CHAPTER XXI
The Beachcombers
The Autumn, with its shortening days and lengthening nights, was upon Golden Crescent, but still the charm and beauty of its surroundings were unimpaired.
I never tired of the scenes, for they were kaleidoscopic in their changing. Even in the night, when sleep was unable to bind me, I have risen and stood by my open window, in reverie and peaceful contemplation, and the dark has grown to dawn ere I turned back to bed.
It was on such an occasion as I speak of. I was leaning on the window ledge, looking far across the Bay. The sea was a mirror of oily calm. A crescent moon was shining fairly high in the south, laying a streak of silver along the face of the water near the far shore. It was a night when every dip of an oar would threaten to bring up the reflected moon from the liquid deep; a night of quiet when the winging of a sea-fowl, or the plop of a fish, could be heard a mile away. In the stillness could be heard the occasional tinkle, tinkle of a cow-bell from the grazing lands across the Bay.
As I listened to the night noises, I heard the distant throb of a launch out in the vicinity of the Ghoul Rock. Suddenly, the throbbing stopped and I fancied I caught the sound of deep voices. All went still again, but, soon after, my ear detected the splashing of oars and the rattle of a badly fitting rowlock.
I watched, peering out into the darkness. The moon shot swiftly from under a cloud and threw its white illuminant like a searchlight sheer upon a large rowing boat as it crept up past the wharf, some fifty yards out from the point.
I counted five figures in the boat, which was heading up the Bay.
A cloud passed over the moon again and the picture of the boat and its occupants vanished from my sight.
Strange, I thought, why these men should arrive in a launch, leave it so far out and come in with a rowing boat of such dimensions, when there was good, safe and convenient anchorage almost anywhere close in!