Carette of Sark

by John Oxenham

"It will come again with the sun, maybe," I said.

"Then the quicker we get home the better," and we hurried on.

When we came out at last on the cliffs the sea lay below us as smooth as a clouded mirror. It would mean a toilsome passage, but toil was nothing compared with Torode. We walked rapidly along till we came to a village, which we learned, afterwards, was not Carteret but Surtainville. There were boats lying on the shore, and we slipped down the cliff before we reached the first house, and made our way towards them. One of those boats we had to use if we had to fight for it, but we had no desire to fight, only to get away at once without dispute and without delay.

We fixed on the one that seemed the least heavy and clumsy, though none were much to our liking, and while Le Marchant hunted up a pair of spare oars in case of accident, I found a piece of soft white stone and scrawled on a board, "Boat will be returned in two days, keep this money for hire"—and emptied all I possessed onto it. Then we ran the clumsy craft into the water and settled down to a long seven hours' pull.

But labour was nothing when so much—everything—waited at the other end of the course. We went to it with a will, and I do not suppose that old boat had ever moved so rapidly since she was built.

We had been rowing hard for, we reckoned, close on three hours when the sun rose. The gray shadows drew slowly off the face of the sea, and we stood up and scanned the northern horizon anxiously. But there was no flaw upon the brimming white rim. Torode had evidently not been able to get round La Hague, and a man must have been blind indeed not to see therein the hand of Providence; for a cap full of wind and he would have been down on us like a wolf on two strayed lambs. But now Sercq lay straight in front of our boat's nose, like a great gray whale nuzzling its young, and every long pull of the oars brought it nearer.

There was time indeed for catastrophe yet, and our anxieties would not be ended till Creux harbour was in sight. For, from Cherbourg to Sercq was but forty miles,—but, fortunately for us, forty miles which included La Hague and the Race,—and if Torode could pick up a fair wind he could do it in four hours—or, with all obstacles, in five, or at most six—whereas, strain as we might, and we were not fresh to begin with, we could not possibly cover the distance in less than seven hours. So, given a wind, the race might prove a tight one, and, as we rowed, our eyes were glued to the northern sky-line, where La Hague was growing dimmer with every lurch of the boat, and our hearts were strong with hope if not entirely free from fear.

We toiled like galley-slaves, for though the danger was not visible as yet, for aught we knew it might appear above the horizon at any moment, and then our chances would be small indeed. Had any eye watched our progress it must have deemed us demented, for we rowed across a lonely sea as though death and destruction followed close in our wake.

For myself, I know my heart was just one dumb prayer for help in this hour of need. We had come through so much. We had escaped so many perils; so very much depended on our winning through to Sercq; and failure at this last moment would be so heart-breaking. Yes, my heart boiled with unspoken prayers and strange vows, which I fear were somewhat in the nature of bargainings,—future conduct for present aid,—but which did not seem to me out of place at the moment, and which, in any case, did me no harm, for a man works better on prayers than on curses, I'll be bound.

Sercq at last grew large in front of us, and our hearts were high. When we jerked our heads over our shoulders we could see the long green slopes of the Eperquerie beckoning us on, and the rugged brown crests of the Grande and Petite Moies bobbing cheerfully above the tumbling waves, and Le Tas on the other side standing like a monument of Sercq's unconquerable stubbornness.