Carette of Sark

by John Oxenham

On the other side of the island I could imagine all that was toward,—the schooner loading rapidly with all they wished to take away, the bustle and traffic between shore and ship, and Carette prisoner, either on board, or in one of the houses,—or, as likely as not, to have her out of the way, in my old cleft in the rock.

I wondered how long their preparations would take, for all my hopes depended on that. If they cleared out before dark I was undone. If they stayed the night I might have a chance.

It was about midday now. Could they load in time to thread their way through the maze of hidden rocks that strew the passages to the sea, and try the skilful pilot even in the daytime? I thought not. I hoped not. He would be a reckless, or a sorely pressed, man who attempted it. And with his boat on the watch there, and no word able to get to Peter Port unless after dark, and the time then necessary for an organised descent on Herm, I thought Torode would risk it and lie there quietly till perhaps the early morning.

It was a time of weary waiting, with nothing to do but think of Carette's distress, and watch the white clouds sailing slowly along the blue sky, while my boat rose high and fell low in the black cleft, now ten feet up with a rush and a swirl, then as many feet down, with deep gurglings and rushing waterfalls from every ledge. She was getting sorely bruised against the rough rock walls in spite of all my fendings, but there was no help for it.

I could make no plans till I knew where Carette was lodged, and that I could not learn until it was dark, and I remembered gratefully that the new moon was not due for several days yet.

In thinking over things while I lay waiting, I took blame to myself, and felt very great regret, that I had not taken the time to see my grandfather and tell him about Torode. For if the night saw the end of me, as it very well might, no other was cognisant of the matter, and Torode would go unpunished. But go he would I felt sure, for he would never believe that it was all still locked up in me. Of course Helier Le Marchant might have told Jeanne Falla. But even then Jeanne Falla would only have on hearsay from Helier what he had heard from me, whereas I was an eye-witness, and could swear to the facts. And yet I could not but feel that if I had not got across to Herm when I did, I should not have got across at all, and Carette's welfare was more to me than the punishment of Torode.

That day seemed as if it never would end. Sercq and Brecqhou lay basking in the sun, as though no tragedies lurked behind their rounded bastions. The sun seemed fixed in the sky. The shadows wheeled so slowly that only by noting them against the seams in the rocks could I be sure that they moved at all. Then even that was denied me, as the headland, in a cleft of whose feet I lay, cut off the light, and flung its shadow out over the sea.

But—"pas de rue sans but." At last the red beams struck level across the water, and all the heads of Sercq and the black rocks of Brecqhou were touched with golden fire. I could see the Autelets flaming under the red Saignie cliffs; and the green bastion of Tintageu; and the belt of gleaming sand in Grande Grève; and the razor back of the Coupée; and the green heights above Les Fontaines; and all the sentinel rocks round Little Sercq.

And then the colours faded and died, and Brecqhou became a part of Sercq once more, and both were folded softly in a purple haze, and soon they were shadows, and then they were gone. And I could not but think that I might never see them again; and if I did not, that was just how I would have wished to see them for the last time.