CHAPTER X
THE DISTANT SMOKE!
The next morning about six o'clock, at low tide, the points of a few rocks which had not been visible the day before were exposed round the edge of the creek. It was ascertained, however, that even at lowest ebb practicable passages remained forty to fifty fathoms in width. This meant that the Montrose river was navigable at all stages of the tide. The depth of water near the rocks where the Elizabeth was moored was so great that she was still floating five or six feet above the sandy bottom.
About seven o'clock ripples were breaking along the rocks, forerunners of the flood tide, and the pinnace would soon have swung round upon her anchor if she had not been held by the hawser aft.
Mr. Wolston and Ernest, who had been ashore since daybreak, came back at this moment, after inspecting the condition of the creek lower down. They merely had to jump on deck to rejoin M. and Mme. Zermatt and Mrs. Wolston and her daughter. Jack had gone out hunting with his two dogs, and was still absent. A few gunshots notified his presence in the neighbourhood and suggested his success in his sport. It was not long before he put in an appearance, with his game-bag bulging with a brace of partridges and half-a-dozen quails.
"I have not wasted my time or my powder," he remarked as he flung the brilliant-plumaged game down in the bows.
"Our congratulations," his father replied; "and now do not let us waste any more of the flood tide. Cast off the hawser and jump aboard."
Jack obeyed, and leaped onto the deck with his dogs. The anchor being apeak already, it was only necessary to trice it up to the cathead. The pinnace was immediately caught by the tide, and, driven by a light breeze blowing in from the sea, she entered the mouth of the Montrose river. Then with the wind behind her she began to ascend it, keeping to the middle of the channel.
The breadth of the stream from one bank to the other was not less than two hundred and fifty or three hundred feet. There was no indication of its narrowing, as far as the eye could see the banks ahead. On the right hand still ran the escarpment of the cliff, gradually diminishing in height while the ground rose in a barely perceptible slope. On the left, over the rather low bank, the eye travelled over plains broken by woods and clumps of trees, the tops of which were turning yellow at this season of the year.