Some said one thing, some another. And then a man suggested "the parson"; and when he said that it flashed across my mind that he meant Mr Cottier, for I knew that sailors always called a schoolmaster a parson, and I remembered how Mrs Cottier had heard his voice among the night-riders on the night of the snow-storm just before Christmas.
"No; it couldn't be the parson," said some one. "No one trusts the parson."
"I don't know as it couldn't be," said the man whom they called Hankie. "He is a proper cunning one to pry out."
"Ah!" said another smuggler. "And, come to think of it, we passed him the afternoon afore we sailed. I was driving with the Captain. I was driving the Captain here from Kingsbridge."
"He knows the Captain," said Marah grimly. "He might have guessed—seeing him with you—that you were coming to arrange a run. Now, how would he know where we were bound?"
"Guessed it," said Hankie. "He's been on a run or two with the Salcombe fellers. Besides, he couldn't be far out."
"No," said Marah, musingly; "he couldn't. And a hint would have been enough to send the cutter after us."
"But how did he put them on us last night?" said another smuggler. "We had drawed them out proper to Bolt Tail to look for a cargo there. Properly we had drawed them. Us had a boat and all, showing lights."
"Well, if it was the parson who done it, he'd easily find a way," said Marah. "We had better go over and see about it"
Before they went they left me in charge of the old Italian man, who taught me how to point a rope, which is one of the prettiest kinds of plaiting ever invented. The day passed slowly—oh! so slowly; for a day like that, so near home, yet so far away, and with so much misery in prospect, was agonising. I wondered what they would do to Mr Cottier; I wondered if ever I should get home again; I wondered whether the coastguards would have sufficient sense to arrest Marah if they saw him on the roads. In wondering like this, the day slowly dragged to an end; and at the end of the day, just before a watery sunset, Marah and the others returned, leading Mr Cottier as their prisoner.