Chapter V A Midnight Excursion
“I know!” said Arthur that evening, coming up to Jack, who was practising skittles in an alley behind the house. He looked up slyly in Jack’s face.
“You do, do you? And what do you know?”
“About you.”
“Well, I suppose you do. I’m Jack Hardy, son of Major James Hardy, late of the East India Company’s service, and—”
“Didn’t he touch you at all?”
“Who? Father? Yes, he used to lay it on pretty thick when I was a young un like you.”
“Jan Lamiger, I mean.”
“Oh, that’s it, is it? And what do you know about Jan Lamiger, may I ask?”
“Tony told me. He says Jan Lamiger has got two black eyes and a green nose. Oh! don’t I wish I’d seen it! Just don’t I!”
“Well, my young cockchafer, you hold your tongue about it. I don’t want it all over the country that a king’s officer has been sparring with a lout like Jan Lamiger.”
“All right. You needn’t be stuck up about it. Did he go squash?”
“Your language is not very choice, Master Bastable. Hullo! There’s Gudgeon’s chimney on fire again.”
“It’s always on fire.”
“What do you mean?”
“So it is—in the winter.”
“Well, I s’pose he doesn’t have fires in the summer, but it isn’t winter yet.”
“I don’t care. I’ve seen the chimney smoking away like that often enough; sometimes twice a week.”
“That’s rather curious, isn’t it? Doesn’t he ever have ’em swept?”
“I don’t know. I asked Bill Gudgeon about it once, and he said they can’t afford sea-coal, and burn up all their muck like that.”
“Just the sort of answer I should expect from him. Well, there’s your tutor coming to teach you a, b, ab, b, a, b, bab. Cut away!”
“I say!”
“Well, what is it now?”
“I hate Frenchmen.”
“A very wise and proper thing for an English boy.”
“And I hate lessons.”
“Very wrong. You’ll grow up a dunce and disgrace to the name of Bastable. Cut!”
“Bother!”
He made a wry mouth and went slowly away. Jack smiled.
“He’ll do!” he said to himself. “But I wonder why Gudgeon’s chimneys seem so uncommonly foul. I think I must pay Bill’s father a visit some day.”
He mentioned the matter of the chimney to Mr. Bastable when that gentleman returned later in the day, after starting the chase for the rogues who had dared to disturb the peace of law-abiding Luscombe. Mr. Bastable laughed.
“Yes, Gudgeon has an uncommon quantity of muck on his farm,” he said, “but some good stuff, too—some uncommonly good stuff.”
Jack did not regard this as a very satisfactory explanation.
That night he was roused from a very heavy sleep by a touch on his arm.
“Who’s that?” he cried, springing up at once.
“Only me,” said Arthur in a whisper. “I say, Jack, I heard some one moving about below. It seemed to be in De Fronsac’s room.”
“Well, he’s stumping about doing some more poetry perhaps. Go to bed.”
“But I believe he’s gone out.”
“’Tis rather a close night. Perhaps he wanted air.”
“I believe he knows something about that fellow who was shot. I watched his face.”
“Oho!”
Jack was surprised to find that the boy’s suspicions jumped so nearly with his own.
“Look here, who’ve you told that to?”
“Only you.”
“That’s all right. I’m going out.”
“So am I,” was the quiet rejoinder.
“I don’t think so. I’m not going to make a row opening doors. I’m going out at the window.”
“If you do, I will, too.”
“All right. Go and pull on some things and be back here in fifty-nine seconds. Sharp!”
The boy hurried away.
De Fronsac’s room was just below, on the ground floor. It had once been a parlor, but little used, and when the tutor begged to have it for his bedroom, Mrs. Bastable made no objection. It had French windows opening on to the lawn, and De Fronsac said it would be so convenient for him, for he could go out before the household was astir, and compose poems on the Dawn, or satiric odes to the Monstair.
Arthur was back as soon as Jack had pulled on his coat, breeches, and boots.
“Ever climb down a rain-pipe?”
“No.”
“Well, you’ve got to now. I’ll go first, to be ready to pick up the pieces. Hist! What’s that?”
Jack had spoken in a whisper. Now through the open window he heard a sound as of a latch falling. Going to the window he peered cautiously out from behind the curtain. For a few moments he saw nothing. It was a dark night, but the moon was rising, and he thought he detected a dark figure moving along in the shadow of the wall. The figure went furtively on until the wall ended and a fence began; then Jack lost sight of it.
“You were right, Arthur,” whispered Jack. “Don’t look like making up poetry, either. Come along.”
Looking out to make sure that the figure was no longer in sight, he slipped over the window-sill, slid down the rain-pipe with a sailor’s ease, and in a few seconds stood on the lawn. Arthur hesitated for a moment at the sill, then, plucking up his courage, he let himself over and grasped the pipe. For a few feet he managed well enough; then he lost his head and his grip together, and came down with a rush, to be caught by Jack, who staggered under his weight.
“Well tried, youngster. No damage done?”
“No,” replied Arthur, not thinking it necessary to tell that he had two or three grazes on his wrists and legs, and that he had knocked his nose against one of the joints of the pipe.
The two boys hurried down the garden, passed through a gap in the fence made by removing two of the palings, and set off in the reverse direction, toward the front of the house. Jack chose this course almost by instinct; somehow he felt sure that De Fronsac was making toward the cliff. Between this and the house ran the highroad. On reaching the road, Jack looked up and down: it ran straight for at least a third of a mile in each direction. No figure was in sight; yet Jack was sure that unless De Fronsac had actually run he could not have already got so far as a third of a mile ahead; and the road lay so white in the moonlight that no person could move along it without being plainly seen.
“No good going on unless we can see him,” said Jack.
“Perhaps he has gone by the beach,” suggested Arthur.
“Right. The tide’s full, but there’s always room to walk at the foot of the cliffs. We’ll chance it.”
They ran across the road, vaulted the low wall on the other side, and doubled over the two fields separating them from the edge of the cliffs. As they approached the steep zigzag leading down to the shore they went more carefully. They did not immediately begin the descent, but made their way to a jutting portion of the cliff whence they could get a good view of the shore on either hand.
“We can’t see him if he’s down there,” said Arthur, still in a whisper.
“No, the shadow’s too black,” replied Jack. “And we can’t hear him, either. Wish it was sand! The rollers make such a noise on that shingle, and the tide’s too high for any one to walk on the sands.”
But he had hardly finished speaking when, looking to the left, he saw a black shade on the shingle, at a point where a mass of rocks at the foot of the cliff interrupted the direct path. It moved a few yards, and again disappeared. That was enough for Jack.
“There he is!” he whispered. “Take care, youngster; we don’t want any broken necks.”
Quickly lowering himself over the steep side of the cliff until his feet touched the zigzag path, he began to race down as quickly as the need for quietness permitted, Arthur following somewhat less rapidly. At the foot he waited for his cousin, then both set off toward the village, the direction in which they had seen the shadow move.
He almost wished now that he had refused to let Arthur come with him, for while the sound of one person running on the loose shingle might pass unheard, it was not so likely that two could run with the same security. But he did not care to send the boy back now, so they went on together, more slowly than he would have done alone.
De Fronsac must have walked rapidly, for it was not until they had nearly reached the village that they caught another glimpse of him. Then, however, the gap in the cliff brought him well into view, and the boys had no difficulty in following. He kept straight on across the deserted harbor and on to the footpath at the other side running up the cliff,—a short cut for pedestrians leading to the highroad a little short of Gudgeon’s farm. Not far up, however, the path forked, a narrow track leading down again to the beach, which it reached about two hundred yards farther east.
Jack had to wait until De Fronsac had disappeared before he followed him across the open space around the harbor, for if he had chanced to turn he must have caught sight of any one behind. Thus, when the boys reached the fork of the path, they were uncertain whether to continue up the cliff, or to turn down to the right.
“Listen!” said Jack.
Holding their breath they waited. Was that a faint sound from above?
“Let us chance it,” said Jack, and up they went, following the steep winding path until it brought them once more to the highroad. They glanced up and down; there was nothing to be seen, only Gudgeon’s farm about a stone’s throw to the right, and the bare white road winding down-hill past it and up-hill to the left. They were again at fault; presumably De Fronsac, to avoid the very loose shingle near the village, had chosen the cliff path, only to turn to the right and continue his road by the beach.
“If that’s it,” said Jack, “we can easily make sure. Remain here by the wall so that you can’t be seen. I’ll go on.”
He ran on tiptoe along the road past Gudgeon’s house standing black and silent, crossed the little bridge over the chine, and, vaulting the wall, hastened to the edge of the cliff. He should now at least be level with the Frenchman if he was still walking along the beach eastward, for on the road Jack had run much faster than was possible on the shingle.
Here again, however, the cliff cast a black shadow. He could see nothing; nor, listening intently, could he detect any sound from below, save the slow wash of the high tide. But in a few moments his practised ear caught another sound. Surely that was the faint thud of oars working in row-locks out at sea. Yes: a quarter of a mile eastward he saw a boat cross the white path of the moonbeam across the water and creep shoreward. And beyond, straining his eyes, he thought he saw in the shimmering moonlight the shape of a larger vessel, motionless.
“Whew!” he whistled softly, “that’s the Frenchman’s little game!”
He was convinced that there must be some connection between the approach of the boat and De Fronsac’s suspicious movements. What was it? He thought of Arthur, remaining by himself in Gudgeon’s field.
“Better fetch the youngster,” he said to himself.
He raced back to the spot and told Arthur what he had seen.
“You had better come with me. Who knows what this will lead to?”
They returned together and hurried along the cliffs, keeping well away from the edge to avoid being seen.
“She’s making for Laxted Cove,” said Arthur when he saw the boat.
“How far away?”
“About half a mile. We’ll have to fetch round it and approach from the other side if we’re to see what’s going on.”
“Come on, youngster; hold your wind.”
They pounded along at a steady pace over the rough bent. The surface was very irregular, and more than once the boys tripped and almost fell headlong as some sudden irregularity of the ground betrayed their steps. In spite of all their haste, by the time they had reached a point beyond the cove whence they could look down in security, the boat had already been beached, and men were landing.
The boys lay flat on their faces, peering over the edge of the cliff that fell here almost perpendicular to the beach. The men below were speaking in low tones; Jack caught a few words of French, he thought. They were apparently impatient to be off. He could not distinguish their faces, nor even their dress, for having come up the beach from the water-line they were now in the shadow of the cliffs.
Suddenly there was a low hail; immediately afterward the sound of footsteps. From the darkness of the undercliff there stepped three men carrying a heavy bundle. They staggered somewhat noisily across the shingle toward the waiting boat. Behind them two other figures came out of the blackness and stood just below the boys, as if watching the proceedings.
The three men met those who had landed from the boat. Jack saw the bundle transferred from the one party to the other, and with a start he recognized that it was the form of a man, well trussed up. It was carried to the boat and stowed with scant ceremony in the bows. Then the boat was pushed off, the men wading until she was fairly afloat. They sprang on board, gave a low farewell to the men on the beach, and seizing the oars pulled rapidly out to sea.
The men who had borne the prisoner watched the receding boat until it was lost to sight, then trudged off toward the village. The other two had already disappeared. Jack wished he could have seen who they were, but the man nearest him had been all the time in shadow, and the others had been too far away to be recognized.
“I say, Jack,” said Arthur, “what shall you do?”
“That’s just what I’m wondering. If I’d only got a few men here I’d go down to the village and demand an explanation of this strange business, in the king’s name. But if I went alone I’d make a fool of myself.”
“I’d go with you.”
“Then there’d be two fools instead of one. They could knock us on the head and send us to join that bundle on the boat. I wonder who he is. Surely they haven’t decoyed De Fronsac here and carried him off to the Monster!”
“He wouldn’t like that, would he?”
“Well, we can’t do anything at present. We’d better get back.”
“Shall you tell father?”
“Don’t know. I’ll tell you that to-morrow morning.”
They went back over the cliffs. They had just crossed the chine when a big figure suddenly loomed up to the left, appearing from the zigzag path leading down to the shore. There was no time to avoid a meeting; indeed, so suddenly had the man appeared from round a bend in the path that unless he and the boys had started back simultaneously there must have been a collision. The moonlight shone full in the face of the big man, and Jack recognized him even as Arthur whispered:
“I say! old Gudgeon!”
Gudgeon recognized the boys at the same moment.
“Oh, Mr. Hardy, sir!” he said, “you put me in quite a flutter. And you, too, Master Bastable; well to be sure! As if I had not had enough flutters for one night! Did you hear a boat, sir?”
“Saw it, too.”
“There now! I was kept up late attending to some lambs” (“Pretty old mutton!” thought Jack.), “and I thought I heard people moving, and I came out, and I was sure I saw a boat putting out to sea. It gave me quite a start. Perhaps it was some of those smugglers—a rough lot. But gracious me! ’tis very late for two young gentlemen to be out; your good mother would be in a terrible flutter, Master Bastable, if she knew.”
“I say, are you going to tell her?”
“I have to consider my duty, Master Bastable. As to Mr. Hardy, of course he’s a king’s officer, and can keep any hours the king likes to let him. But a boy like you, Master Bastable! Really, Mr. Hardy, sir, I’m surprised at you. But I keep myself to myself, I do, and don’t meddle with no man’s business as don’t concern me. So this time, Master Bastable, I won’t think it my duty to tell your lady mother what I seed this night.”
“I’m going to tell her myself, and what—”
“Avast there!” interrupted Jack, “you ought to be very much obliged to Mr. Gudgeon, you young donkey, for not rounding on you. Good night, Mr. Gudgeon.”
And he hauled Arthur away.
“You young idiot!” said Jack, when they were out of earshot. “You were going to say you would tell your mother all you had seen. We mustn’t on any account let them know what we have found out. That would put them on their guard at once. Better say nothing at all just yet.”
“All right. But why?”
“Because there’s something going on which I don’t understand. De Fronsac may be in it; Gudgeon certainly is; and if they think we know too much it will spoil things. Not a word to any one, mind.”
“I say, how am I going to get back into your room? I got down the rain-pipe, but I couldn’t climb up it.”
“Don’t worry yourself, we’ll find a way.”
On reaching the house they saw that De Fronsac’s windows were shut. Jack quickly swarmed up the pipe and entered his room. In about a minute down came the end of a knotted sheet. Arthur caught it, and in a few minutes was standing beside Jack.
The family were seated at the breakfast-table next morning when De Fronsac came in.
“Pardon, Madame,” he said, “I am late. Last night I see a fine moon; it drew me out towards de so beautiful sea over dere”—he pointed in a direction exactly contrary to that taken by the figure followed by the boys—“and I compose a little poem on de Minotaur—who is, of course, dat Monstair Bonaparte.”
“That’s strange, Monsieur,” said Jack, at whom Arthur had been staring very hard while the Frenchman spoke. “I could not sleep last night, and went out for a stroll, and I could have sworn I saw you coming just the opposite way.”
“Ah! I see you also. I see you drough my curtains—ven you climb up de pipe. To mariners dat is, of course, as easy as the staircase; but as for me, I shudder.”
“Gave you the flutters, eh, Monsieur?”
“Myself I vould say de tr-r-rembling. De poem I compose, Madame, it begin—
“‘Is dere a creature vizout shame?
Napoleon—so is he name.
Is dere a creature vizout heart?
Ah! yes!—de Monstair Bonaparte.’”
“Yes, but Monsieur,” persisted Jack, “I saw some one uncommonly like you going the other way, towards Laxted Cove.”
“Ah, Monsieur Jack, ve have a proverb, ‘In the dark all cats are gray.’ Dat you see some vun, it is certain; but me—no, Monsieur Jack, how can it? I vas composing my poem—over dere.”