"Yes, yes," panted Mrs. Day. "You row as hard as you can. I will hold her, poor dear. Oh, James, what can have happened? And she so happy a few hours agone!"
Day bent to the oars. Margaret had ceased to struggle, but Mrs. Day did not dare to relax her grasp. The boat forced its way nearer the shore.
Suddenly there rang out a sharp report, and a flash of fire darted from the beach.
Day uttered a cry and stopped rowing as if he had been shot, and Mrs. Day crouched still lower in the boat.
"It's the coastguard!" he said, bending forward and lowering his voice, though no one but the two women could have heard him. "It's the revenue men—and I've got the things aboard!"
There was silence for a moment, then Mrs. Day spoke.
"You must go to shore, James," she said, with the calmness of despair. "If we were alone——"
She stopped and looked at the prostrate figure at the bottom of the boat.
"Go ashore!" he responded, with an oath. "What! and them waiting for me? I tell you I've got the stuff on board. It's ruin, blank ruin!"
Silence again. The wind howled, the boat tossed like a walnut shell upon the black billows.