The breakfast the next morning was rather late, consequent upon Captain
Lawrence and his nephew dropping off each into a deep sleep just when it
was about time to rise; but it was a very pleasant meal when they did
meet, for the removal of a great weight from Aleck's mind allowed some
other part of his economy to rise rampant with hints that it had missed
the previous day's dinner. There was a pleasant odour, too, pervading
the house, suggesting that Jane had been baking bread cakes and then
frying fish.
Aleck noticed both scents when he threw open his window to let the
perfume of the roses come in from the garden; but the kitchen windows
and door were open, and the odour of the roses was regularly ousted by
that of the food.
"My word! It does smell good," said the boy to himself, and his lips
parted to be smacked, but gave vent to the interjection "O!" instead,
for the movement of the articulations just in front of his ears caused a
sharp pain.
"That's nice!" muttered Aleck. "How's a fellow to eat with his jaw all
stiff like that?"
This reminder of the previous day's encounter brought with it other
memories, which took the lad to the looking-glass, and the reflection he
saw there made him grin at himself, and then wince again.
"Oh, my!" he said, softly. "How it hurts! My face feels stiff all
over. I do look a sight. Can't go down to breakfast like this, I know;
I'll stop here, and Jane will bring me some up. One can't stir out like
this."
Grasping the fact that it was late, the boy dressed hurriedly, casting
glances from time to time at the birds which sailed over from the sea,
and at old Dunning, the gardener, who was busy digging a deep trench for
celery, and treating the soft earth when he drove in the spade in so
slow and tender a way that it seemed as if he was afraid of hurting it.
Aleck noted this, and grinned and hurt himself again.
"Poor old 'Nesimus," he said, feeling wonderfully light-hearted; "he
always works as if he thought it must be cruel to kill weeds."
The boy had a good final look at the old man, who wore more the aspect
of a rough fisherman than a gardener. In fact he had pursued the former
avocation entirely in the past, in company with the speculative growing
of fruit and vegetables in his garden patch--not to sell to his
neighbours, the fishing folk of the tiny hamlet of Eilygugg, but to
"swap" them, as he termed it, for fish. Then the time came when the Den
gardener happened to be enjoying himself at Rockabie with a dozen more
men, smoking, discussing shoals of fish, the durability of nets, and the
like, when they suddenly discovered the fact that a party of men had
landed on the shore from His Majesty's ship Conqueror, stolen up to the
town in the darkness, and, after surrounding the little inn with a
network of men, drawn the said net closer and closer, and ended by
trammelling the whole set of guests and carrying them off as pressed men
to the big frigate.
That was during the last war, and not a man came back to take up his
regular avocation. Consequently there was a vacancy for a gardener at
the Den, and it was afterwards filled up by Fisherman Onesimus Dunning,
the wrinkled-faced man handling the spade and dealing so tenderly with
his Mother Earth when Aleck looked out of the window.
"I wonder old Jane hasn't been up to see how I am," said Aleck, as he
handled his comb as gingerly as the gardener did his spade.
"I wonder how Master Aleck is," said Jane, just about the same time.
"But I won't disturb him. Nothing like a good long sleep for hurts."
"I know," said Aleck to himself; "I can't call down the stairs, because
uncle would hear. I daresay he's asleep. I'll tell old Ness to go
round to the kitchen door and say she is to come up. No, I won't; he'd
come close up and see my face, and it would make her cross now she's
busy frying fish. How good it smells! I _am_ hungry! Wish she'd bring
some up at once. How _am_ I to let her know?"
He had hardly thought this before he started, for there was a sharp rap
at the door, the handle rattled, and the old captain came in.
"Getting up, Aleck, boy?" he said. "Ah, that's right--dressed. Come
along down. You must be hungry."
"I am, uncle," replied the boy, returning his uncle's warm and
impressive grasp; "but I can't come down like this," and the boy made a
deprecating gesture towards his battered face.
"Well, you don't look your best, Aleck, lad," said the old man, smiling;
"but you are no invalid. Never mind your looks; you'll soon come
right."
Nothing loth, the boy followed his uncle downstairs, Jane hurriedly
appearing in the little breakfast-room with a hot dish and plates on
hearing the steps, and smiling with satisfaction on seeing Aleck.
"Ah, that's right, Jane!" said the captain, cheerfully, making the maid
beam again on seeing "master" in such an amiable frame of mind.
"Fried fish?"
"Yes, sir; brill."
"Some of your catching, Aleck?"
"No, sir," put in the maid, eagerly; "that Tom Bodger was over here with
it as soon as it was light. He knocked and woke me up. Said Master
Aleck forgot it yes'day."
"No wonder," said the captain, smiling at his nephew; "enough to knock
anything out of your head, eh, Aleck?"
"Yes, uncle; one of the fishermen said I was to bring it home."
"That's right. Shows you have friends as well as foes in Rockabie."
The breakfast went on, and after the first mouthfuls the boy's jaws
worked more easily, and he was enjoying his meal thoroughly, when his
uncle suddenly exclaimed:
"What are you going to do to-day, my boy?"
"Go on with those problems, uncle, unless you want me to do anything
else."
"I do," said the old man, smiling. "I want you to leave your books
to-day--for a few days, I should say, till your face comes round again--
I mean less round, boy," he added, laughing. "Have a rest. Go and
ramble along the cliffs. Take the little glass and watch the birds till
evening, and then you can fish."
Aleck jumped at the proposal, for the thought of books and writing had
brought on suggestions of headache and weariness; and soon after
breakfast he went up to his uncle's study, to find him sitting looking
very thoughtful, and ready to start at the boy's entry.
"I've come for the spy-glass, uncle," said Aleck.
"To be sure, yes. I forgot," said the old man, hastily. "Take it down,
my boy; and mind what you're about--recollect you are half blind. Let's
have no walking over the cliff or into one of the gullies."
"I'll take care, uncle," said the boy, smiling. "I'll be back to dinner
at two."
The captain nodded, and Aleck was moving towards the door, when the old
man rose hastily, overtook him, and grasped his hand for a moment or
two.
"Just to show you that I have not forgotten yesterday, Aleck, my boy,"
he said, gravely, and then he turned away.
"Who could forget yesterday?" thought the boy, as he slipped out by the
side door and took the path leading round by the far edge of the cliff
wall, the part which was left wild, that is, to its natural growth.
For Aleck's intent was to avoid being observed by the old gardener, whom
he had last seen at work over the celery trench upon the other side of
the house.
"He'd only begin asking questions about my face, and grinning at me like
one of the great stupid fisher boys," said Aleck to himself, as he
passed the sling strap of the spy-glass over his shoulder and hurried in
and out among the bosky shrubs close under the great cliff wall, till,
passing suddenly round a great feathery tuft of tamarisk, he came
suddenly upon the very man he was trying to avoid, standing in a very
peculiar position, his back bowed inward, head thrown backward, and a
square black bottle held upside down, the neck to his lips and the
bottom pointing to the sky.
Aleck stopped short, vexed and wondering, while the old gardener jerked
himself upright, spilling some of the liquid over his chin and neck, and
making a movement as if to hide the bottle, but, seeing how impossible
it was, standing fast, with an imbecile grin on his countenance.
"Morning, Master Aleck," he said. "Strange hot morning. Been diggin';
and it makes me that thusty I'm obliged to keep a bottle o' water here
in the shady part o' the rocks."
"Oh, are you?" said Aleck, quietly, and he could not forbear giving a
sniff.
"Ah! nice, arn't it, sir? Flowers do smell out here on a morning like
this, what with the roses and the errubs and wile thyme and things. It
do make the bees busy. But what yer been eating on, sir? Or have yer
slipped down among the nattles? Your face is swelled-up a sight. Here,
I know--you've been bathing!"
"Not this morning, Ness; I did yesterday."
"That's it, then, my lad, and you should mind. I know you've had one o'
they jelly-fish float up agen yer face, and they sting dreadful
sometimes."
"Yes, I know," said Aleck, beginning to move onward past the man; "but
it wasn't a jelly-fish that stung my face."
"Wasn't it now? Yer don't mean it was a bee or wops?"
"No, Ness; it was a blackguard's fist."
"Why, yer don't mean to say yer been fighting, do 'ee?"
"Yes, I do, Ness. Going to finish the celery trench?"
"Yes, sir; but the ground's mighty hard. Hot wuck, that it is. But
where be going wi' the spy-glass?"
"Over yonder along the cliffs to look at the Eilyguggs."
"Eh?" cried the man, sharply. "'Long yonder, past the houses?"
"Yes."
"Nay, nay, nay, I wouldn't go that away. Go east'ard. It's a deal
better and nicer that way, and there's more buds."
"I'll go that way another time," said the boy, surlily, and he hurried
on. "A nasty old cheat," he muttered; "does he take me for a child?
Water, indeed! Strong water, then. I shouldn't a bit wonder if it was
smuggled gin. But, there, I won't tell tales."
"Ahoy there!" shouted the gardener. "Master Aleck, there's a sight more
eggs yon other way."
"Yes, I know," cried the boy. "Another time." Then to himself, "Bother
his officiousness! Wants to be very civil so that I shan't notice about
his being there with that bottle."
The man shouted something back, and upon Aleck looking round he saw to
his surprise that he was being followed, the gardener shuffling after
him at a pretty good rate.
"Now, why does he want me to go the other way?" thought the boy. "I
didn't mind which cliff I went along, but I do now. I'm not going to be
dictated to by him. I know, he wants to come with me, just by way of an
excuse to leave off digging for an hour or two and chatter and babble
and keep on saying things I don't want to hear, as well as question me
about yesterday's fight; and I'm not going to give him the chance."
Aleck smiled to himself, and winced again, for the swollen face was
stiff and the nerves and muscles about his eyes in no condition for
smiles. Then, keeping on for a few yards till he was hidden from his
follower by the thick shrubs, he stooped down, ran off to his right, and
reached the path on the other side of the depression, well out of the
gardener's sight; and reaching a suitable spot he dropped down upon his
knees, having the satisfaction of watching the man hurrying along till
he came to where the depression narrowed and the pathway along the chasm
began.
From here there was a good view downward, and the man stopped short,
sheltered his eyes with his right hand to scan the narrow shelf-like
declivity for quite a minute, before he took off his hat and began
scratching his head, while he looked round and behind before having
another scratch and appearing thoroughly puzzled.
"Wondering how I managed to drop out of sight," laughed Aleck to
himself.
He was quite right, for he saw Dunning turn to right and left, after
looking forward, ending by staring straight up in the air, and then
backward, before giving his leg a sounding rap, and taking off his hat
to wipe the perspiration from his forehead.
"He doesn't get so hot as that over his work," said Aleck to himself, as
he crouched lower, laughing heartily; and he had another good laugh
when, after one more careful look, the old gardener shook his head
disconsolately and turned to walk back.
"Given it up as a bad job," he said, merrily. "An old stupid! I could
have found him. Well, I can go now in peace."
He waited till the coast was clear, and then, stooping low, set off at a
trot, getting well down into the gorge-like rift. Striking off
gradually to his right, he attacked the great cliff wall in a perfectly
familiar fashion, and climbed from ledge to ledge till he reached the
top, glanced back to see that the gardener was not in sight, and then
strode away over the short, velvety, slippery turf, with the edge of the
cliff some fifty yards or so to his left, and the rough, rocky slope
that led up to the scattered cottages of the Eilygugg fishermen to his
right.
He soon reached a somewhat similar chasm to that which ended in his own
boat harbour; but this was far wider, and upon reaching its edge he
could look right down it to the sea, where at its mouth a couple of
luggers and about half a dozen rowboats of various sizes were moored.
The cottages lay round and about the head of the creek, and partly
natural, partly cut and blasted out of the cliff side, ledge after ledge
had been formed, giving an easy way down from the cottages to the boats.
But there was not a soul in sight, and nothing to indicate that there
were people occupying the whitewashed cots, save some patches of white
newly-washed clothes which were kept from being blown away by the
playful wind by means of big cobble stones--smooth boulders--three or
four of which were laid upon the corners of the washing.
There was not even one fisherman hanging about the front of the
cottages, where all looked quiet and sleepy in the extreme, so, passing
on, Aleck hurried round the head of the narrow rugged harbour, and was
soon after making his way along the piled-up cliffs, keeping well inland
so as to avoid the great gashes or splits which ran up into the land and
had to be circumvented, where they ended as suddenly as they appeared,
in every case being perfectly perpendicular, with the water running
right up, looking in some cases black, still, deep and clear, in others
floored with foam as the waves rushed in over the black, jagged masses
of rock that had in stormy times been torn from the sides.
To a stranger nothing could have appeared more terrible than these
zigzag jagged gashes or splits in the stern, rocky coast, for they were
turfed to the sharp edge, where an unwary step would have resulted in
the visitor plunging downward, to drown in the deep, black water, or be
mutilated by the rocks amidst which the waters foamed.
But "familiarity breeds contempt," says one proverb, "use is second
nature" another, and there was nothing that appeared terrible to the
boy, who walked quickly along close to the edge, glancing perhaps at its
fellow, in some cases only a few yards away, and looking so exactly the
counterpart of that on the near side that it seemed as if only another
convulsion of nature was needed to compress and join the crack again so
that it would be possible to walk where death was now lurking.
But there was nothing horrible there to Aleck who in every case turned
inland to skirt the chasm, gazing down with interest the while at the
nesting-places of the sea-birds which covered nearly every ledge, each
one being alive with screaming, clamouring, hungry young, straining
their necks to meet the swift-winged auks and puffins that darted to and
fro with newly-captured fish in their bills.
Aleck had left the whitewashed cottages behind, along with the last
traces of busy human life in the shape of boat, rope, spar, lobster-pot,
and net, to reach one of the most rugged and inaccessible parts of the
rocky cliffs--a spot all jagged, piled-up rift with the corresponding
hollows--and at last selected a place which looked like the beginning of
one of the chasms where Nature had commenced a huge gaping crack a good
hundred feet in depth, though its darkened wedge-shaped bottom was still
quite a hundred feet above where the waves swayed in and out at the
bottom, of the cliff. The sides here were not perpendicular, but with
just sufficient slope to allow an experienced, cool-headed cliff-climber
to descend from ledge to ledge and rock to rock till a nook could be
reached, where, securely perched, one who loved cliff-scanning and the
beauties of the ever-changing sea and shore, could sit and enjoy the
wild wonders of the place.
The spot was exactly suited to Aleck's taste; and as old practice and
acquaintance with the coast had made giddiness a trouble he never felt,
he was not long in lowering himself down to this coign of vantage. Here
he perched himself with a sigh of satisfaction, and watched for a time
the great white-breasted gulls which floated down to gaze with curious
watchful eyes at the intruder upon their wild domain. The puffins kept
darting down from the ledges, with beaks pointed, web feet stretched out
behind, and short wings fluttering so rapidly that they were almost
invisible, while the singular birds looked like so many animated
triangles darting down diagonally to the sea, and gliding over it for
some distance before touching the water, into which they plunged like
arrow-heads, to disappear and continue their flight under water till
they emerged far away with some silvery fish in their beaks.
Some little distance below a few sooty-looking cormorants had taken
possession of an out-standing rock upon which the sun beat warmly, and
here, their morning fishing over, leaving them absolutely gorged, they
sat with wings half open and feathers erect, drying themselves, looking
the very images of gluttonous content.
Birds were everywhere--black, black and white, black and grey, and grey
and white, with here and there a few that looked black in the distance,
but when inspected through the glass proved to be of a deep bronzy
metallic green.
But while the air and rocks were alive with objects that delighted the
watcher's eye, there was plenty to see beside. Close in where the deep
water was nearly still, the jelly-fish floated at every depth, shrinking
and expanding like so many opening and shutting bubbles of soap and
water, glistening with iridescent hues. Farther out the smooth,
vividly-blue water every now and then turned in patches from sapphire to
purple, and a patch--a whole acre perhaps in extent--became of the
darkest purple or amethyst, all of a fret and work, while silvery
flashes played all over it, reflecting the rays of the burning sun. For
plenty of shoals of fish were feeding, over which the birds were rising,
falling, darting and splashing, as they banqueted upon their silvery
prey.
All this was so familiar to Aleck that, though still enjoying it, he
satisfied himself with a few glances before, carefully focussing the
glass he had brought, he began to sweep the coast wherever he could
command it from where he sat.
The opposite side of the rift seemed to take his attention most, and
perhaps he was examining some of the deep cavernous hollows seen here
and there high up or low down towards the sea; or maybe his attention
was riveted upon some quaint puffin, crouching, solemn and big-beaked,
watching patiently for the next visit of main or dad; or, again, maybe
the lad was looking at a solitary greatly-blotched egg, big at one end,
going off to almost nothing at the other, and wanting in the soft curves
of ordinary eggs, while he wondered how it was that such an egg should
not blow out of its rocky hollow when the wind came, but spin round as
upon a pivot instead.
Anyhow, Aleck was watching the other side of the half-made chasm, the
great wedge-shaped depression in the coast-line, looking straight across
at a spot about a hundred yards distant in the level, though higher up
it was too, and going off to nothing at the bottom, where the place
looked like the dried-up bed of a river.
All at once he started and nearly dropped the glass, as he wrenched
himself right round to gaze back and up, for a gruff voice had suddenly
cried:
"Hullo!"
The next moment the boy, was gazing in a fierce pair of very dark eyes
belonging to a swarthy, scowling, sea-tanned face, the lower part of
which was clothed in a crisp black beard, as black as the short head of
hair.
This head of hair of course belonged to a man, but no man was to be
seen, nothing but the big round bullet head peering down from the edge
of one of the ledges, while on both sides, apparently not heeding the
head in the least, dozens of wild fowl sat solemnly together, looking
stupid and waiting for the next coming of parent birds.
"Hullo!" cried the head again.
"Hullo!" retorted Aleck, as gruffly as he could, after recovering from
his surprise. "That you, Eben Megg?"
"Oh! ay, it's me right enough, youngster. What are you doing there?"
"Now?" said Aleck, coolly. "Looking up at your black face."
"Black face, eh, youngster? Perhaps other people ha' got black faces
too. What ha' you been doing of--tumbling off the rocks? Strikes me
you're trying it on for another tumble."
Aleck flushed a little at the allusion to his injured face, feeling
guilty too, as it struck him that he had brought the allusion upon
himself, a Rowland for his Oliver, on the principle that those who play
at bowls must expect rubbers.
"No, I haven't had a tumble, and I'm not going to tumble," he said,
testily. "I daresay I can climb as well as you."
"P'raps you can, youngster, and p'raps you can't; but, if you do want to
break your neck, stop at home and do it, and don't come here."
"What!" cried Aleck, indignantly. "Why not? I've as good a right here
as you have, so none of your insolence."
"Oh, no, you haven't. All along here's our egging-ground, and we don't
want our birds disturbed."
"Your egging-ground--your birds!" cried Aleck, indignantly. "Why, I do
call that cool. You'll be telling me next that the fish in the sea are
yours, and that I mustn't whiff or lay a fish-pot or trammel."
"Ay, unless you want to lose your net or other gear. I hev knowed folk
as fished on other people's ground finding a hole knocked in the bottoms
of their boats."
"What!" cried Aleck. "That's as good as saying that if I fish along
here you'll sink my boat."
"Didn't say I would, but it's like enough as some 'un might shove a
boat-hook through or drop in a good big boulder stone."
"Then I tell you what it is, Master Eben Megg. If any damage is done to
my Seagull you'll have to answer for it before the magistrate."
"Oh! that's your game, is it, my lad? Now, lookye here, don't you get
threatening of me or you'll get the worst on it. We folk at Eilygugg
never interferes with you and the captain and never interferes about
your ketching a bit o' fish or taking a few eggs so long as you are
civil; but you're on'y foreigners and intruders and don't belong to
these parts, and we do."
"Well, of all the impudence," cried Aleck, "when my uncle bought the
whole of the Den estate right down to the sea! Don't you know that
you're intruders and trespassers when you come laying your crab-pots
under our cliff and shooting your seine on the sandy patch off the
little harbour?"
"No, youngster, I don't; but I do know as you're getting a deal too
sarcy, and that I'm going to stop it, and my mates too."
"Get out! Who are you?" cried the boy, indignantly. "What do you
mean?"
"I mean that if you want to fish off our shore and wants a man to help
with your boat you've got to ask some of us to help, and not get
bringing none o' your wooden-legged cripples spying and poking about our
ground."
"Spy? What is there to spy?" said Aleck, giving the man a peculiar
look.
"Never you mind about that. You be off home, and don't you come spying
about here with none of your glasses."
Aleck laughed derisively.
"Ah, you may grin, my lad; but I've been a-watching of yer this
morning," said the man, fiercely. "You've been busy with that glass,
prying and peering about, and I caught yer at it."
Aleck laughed again.
"Oh! that's what you think, is it?" he said.
"Yes, and it's what I says; so be off home."
"I shall do nothing of the kind, Eben," said the boy, hotly. "I've a
better right here than you have, and I shall come whenever I please.
Spying, eh?"
"Ay, spying, youngster; and I won't have it."
"Then it's all true, eh?" said the boy, mockingly.
"What's true?" snarled the man.
"You know. What have you got hidden away among the caverns--Hollands
gin or French brandy? Perhaps it's silk or velvet. No, no; I know.
But you can't think that. How do you manage to land the great casks?"
"I dunno what you're talking about, youngster--do you?"
"Thoroughly. But aren't the tobacco casks too big and too heavy to haul
up the cliffs?"
"Look here, young fellow," growled the man; "none o' your nonsense.
You'd better be off before you get hurt. That's your way back."
"Is it?" said Aleck. "Then I'm not going back till I choose. I say,
should you talk like this to one of the Revenue sloop's men if he came
ashore?"
"Oh, we know how to talk to that sort if he comes our way," said the
man, with a chuckling laugh; "and they knows it, too, and don't come."
"Nor the press-gang either, eh?" said Aleck, mockingly.
Up to that moment the man's fierce face had alone been seen, but at the
word press-gang he gave a violent start and rose to his knees, upon
which he hobbled close up to the edge of the shelf upon which he had
perched himself.
"Oh, that's it, is it, my lad, eh?" he growled, shaking his fist
savagely. "Then, look here. If the press-gang--cuss 'em!--ever does
come along here we shall know who put 'em up to it, and if they take any
of our chaps--mind yer they won't take all, and them behind'll know what
to do. I'm not going to threaten, but if someone wasn't sunk in his
boat, or had a bit o' rock come tumbling down on him when he was taking
up his net under the cliffs, it would be strange to me. D'yer hear
that?"
"Oh, yes, I hear that," retorted Aleck. "So you won't threaten, eh?
What do you call that?"
"Never you mind what I call it, youngster; and what I says I means. So
now you know."
"Yes," said Aleck, coolly; "now I know that what people say about you
and your gang up at Eilygugg is quite true."
"What do people say?" shouted the man. "What people?"
"The Rockabie folk."
"And what do they say?"
"That you're a set of smugglers, and, worse still, wreckers when you get
a chance, and don't stop at robbery or murder. One of the fishermen--I
won't say his name--said you were a regular gang of pirates."
"The Rockabie fishermen are a set o' soft-headed fools," snarled the
man. "But what do I care for all they say? Let 'em prove it; and, look
here, if we're as bad as that you folk up at the Den aren't safe."
"Which means that you threaten the captain, my uncle," cried Aleck,
defiantly.
"Are you going to tell him what I said?"
"Perhaps I am," said Aleck; "perhaps I'm not. I'm going to do just as I
please all along this coast, for it's free to everybody, and my uncle
has ten times the rights here that you people at the fishermen's
cottages have. You've just been talking insolence to me, so let's have
no more of it. This comes of the captain, my uncle, being kind and
charitable to you people time after time when someone has been ill."
The man growled out something in a muttering way.
"Ah, you know it, Eben Megg! It's quite true."
"Who said it warn't?" growled the man; "but if he'd done ten times as
much I'm not going to have you spying and prying about here. What is it
you want to know?"
"That's my business," said Aleck, defiantly. "I say, you haven't made a
fortune out of smuggling, have you, and bought the estate?"
"You keep your tongue quiet, will yer?" growled the man, fiercely.
"What do you know about smuggling?"
"Just as much as you do, Eben Megg," cried the boy, laughing. "Just as
much as everyone else does who lives here. Didn't our old maid come in
scared one night after a holiday and walking across from Rockabie and go
into a fit because she had seen, as she said, a whole regiment of ghosts
walking over the moor, leading ghostly horses, which came out of the sea
fog and crossed the road without making a sound? Jane said they were
the spirits of the old soldiers who were killed in the big fight and
buried by the four stones on Black Hill, and that as soon as they were
across the stony road they were all swallowed up in a mist. She keeps
to it till now, and believes it."
"Well, why shouldn't she?" growled the man. "She arn't the first as has
seen a ghost. Why shouldn't she?"
"Because it's so silly, when it was a party of smugglers leading their
horses, with kegs slung across their backs and bales on pack saddles."
"Bah!" cried the man. "Horses loaded like that would clatter over the
rough stones."
"Yes," said Aleck, "if their hoofs weren't covered over with bits of
canvas and a few handfuls of hay."
"What!"
"I found one that a horse had kicked off on the road one morning, Eben,"
said the boy. "Ah! I see now."
"See--see what?" said the rough, fisherman-like fellow, sharply.
"See why Ness Dunning was so anxious that I shouldn't come along the
cliff this side."
"Ness Dunning?" cried the man, scowling. "What did he say?"
"That I'd better go the other way. Behaved just like a silly plover
which wants to prove to you that it has no nest on the moor, and sets
you looking for it."
"Ness Dunning's an old fool," cried the man, fiercely.
"Yes, he is a thick-headed old noodle, Eben; I wouldn't trust him."
"Then because he did that he made you think there was something hid
somewhere and come to hunt for it, did you?" cried the man, angrily.
"No, I didn't think anything of the kind till just this minute, but I
see now. You're not much wiser than old Ness, Eben, for you've been
trying to throw me off the scent too, and now I know as well as if I
could see it that you people have been running a cargo, and you've got
it hidden in one of the caves or sunk in one of the holes."
"What yer talking about?"
"Smuggled goods, Eben. I could find it if I tried now."
The man stepped down from the shelf on which he had been standing, and
made a great show of being exceedingly ferocious, evidently thinking
that the boy would turn and run away. But Aleck stood fast, not even
stirring when the man was close up, planting his doubled fists upon his
hips and thrusting out his lower jaw in a peculiarly animal-like way.
"So you're going to look and see if you can find something hidden, and
when you've found it you're going to send word to the Revenue cutter men
to fetch it, are yer?"
"Who says I am?" said Aleck, sharply.
"Who says it? Why, I do, my lad. So that's what you think you're going
to do, is it?"
"No," said the lad, coolly enough. "Why should I? It's no business of
mine."
"Ho!" growled the man, frowning, and raising one hand to rub his short,
crisp, black beard. "No," he said, after a pause, "it arn't no business
of yours, is it?"
"Of course not," said the boy, coolly. "I don't want to know where the
run cargo's hidden, and I wasn't looking for it. I only came to watch
the birds and get a few eggs if I saw any that I hadn't got."
The man made a sudden quick movement and caught Aleck's right wrist
tightly, leaning forward as if to pierce his eyes with the fierce look
he gave.
"Don't do that--you hurt!" cried Aleck, sharply.
"Yes, I mean to hurt," growled the man. "Now, then, look at me! Is
that true?"
"Do you hear, Eben Megg? You hurt me. Let go, or I shall hit out."
"You'll do what?" cried the big fellow, mockingly, as he tightened his
grasp to a painful extent, when _spank_! Aleck's left fist flew out,
striking the man full on the right cheek, not a heavy blow, but as hard
as the boy could deliver, hampered as he was, being dragged close to his
assailant's breast.
"Why, you--" roared the man. He did not say what, but flung the arm he
had at liberty round the boy's waist and lifted him, kicking and
struggling, from the ground, perfectly helpless, with the great muscular
arm acting like a band of iron, to do more than try to deliver some
ineffective blows, which his assailant easily avoided.
"Ah! Would you?" he growled, fiercely. "You're a nice young game cock
chick, you are. Hold still!" he roared, taking a step forward, to stand
on the very edge of the shelf. "Keep that hand quiet, or I'll hurl you
down among the rocks. You'll look worse then than you do now."
"Do, if you dare," cried the lad, defiantly.
"You tell me what I asked," growled the man; "is what you said true?"
"I won't tell you while you grip my wrist."
"You'd better speak," cried the man. "D'yer see, you're like a feather
to me. I could pitch you right out so as you'd go to the bottom
yonder."
"You could, but you daren't?" cried Aleck, grinding his teeth and
striving hard to bear the pain he suffered.
"Oh, I dare--I could if I liked! Nobody would see out here. It would
kill yer, and nobody would know how it happened; but they'd say when
they found you that you'd slipped and fell when you was egging. They
would, wouldn't they? That's true, arn't it?"
"I suppose so," said the boy, huskily.
"And that's what I'm going to do for hitting me, unless you tell me
whether that was true what you said. Now, then, beg me not to hurl yer
down."
"I--shan't," ground out the boy through his set teeth, and a grim smile
crossed the man's dark face, making it look for the moment open and
manly--a smile caused by something akin to admiration.
"Well, you're a nice-tempered sort of a young fellow," growled the man.
"Let go of my wrist."
"Will yer promise not to hit?"
Aleck nodded.
"Nor yet kick?"
The boy nodded again.
"There," said the man, loosening the prisoned wrist. "Now, tell me, is
it true?"
"Of course it is," said the boy, haughtily.
"I'll believe yer," growled the man. "There," he continued, dropping
the boy to his feet. "Then you won't look for where the stuff's
stowed?"
Aleck burst into a hoarse laugh.
"Then there is some stowed?"
The man gave himself a wrench, and his face puckered up again with
anger.
"Lookye here," he said, more quietly, "I don't say there is, and I don't
say there arn't; but suppose there is, you're going to swear as you
won't take no notice."
"No, I'm not," said Aleck, boldly.
"Then you do want me to chuck you down yonder?"
"You've got to catch me first," cried the boy, making a backward bound
which took him ten feet downward before he landed and kept his feet,
following up his leap by running along the ledge of stony slate he had
reached and then beginning to climb rapidly.
The man had followed him at once, leaping boldly, but without Aleck's
success, for he slipped, through the stones giving way, and went down
quite five-and-twenty feet in a rough scramble before he checked himself
and took up the pursuit, which he soon found would be useless, for his
young adversary was lighter and far more active, and soon showed that he
was leaving him behind.
"There, hold hard, Master Aleck," he growled, looking up at the lad. "I
won't hurt yer now."
"Thankye," said the boy, mockingly, as he stopped, holding on by a
projecting rock in the stiff slope, and well on his guard to go on
climbing if there was the slightest sign of pursuit.
"You made me wild by hitting out at me."
"Serve you right, you great lumbering coward, to serve me like that!"
"I didn't mean to hurt you."
"Yes, you did--brute! You squeezed my wrist as hard as you could."
"Well, I didn't want to hurt you much. But you did make me wild, you
know, hitting me like you did."
"Look here," cried Aleck, fiercely, as the man took a step to continue
climbing to where the boy stood, some thirty feet above him, "you come
another step, and I'll send this big stone down at you--it is loose."
"I don't want to ketch you now, only to talk quiet without having to
shout."
"I can hear you plainly enough. Sit down."
The great muscular fellow dropped at once, seating himself upon the
slope and digging his heels into the loose screes to keep from sliding
down.
"There y'are," he growled.
"Now, then," said Aleck, "what do you want to say?"
"Only about you coming along here to-day. You warn't trying to spy out
nowt, was yer?"
"No," cried Aleck; "of course I wasn't. I've known for long enough that
you people at Eilygugg do a lot of smuggling. I've stood with the
captain, my uncle, of a night and seen you signal with a lanthorn, and
then after a bit seen a light shown out at sea."
"You've seen that, youngster?"
"Lots of times; and the boats going and coming and the lights showing up
against the cliff. Of course we know what goes on, but my uncle doesn't
care to interfere, and I've never tried to find out where you hide the
smuggled goods; but I shouldn't be long finding out if I tried."
"Hum!" growled the man, gazing up searchingly. "P'raps you're right,
youngster, p'raps you arn't; but there is a deal o' smuggling goes on
along this coast."
"Especially about here," said Aleck, with a smile.
"Well, what's the harm, eh? A man must live, and if one didn't do it
another would."
"Look here; I don't want to know or hear anything about it," cried
Aleck. "Only I shall come along these cliffs, egging or watching the
birds, as often as I like."
"Well, I don't know as anyone'll mind, Master Aleck, if I speaks to 'em
and says as you says as a young gentleman that you'll never take no
notice of anything as you sees or hears--"
"What! How can a gentleman promise anything of the kind about people
breaking the law?"
"How? Why, by just saying as he won't."
"A gentleman can't, I tell you. There, I won't promise anything."
The man gave his rough head a vicious scratch, before saying, sharply:
"Then how's a man to trust yer?"
"I don't know," said Aleck, carelessly, "but I'll tell you this. If I'd
wanted to I could have found out whether you've got a place to hide your
stuff, as you call it, long enough ago."
"I don't know so much about that," said the man, with a grin.
"Well, then, I could have told the Revenue cutter's men where they had
better look."
"But you won't, Master Aleck? We are neighbours, you know."
"Neighbours!" said Aleck, scornfully. "Pretty neighbours! There, I'm
not going to alter my words. I shall make no promises at all."
"Well, you are a young gentleman, and I'll trust yer," said the man;
"for I s'pose I must. But I don't know what some of our lads'll say."
"Then I'd better tell my uncle that if anything happens to me he'd
better get the Revenue cutter's men to hunt out the Eilygugg smugglers,
because they pushed me off the cliff."
"Nay, don't you go and do that," said the man, anxiously. "I didn't
mean it."
"Am I to believe that, Eben?" said the boy, sharply.
The man showed his teeth in a laugh, and put his hands round his neck in
a peculiar way.
"Look here, Master Aleck," he said; "man who goes to sea has to take his
chance o' being drownded."
"Of course."
"And one who tries to dodge the Revenue sailors has to take his chance
of getting a cut from a bit o' steel or a bullet in him."
"I suppose so."
"That's quite bad enough, arn't it?"
"Yes."
"Bad enough for me, sir, so I'm not going to do what might mean being--
you know what I mean?"
"What--"
"Yes, that's it. A bit o' smuggling's not got much harm in it, but they
call it murder when a man kills a man."
"By pushing him off a cliff, Eben?" said Aleck. "Yes."