The tide must come up again, however, before they could launch their raft. It would not be safe to do that unless the wind was off shore and the water smooth. Of this they were thoroughly convinced. Some hours must also elapse before the hitherto tumultuous sea would go down; what should they do in the meantime?
Bill felt very unwilling to go away without wishing their friends the Turgots good-bye. He wanted also to tell Jeannette of the smugglers’ store. The Turgots, at all events, would have as good a right to it as any one else, should the proper owners not be in existence.
Jack did not want him to go.
“You may be caught,” he observed, “or some one may come down and discover the vessel, and if I am alone, even should the tide be high, I could not put off.”
“But there is no chance of the tide coming up for the next three hours, and I can go to the village and be back again long before that,” answered Bill.
At last Jack gave in.
“Well, be quick about it,” he said; “we ought to be away at daylight, if the wind and the sea will let us; and if we don’t, I’m afraid there will be very little chance of our getting off at all.”
Bill promised without fail to return. There was no risk, he was sure, of being discovered, and it would be very ungrateful to the Turgots to go away without trying to see them again. He wished that Jack could have gone also, but he agreed that it was better for him to remain to do a few more things to the raft. Before he started they arranged the tackles for launching it; and they believed that, when once in the water, it would not take them more than ten minutes or a quarter of an hour to haul the empty casks under the bottom and to step and set up the mast. They might then, should the wind be favourable, stand boldly out to sea.
This being settled, Bill lowered himself down on the sand by a rope, and ran off as fast as he could go.
Jack quickly finished the work he had undertaken; then putting his hand into his pocket, he felt the gold pieces.