All was ready. Suddenly a girl came running round the corner of the building.
It was Carterette. She was making for the right-hand gun. Ranulph started, the hand that held the match trembled.
"Fire, you fool, or you'll kill the girl!" cried Richambeau.
Ranulph laid a hand on himself as it were. Every nerve in his body tingled, his legs trembled, but his eye was steady. He took the sight once more coolly, then blew on the match. Now the girl was within thirty feet of the gun.
He quickly blew on the match again, and fired. When the smoke cleared away he saw that the gun was dismounted, and not ten feet from it stood Carterette looking at it dazedly.
He heard a laugh behind him. There was Richambeau walking away, telescope under arm, even as the other 12-pounder on shore replied impudently to the gun he had fired.
"A good aim," he heard Richambeau say, jerking a finger backward towards him.
Was it then? said Ranulph to himself; was it indeed? Ba su, it was the last shot he would ever fire against aught English, here or elsewhere.
Presently he saw a boat drawing away with the flag of truce in the hands of a sous-lieutenant. His mind was made up; he would escape to-night. His place was there beside his fellow-countrymen. He motioned away the men of the gun. He would load ma couzaine himself for the last time.
As he sponged the gun he made his plans. Swish-swash the sponge-staff ran in and out—he would try to steal away at dog-watch. He struck the sponge smartly on ma couzaine's muzzle, cleansing it—he would have to slide into the water like a rat and swim very softly to the shore. He reached for a fresh cartridge, and thrust it into the throat of the gun, and as the seam was laid downwards he said to himself that he could swim under water, if discovered as he left the Victoire. As he unstopped the touch-hole and tried with the priming-wire whether the cartridge was home, he was stunned by a fresh thought.