He made no reply, but he bent to the oar until the bead-drops of mingled agony and toil stood thick upon his brow.
"God help them! They must be trying to escape," she muttered yet again, as something like a shot or two of musketry reached her ear.
Faster he rowed, and faster. The boat leaped like a living thing along the waters. They were close to the cliff at last. Overhead, the sky was hidden by a canopy of heavy smoke, with here and there a streak of fire flashing like forked lightning athwart it. Underneath, the water lay black as ink, in the reflection of the clouded heavens, as the boat rushed through it. One more effort, and they were in the cove—another, and they were flung high and dry upon the beach. Roger jumped out without a word. Was he in time? or was he not? His whole soul was engrossed in that fearful question.
"What are you going to do?" asked Henrietta, uncertain as to what her own share in the enterprise was to be. He had been searching in the bottom of the boat for something; but he looked up then with a kindling eye, and said:
"Will you be true to the end?"
"So help me God, I will!" she answered in that quiet tone which tells all the more of steady courage that it has no touch of bluster in it. He had found what he wanted now—a cutlass and a coil of rope—and answered rapidly:
"Take the boat out of this, then, and wait beneath the cliffs. Wait till I come, or until yonder tower falls, as fall it must, and soon. After that, you may go home in peace. Yes, peace! For happen what may, your soul, at any rate, will be guiltless of this day's murder."
He shoved the boat back into deep water as he finished speaking, and then, without even looking back to see if Henrietta followed his directions, strode rapidly up the cliffs.