The Adventures of Harry Revel

by Arthur Quiller-Couch

"Tell 'en he's a good boy, and I wouldn' mind having one like him."

"You're a good boy," said O.P., and covered the remainder of the message with a discreet cough. "Seems to me Tucker's holdin' off a bit," he added, peering again under the sail. "Wonder what his game is?"

But I was already stripped, and already the high land loomed over us. Down went the helm again, and "Now's your time," muttered O.P. as we scrambled forward to cast off sheets. Amid the flapping of her head sails as she hung for a moment or two in stays, I slipped overside and took the water easily while the black mass of her stern swung slowly round and covered me from view of the boat. Then, as the tall side began to gather way and slip by me, I cast a glance towards land and dived.

I came to the surface warily and trod water whilst I spied for the boat, which—as I reckoned—must be more than a gunshot distant. The sound of oars guided me, and I dived again in a terror. For she had not turned about to follow the ketch, but was heading almost directly towards me, as if to cut me off from the shore.

My small body was almost bursting when I rose for air and another look. The boat had not altered her course, and I gasped with a new hope. What if, after all, she were not pursuing me? I let my legs sink and trod water. No: I had not been spied. She was pointing straight for the shore. But what should take a long-boat, manned (as I made out) by a dark crowd of rowers and passengers, at this hour to this deserted spot? Why was she not putting-in for Cawsand, around the point? And did she carry the water-guard? Was this Tucker's boat after all, or another?

Still treading water, I heard her nose take the ground, and presently the feet of men shuffling, as they disembarked, over loose stones: then a low curse following on a slip and a splash. "Who's that talking?" a voice inquired, quick and angry. "Sergeant! Take that man's name." But apparently the sergeant could not discover him. The footfalls grew more regular and seemed to be mounting the cliff, along the base of which, perhaps a hundred yards from shore, the tide was now sweeping me. I gave myself to it and noiselessly, little by little working towards land, was borne out of hearing.

Another ten minutes and my feet touched bottom. I pulled myself out upon a weed-covered rock, and along it to a slate-strewn foreshore overhung by a low cliff of shale, grey and glimmering in the darkness. But even in the darkness a ridge of harder rock showed me a likely way. I remembered that the cliff hereabouts was of no great height and scalable in a score of places. Very cautiously, and sometimes sitting and straddling the ridge while my fingers sought a new grip, I mounted to the edge of a heathery down; and there, after pricking myself sorely among the furze-bushes that guarded it, found a passage through and cast myself at full length on the short turf.

For a while I lay and panted, flat on my back, staring up at the stars: for the wind had chopped about and was now drawing gently off shore, clearing the sky. But, though gentle, it had an edge of chill which by and by brought me to my feet again. Far out on the dark waters of the Sound glimmered the starboard light of the Glad Tidings, and it seemed to me that she was heading in for shore. Had the Pengellys too discovered that the boat was not the water-guard's? And was O.P. working the ketch back to give me a chance of rejoining her? Else why was she not slackening sheets and running? Vain hope! I suppose that the new slant of wind took some time in reaching her; for, just as I was preparing to creep back between the furze-whins and scramble down to the foreshore again, the green light was quenched. She had altered her helm and was clearing the Sound.

I dared not hail her. Indeed, had I risked it, the odds were against my voice carrying so far, to be recognised. And while I stood and searched the darkness into which she had disappeared, my ear caught again the muffled tramp of the soldiers, this time advancing towards me. I waited no longer, but started running for dear life up the shoulder of the down.

The swim and the chill breeze had numbed my legs and arms. After a few hundred yards, however, I felt life coming back to them, and I ran like a hare. I was stark naked, and here and there my feet struck a heather root pushed above the turf, or wounded themselves on low-lying sprouts of furze; but as my eyes grew used to the dark sward I learned to avoid these. So close the night hung around me that even on the sky-line I had no fear of being spied. I crossed the ridge and tore down the farther slope; stumbled through a muddy brook and mounted another hillside. My heart was drumming now, but terror held me to it—over this second ridge and downhill again.