The next moment the sleeper was wide awake, listening to what was undoubtedly a shout, and it was followed by another, both far away, but sounding clear on the night air, while from time to time came a dull murmur as of several voices together.
“They’re landing a cargo,” thought Aleck, and with his mind full of luggers lying off the coast, with boats going to and fro to fetch kegs, chests and bales, he hurried on his clothes, dropped from his bedroom window, hurried down the garden to the cliff path, and began to climb up the zigzag.
The landing-place would no doubt be away to the west and below Eilygugg, where the smugglers’ fishing-boats lay, and as soon as he was up out of the depression on to the level down, Aleck went off at a trot to get right at the edge of the cliff, where, unseen, he calculated upon getting a good view of what was going on by the light of, as he expected, many lanthorns.
Before he was half way to the edge a thrill ran through him, for a wild shrieking arose, beginning with one voice, and turning to that of several.
“Oh, it’s a wreck!” cried the lad, wildly, and he hurried on, hoping to reach the way down to the boats and be of some use before it was too late.
But as he ran on with throbbing heart and his breath growing short it gradually dawned upon him that the shrieks were those of angry women raging and storming, and this was soon confirmed, for there was the gruff burr of men’s voices in the distance, followed by a shout or two, which sounded like the orders he had heard in his dream.
“Why, it’s a fight,” he cried, half aloud. “Tom Bodger’s right; the press-gang has landed again, but, instead of going to Rockabie, they’ve come here.”
He was as right as Tom Bodger, for at last when he made his way to the edge of the cliff it was to look down on the lanthorns carried by three boats, which were close up to the shingly patch of beach from which the fishing craft put off.
As far as he could make out in the darkness, badly illumined by the lanthorns, there was a desperate struggle going on in the shallow water lying between the shingle and the boats.
For the first few moments it seemed to Aleck in his excitement that the press-gang was being beaten off by the smugglers. Then he was puzzled, for he could hear hoarse shouts and laughter, mingled with shrieks and what seemed to be loud abuse in women’s voices, followed by splashing in the water as of struggles going on again and again.