There was no denying a man who took matters into his own hands so energetically.
“You can pull an oar?” inquired the boatman, doubtfully.
“I was born at Bonifacio, my friend. Come, I will take the bow oar if you will find me an oilskin coat. It will not be too dry up in the bows to-night.”
And, like most masterful people—right or wrong—the abbé had his way, even to the humble office assigned to Mademoiselle Brun.
“You will need to remove your glove and bare your arm,” explained the boatman, handing her an old tin mug. “But you will not find the water cold. It is always warmer at night. Thus the good God remembers poor fishermen. The seas will come over the bows when we round this corner; they will rise up and hit the abbé in the back, which is his affair; then they will wash aft into this well, and from that you must bale it out all the time. When the seas come in, you need not be alarmed, nor will it be necessary to cry out.”
“Such instructions, my friend,” said the priest, scrambling into his oilskin coat, “are unnecessary to mademoiselle, who is a woman of discernment.”
“But I try not to be,” snapped Mademoiselle Brun. She knew which women are most popular with men.
“As for you, mademoiselle,” said the boatman to Denise, “keep the boat pointed at the waves, and as each one comes to you, cut it as you would cut a cream cheese. She will jerk and pull at you, but you must not be afraid of her; and remember that the highest wave may be cut.”
“That young lady is not afraid of much,” muttered the abbé, settling to his oar.
They pulled slowly out to the end of the rocky promontory, upon which a ruined house still stands, and shot suddenly out into a howling wind. The first wave climbed leisurely over the weather-bow, and slopped aft to the ladies' feet; the second rose up, and smote the abbé in the back.