They now gave way with might and main. They were rowing for life and liberty; for if again caught, they fully believed that they should be shot. How anxiously they wished that a breeze would spring up!
For fully an hour they rowed on, till the shore faded from sight.
They were steering by the polar star, which both Jack and Bill knew well.
“If there’s a breeze from the southward, we ought to feel it by this time,” observed Jack.
“Never fear; we shall find it before long,” answered Bill. “We are not so far away from the cliffs as you suppose, and it would be as well not to speak loud, or our voices may reach any boat passing, or even people on shore.”
“I hope there will be none there at this hour, though they will come down fast enough in the morning from the chateau, when they find we have taken French leave,” said Jack.
“A very proper thing to take, too, seeing we were in France,” remarked Bill, with a quiet chuckle. “I hope we shall never set foot on its shores again.”
“So do I; but I’m afraid we have a great chance of doing so, unless we get a breeze pretty soon. I am inclined to whistle for it,” said Jack.
“It won’t come the faster for that,” answered Bill. “We shall do more good by working our oars. We are sending the raft along at three knots an hour at least, and as it will be three hours or more before daylight, we shall be ten miles or so away from the shore, even if we do not get a breeze, before the Frenchmen find out that we have got off.”
As Bill advised, he and Jack continued pulling away as lustily as at first.