"What will I say?" he cried. "Why, I will tell you that you shall have her, my boy, with ten thousand blessings on your head. I know you now; and since I've treated you so badly, and you've taken such a noble revenge, why, I'll make it up to you, or my name's not Wetherell. But we won't talk any more about that till we have got possession of her; we have other and more important things to think of. What time ought we to start to-night?"
"The letter fixes the meeting for ten o'clock; we had better be in the boat by half-past nine. In the meantime I should advise you to take a little rest. By the way, do you think your footman realizes that you have the money?"
"He ought to, for he carried it up to this room for me; and, what's more, he has applied for a holiday this afternoon."
"That's to carry the information. Very good; everything is working excellently. Now I'm off to rest for a little while."
"I'll follow your example. In the meantime I'll give orders for an early dinner."
We dined at seven o'clock sharp, and at half-past eight I went off to my room to don my disguise; then, bidding the Marquis good-bye—much to the young gentleman's disgust, for he was most anxious to accompany us—I slipped quietly out of my window, crossed the garden—I hoped unobserved—and then went down to the harbour side, where the boat I had chartered was waiting for me. A quarter of an hour later Wetherell's carriage drove up, and on seeing it I went across and opened the door. My disguise was so perfect that for a moment the old gentleman seemed undecided whether to trust me or not. But my voice, when I spoke, reassured him, and then we set to work carrying the bags of spurious money down to the boat. As soon as this was accomplished we stepped in. I seated myself amid-ships and got out the oars, Mr. Wetherell taking the yoke-lines in the stern. Then we shoved off, and made our way out into the harbour.
It was a dull, cloudy night, with hardly a sign of a star in the whole length and breadth of heaven, while every few minutes a cold, cheerless wind swept across the water. So chilly indeed was it that before we had gone very far I began to wish I had added an overcoat to my other disguises. We hardly spoke, but pulled slowly down towards the island mentioned in the letter. The strain on our nerves was intense, and I must confess to feeling decidedly nervous as I wondered what would happen if the police boat did not pull up to meet us, as we had that morning arranged.
A quarter to ten chimed from some church ashore as we approached within a hundred yards of our destination. Then I rested on my oars and waited. All round us were the lights of bigger craft, but no rowing-boat could I see. About five minutes before the hour I whispered to Wetherell to make ready, and in answer the old gentleman took a matchbox from his pocket. Exactly as the town clocks struck the hour he lit a vesta; it flared a little and then went out. As it did so a boat shot out of the darkness to port. He struck a second, and then a third. As the last one burned up and then died away, the man rowing the boat I have just referred to struck a light, then another, then another, in rapid succession. Having finished his display, he took up his oars and propelled his boat towards us. When he was within talking distance he said in a gruff voice:
"Is Mr. Wetherell aboard?"
To this my companion immediately answered, with a tremble in his voice, "Yes, here I am!"