Then he broke the seal of his letter, and found that he was to convey the substance of each report that he sent in, not only to His Majesty’s intelligence officer at Perth, but to Captain Hall, of the English ship Venture, that was lying under Ferryden. He was to proceed at once to the vessel, to which further instructions for him would be sent in a couple of days’ time.
He pocketed the letter and drew a breath of relief, blessing the encounter that he had just cursed, for a road of escape from his present difficulty began to open before him. He must take to his own feet on the other side of Brechin, and go straight to the Venture. He would be close to Montrose, in communication with it, though not within the precincts of the town, and safe from the chance of running against Logie. Balnillo and his brother would not know what had become of him, and Christian Flemington would be cured of her suspicions by the simple testimony of his whereabouts.
He would treat the two days that he had spent at the judge’s house as if they had dropped out of his life, and merely report his late presence in Montrose to the captain of the sloop. He would describe his watching of the two men who came out of ‘The Happy Land,’ and how he had followed them to the harbour through the darkness; how he had seen them stop opposite the ship’s light as they discussed their plans; how he had tried to secure the paper they held. He would tell the captain that he believed some design against the ship to be on foot, but he would not let Logie’s name pass his lips; and he would deny any knowledge of the identity of either man, lest the mention of Ferrier should confirm the suspicions of those who guessed he was working with James. When he had reported himself to Perth from the ship, he would no longer be brought into contact with Skirling Wattie, which at that moment struck him as an advantage.
The evenings had begun to close in early. As he crossed the Esk bridge and walked out of Brechin, the dusk was enwrapping its parapet like a veil. He hurried on, and struck out along the road that would lead him to Ferryden by the southern shore of the Basin. His way ran up a long ascent, and when he stood at the top of the hill the outline of the moon’s disc was rising, faint behind the thin cloudy bank that rested on the sea beyond Montrose. There was just enough daylight left to show him the Basin lying between him and the broken line of the town’s twinkling lights under the muffled moon.
It was quite dark when he stood at last within hail of the Venture. As he went along the bank at the Esk’s mouth, he could see before him the cluster of houses that formed Ferryden village, and the North Sea beyond it, a formless void in the night, with the tide far out. Though the moon was well up, the cloud-bank had risen with her, and taken all sharpness out of the atmosphere.
At his left hand the water crawled slithering at the foot of the sloping bank, like a dark, full-fed snake, and not thirty yards out, just where it broadened, stretching to the quays of Montrose, the vessel lay at anchor, a stationary blot on the slow movement. Upstream, between her and the Basin, the wedge-shaped island of Inchbrayock split the mass of water into two portions.
Flemington halted, taking in the dark scene, which he had contemplated from its reverse side only a few nights ago. Then he went down to the water and put his hands round his mouth.
“Venture ahoy!” he shouted.
There was no movement on the ship. He waited, and then called again, with the same result. Through an open porthole came a man’s laugh, sudden, as though provoked by some unexpected jest. The water was deep here, and the ship lay so near that every word was carried across it to the shore.
The laugh exasperated him. He threw all the power of his lungs into another shout.