“Be that your honour?”
“Aye, aye, Sharkie man, wi’ twa friends. Send the boat!”
“Nay, I be comin’ myself, sir!”
Followed a scrambling, scuffling sound, the dip of oars, creak of rowlocks and a mutter of voices, then Sir Hector called softly:
“This way, John.”
With his companion’s hand in his, Sir John advanced cautiously until, above the stones of the jetty, at his very feet, he visioned the dim outline of a human head that admonished him thus:
“Gi’e’s a holt o’ the young ’ooman, sir, an’ easy it is!”
Here my lady manifested very decided unwillingness to be taken a “holt of”, but was swung suddenly aloft in compelling arms, passed below to other arms and safely deposited in the stern-sheets of a swaying boat; then the others followed in turn, and they pushed off. Half a dozen strokes brought them to the side of a fair-sized vessel, and very soon my lady found herself set on deck, her hand securely tucked within Sir John’s arm.
“Perfect!” he exclaimed, glancing aloft at dim-seen, raking masts. “But wherefore all this stealth and secrecy, Hector?”
“Whisht, man! Wha’ gars ye tae say sic things o’ honest fusher-folk? Ye’re aboard the True Believer, Johnnie lad, juist a bit fushin’-boat out o’ Newhaven.”