
_Saucy Lass_--old Jonas's lugger, and it looks big through the fog."
Just then in the coming grey dawn I saw another patch rise up, following
a creaking noise, and I could make out that it was a third sail, when I
knew that it could not be the _Saucy Lass_, but must be a stranger.
I was so glad, for Bigley's sake, that my heart gave quite a heavy
throb; and, unless I was very much deceived, I heard my father draw a
long breath like a sigh of relief.
As we gazed at the sails and the dark hull in the increasing light,
everything looked so strange and indistinct that it seemed impossible
for it all to be real. The sails began to fill, and the vessel glided
silently away without a voice on board being heard, till it was so
far-off that my father said:
"I think we may begin to talk, my lads, now."
"I say, sir," cried Bob excitedly, "weren't those smugglers?"
"I cannot say," replied my father coldly.
"Let's get down now and look," said Bob.
"I think," said my father, "that we had better leave everything alone,
and, as soon as the tide will allow us, get home to breakfast. You, Bob
Chowne, if I were you, I should keep my own counsel about this, and you
too, Sep."
I noticed that he did not say anything to Bigley, who was kneeling down
gazing after the vessel in the mist which was dying away about the land,
and appeared to be going off with the vessel, surrounding it and trying
to hide it from those on shore, as with the faint breeze and the swift
tide it glided rapidly away.
Soon after there was a warm glow high up in the east. Then hundreds of
tiny clouds began to fleck the sky with orange, the sea became glorious
with gold and blue, the sun peeped above the edge, and it was day once
more, with the vessel a couple of miles away going due west.