William Tell Told Again

by P. G. Wodehouse

When they had arrived at the vessel they went on board, and Tell was placed at the bottom of the hold. It was pitch dark, and rats scampered over his body as he lay. The ropes were cast off, the sails filled, and the ship made her way across the lake, aided by a favouring breeze.

A large number of the Swiss people had followed Tell and his captors to the harbour, and stood gazing sorrowfully after the ship as it diminished in the distance. There had been whispers of an attempted rescue, but nobody had dared to begin it, and the whispers had led to nothing. Few of the people carried weapons, and the soldiers were clad in armour, and each bore a long pike or a sharp sword. As Arnold of Sewa would have said if he had been present, what the people wanted was prudence. It was useless to attack men so thoroughly able to defend themselves.

Therefore the people looked on and groaned, but did nothing.

For some time the ship sped easily on her way and through a calm sea. Tell lay below, listening to the trampling of the sailors overhead, as they ran about the deck, and gave up all hope of ever seeing his home and his friends again.

But soon he began to notice that the ship was rolling and pitching more than it had been doing at first, and it was not long before he realized that a very violent storm had begun. Storms sprung up very suddenly on the lake, and made it unsafe for boats that attempted to cross it. Often the sea was quite unruffled at the beginning of the crossing, and was rough enough at the end to wreck the largest ship.

Tell welcomed the storm. He had no wish to live if life meant years of imprisonment in a dark dungeon of Castle Küssnacht. Drowning would be a pleasant fate compared with that. He lay at the bottom of the ship, hoping that the next wave would dash them on to a rock and send them to the bottom of the lake. The tossing became worse and worse.

Upon the deck Gessler was standing beside the helmsman, and gazing anxiously across the waters at the rocks that fringed the narrow entrance to the bay a few hundred yards to the east of Castle Küssnacht. This bay was the only spot for miles along the shore at which it was possible to land safely. For miles on either side the coast was studded with great rocks, which would have dashed a ship to pieces in a moment. It was to this bay that Gessler wished to direct the ship. But the helmsman told him that he could not make sure of finding the entrance, so great was the cloud of spray which covered it. A mistake would mean shipwreck.

"My lord," said the helmsman, "I have neither strength nor skill to guide the helm. I do not know which way to turn."

"What are we to do?" asked Rudolph der Harras, who was standing near.

The helmsman hesitated. Then he spoke, eyeing the Governor uneasily.