White, dishevelled, and tear-stained, the little boy got off the seat. "Are we to get out now?" he asked uncertainly, as the sail came down with a run.
"Yes, little one, and be careful that you do not slip," said the émigré, putting him over the side on to the rock, and scrambling after him. Once there he spread his cloak on the seaweed. "Now sit quiet for a moment," he went on, in a business-like tone, "and take care of these things for me." He put the water-keg, the compass, and what remained of the provisions beside him, and armed himself with an oar.
"I am not going to leave you, Anne," he said. "I am only going to the end of this rock; but I want you to look at the compass carefully while I am away, so that when I come back in a minute or two you will be able to tell me which is the north. Will you?"
"Yes, M. le Chevalier," responded Anne, and averted his eyes not unwillingly from La Vireville's bandaged head to the still-swinging compass-card.
With the oar La Vireville manœuvred the boat farther out along the spit of rock, where she would catch a better wind for his purpose. Then he clambered on board again, and, lifting the sail, looked regretfully at the young, sunburnt face beneath. Thinking of the dead fisherman's wife, he turned out his pockets; there was nothing there but a claspknife and a twist of tobacco, but round his neck was a medal, and on his finger a silver ring, and these he took. Then with a rope he lashed the body to the thwarts and made fast the tiller. The last thing was done with an auger from the locker. Hastily he then hoisted the sail, scrambled back on to the rock, and pushed the boat off with the oar.
Slowly at first, then faster as the breeze caught her, the Marie-François moved away. Her executioner had bored only small holes, so that she should be well out in the bay before her doom came upon her; but she was settling little by little as she went. She began at last to lie over to the wind, and that hastened the end; the water without and the water within met over the gunwale; she heeled suddenly over, struggled to right herself, heeled over again . . . and was gone. The brown sail lay a second or two on the water, then it followed the rest, and the Marie-François and her master went down to the bottom of the bay.
An oar, a loose spar, some indeterminate objects, and a couple of lobster-pots bobbed on the surface of the waves as La Vireville, dizzy with pain and regret, made his way back over the seaweed to the forlorn, frightened child for whom these two lives had just been thrown away.
CHAPTER XII
Introducing Grain d'Orge
(1)
Anne-Hilarion was still sitting obediently on the cloak, staring at the now stationary compass. La Vireville stooped and kissed him before he had time to ask any questions. "Anne, you have been a very brave little boy! Now you will go on being brave, will you not? The fisherman and his boat have gone home; you will not see them any more. But we do not need them, because for the rest of the day we are going to stay here, in a cave that I know of. You can help me to carry these things to it. Mind you do not slip on the seaweed!"