The fugitive was snow-rigged, a merchant brig apparently by her deep bends, bluff bows, and somewhat clumsy top and hamper; the British colours were displayed at her gaff peak. The other was a smart gun-brig or privateer with the tricolour of France floating at her gaff, and a long whiplike pennant streaming ahead of her, as she fired her bow chasers. Twice luffing round, she let fly some of her broadside guns, and once she discharged a large pivot cannon from amidships, in her efforts to cripple the fugitive. But as both vessels were plunging heavily in a tempestuous sea, the shot only passed through the fore and main courses of the merchantman, and were seen to ricochet along the waves' tops ahead, ere they sunk amid tiny waterspouts to the bottom. Thus the violence of the gale rendered the cannonading of the Frenchman nearly futile.
Neglected, or ill-protected at times by warship and batteries, as the whole Scottish coast was during the war against France, such episodes as this were of frequent occurrence. There was no cruiser in the vicinity, so the flight and pursuit in the offing went on interrupted, notwithstanding the fury of the gale, which was increasing every moment.
Although our fleets successfully blockaded the great military ports of France, in the beginning of the war, her privateers infested all the broad and narrow seas, and frequently made dashes inshore. Only seventeen years before the period of our story, the Fearnought, of Dunkirk, cannonaded Arbroath with red-hot shot; and much, about the same time, the notorious renegade Paul Jones kept all the Scottish seaboard in alarm with his fleet.
Now the wild blast that tore round the sea-beaten cliff on which the castle stood, increased in fury; the waves grew whiter as the lurid sun went down, enveloped in clouds; the sky grew darker and the guns flashed redder, as they broke through the murky atmosphere, while their reports were brought by the wind, sharply and distinctly, to the ears of those who so anxiously looked on.
"Oh, if Rohallion should be there!" exclaimed Lady Winifred, wringing her hands again and again.
"This will never do!" exclaimed the old Quartermaster, wrathfully; "a Frenchman in the very mouth o' the Clyde and dinging a Scottish ship in that fashion! I must fire a gun, and get the volunteers to man the battery."
Suddenly the sails of the merchantman were seen to shiver, and she seemed in danger of losing her masts, for a shot had carried away her rudder, and consequently she became unmanageable!
Both vessels were now so near the land, that the Frenchman probably became alarmed for his own safety; so changing his course, he braced his yards sharp up, and beating to windward, speedily disappeared into the gloom from which he had so suddenly emerged, and was seen no more; but the unfortunate victim of his hostility drifted fast away before the wind, partly broadside on, towards that lee and rocky shore.
"She will be foul o' the Partan Craig, so sure as my name is John Girvan!" exclaimed the Quartermaster.
"There is death in the air, Girvanmains," added Lady Rohallion, in a low voice that was full of deep emotion; "I heard the moan of the sea and wind—the deep sough of coming trouble—in the coves below the house this morning, and I never knew the omen fail—oh, look there—all is over!" she exclaimed with a shudder, as the drifting vessel struck with a crash, they seemed to hear, on the long white ridge of the Partan Craig.