"Faith, sir, I cannot tell you," she answered again, still in the same light tone. "But I came, just now, to kidnap the Commandant!"
Without giving a chance of reply, she broke into singing again; the air, Ah, fors é lui. It gushed from her lips like a very fountain of happiness, irrepressible, springing towards the stars in jets and spurts of melody, falling with a ripple in which the music of the stars themselves seemed to echo; almost in the moment of its fall rising again, as though it panted with joy—not with weariness, for the spirit of it called impetuously to life. The two men listened, marvelling. Nor when the song ended was the spell broken; for still, as she pulled towards the looming shadow of Inniscaw, sinking her voice almost to a murmur, she took up the melody as though in echo, caressing, repeating it, loth to let it go.
They came to the dark landing-quay. Sir Ommaney, stepping ashore, stretched out a hand; but she disregarded it, as she disregarded the Commandant's, held out to take the painter and make fast.
"Thank you"—she stooped, apparently groping among the bottom-boards. "I will moor the boat myself. But wait: I have something for each of you to carry."
In the darkness she passed up a double tackle and a coil of rope. "I fetched these from Saaron on my way to you," she explained. "We shall need them. Have you fairly strong heads for a climb? Very well, then"—she sprang ashore with the painter in her hand, made it fast to a ring above the quay steps, and picked up the lantern. "Now forward! And no talking, please, until we are well past the house and out of hearing!"
Sir Ommaney picked up the tackle, the Commandant the coil of rope, and the pair followed her one behind the other. In Indian file they stole up through the plantations, almost to the foot of the glimmering terrace; thence, bearing to the left, along dim paths through the mazes of the gardens, thence again through the north-west plantation, and out upon the path which the Lord Proprietor had taken, on his way to North Inniscaw. Here, on the uplands, the breeze met them, and at his feet Sir Ommaney, for the first time, saw spread the wonderful circle of the great sea lights. Smaller lights twinkled like a thread of gems along the north and north-eastern horizon. They belonged to the boats still prosecuting the search.
From the first Vashti had led the way without faltering or appearing to hesitate for a moment. Even when clear of the woods her companions observed the prohibition she had laid upon them at the start, and exchanged scarcely a word.
"You have followed well," said Vashti, as they reached the foot of Pare Coppa. She pointed to the mass of shadow ahead, and the granite blocks on the summit faintly touched by the starlight. "I know now what it feels like to command soldiers, and it feels good. There, by that high rock to the left, our march ends."
They breasted the slope and arrived at the rock panting, after seven or eight minutes' climb. It was the same on which Sam Leggo had last seen the Lord Proprietor sitting with his gun across his knees. But why she had brought them to this spot the two men were as far as ever from guessing; for almost straight beneath them lay the sea.
After a minute's rest Vashti lowered herself over the western edge of the rock, at the same time warning them to follow with extreme caution; and so all three came to the ledge of the adit. But their business did not lie here. Indeed, in the darkness neither Sir Ommaney nor the Commandant observed the opening, and Vashti had no leisure to call their attention to it. Clambering, still to the left, across a boulder which fairly overhung the sea, she struck a match, lit the candle in her lantern, and held it up before a dark hole—a second adit—pierced in the cliff-side and running west, as the other ran south-by-east.