Carette of Sark Part 42

"With those on Herm, sixty to eighty, I should say."

"He could harry us to his heart's content if he knew it;" and Abraham Guille went off soberly to Dos d'Ane, and the rest of us went on to our homes.

My grandfather was full of thought, and I saw that he was anxious on our account. And now that the excitement was over, my shoulder began to throb and shoot. Every movement was painful to it, and I felt suddenly worn out and very weary. Carette must have seen it in my face, for she said--

"Lean on me, Phil dear. Aunt Jeanne will doctor you as soon as we get there;" and I leaned on her, for the touch of her was very comforting to me, and my right arm was happy if my left was not, and I was content.

"Go on to Jeanne Falla, you two," said my grandfather, when we came to La Vauroque, "and ask her to see to your arm, Phil. She is a famous doctor. I must see George Hamon."

Aunt Jeanne cut away the sleeves of my coat and shirt, and saw to my wound with the tenderest care, and many a bitter word for the cause of it. The bullet had gone clean through the muscles and had probably grazed the bone, she thought, but had not broken it. She washed it, and bound it up with soft rags and simples of her own compounding, while Carette fetched and carried for her. Then she set my arm in a sling, and but for the fact that I had only one arm to use, and so felt very lopsided, and deadly tired, I was still in much greater content than two whole arms and the highest of spirits had ever found me.

I was also feeling very empty, though with no great appet.i.te for food. But she insisted on my eating and drinking, and saw to it herself in her sharp, masterful way.

She was tying the sling behind my neck when my grandfather and George Hamon came in together.

Uncle George gave me very hearty greeting, and they complimented Aunt Jeanne on her handiwork, and then asked her advice, and all the while I was in fear lest some incautious word from one or the other should weight Carette's heart with over-sudden news of her brother's death.

"Jeanne Falla, we want your views," said my grandfather. "It is in my mind that Torode will come back for these two. Phil holds his life in his hand.

What others know is hearsay, but Phil can swear to it. I cannot believe he will rest while Phil lives. He can bring sixty or eighty ruffians down on us, and I doubt if we can put thirty against them. What does your wit suggest?"

"Ma fe!" said Aunt Jeanne, "you are right. Torode will be after them, and they are not safe here. Can you not get them over to Peter Port, or to Jersey?"

"They are watching the ways," I said, for I was loth to start on any fresh voyaging now that Carette and home were to my hand. "Their boats were out all night on the look-out."

"We might get through one way or another, if we started at once," said my grandfather, looking doubtfully at me.

"I can't do another thing till I've had some rest," I said. "It is so long since I slept that I cannot remember when it was;" and indeed, what with want of food, and want of sleep, and loss of blood, now that the excitement was over I was feeling weary unto death.

"Then hide them," said Aunt Jeanne. "George Hamon knows hiding-places, I trow,"--at which Uncle George grinned knowingly. "And if Torode comes, swear they are safe in Peter Port. One does not cut gorse without gloves, and lies to such as Torode don't count. Bon Gyu, non!"

"That is right," said Uncle George, "and what I advised myself. Philip thinks we might hold them at arm's length, but--"

"It would mean many lives and to no purpose, may be, in the end," said Aunt Jeanne, shaking her head.

"I can hide them where none will ever find them," said Uncle George.

"Ma fe! it does not sound too tempting," said Carette.

"Since we are together, I am content," I said; for rest and the a.s.surance of Carette's safety were the only things I cared about just then.

"Bien! So am I," said Carette. "When will you put us in the hole?"

"At once. Torode is not the man to waste time when so much is at stake."

"And how long will you keep us there?" she asked.

"That may depend on Torode," said Uncle George. "But no longer than is necessary."

"Ma fe, it may be days! We must take food--"

"There is a pie and a ham, and I made bread and gache to-day," said Aunt Jeanne, picking up a big basket and beginning to pack it with all she could think of and lay hands on.

"Water?" asked Carette.

"Plenty of water, both salt and fresh," said Uncle George.

"All the same, a can of milk won't hurt," said Aunt Jeanne. "Carette, ma fille, fill the biggest you can find."

"And Mistress Falla will give us two sacks of hay to soften the rocks,"

said Uncle George, "and a lantern and some candles, lest they get frightened of one another in the dark,"--which I knew could never happen.

All the same, Carette asked, "Is it dark there _all_ the time?"

"Not quite dark all the time, but a light is cheerful."

"Lend me a pipe, Uncle George," I said, and the good fellow emptied his pockets for me.

CHAPTER x.x.xII

HOW WE WENT TO EARTH

So presently we set out, all laden to the extent of our powers, and went first to Belfontaine, since our way lay past it. And there my mother fell gratefully on Carette and me, as though she had feared she might never see either of us again, and I was well pleased to see the tender feeling that lay between these two who were dearest to me in all the world.

"Wherever George Hamon puts you you will be safe," said my mother, at which Uncle George's face shone happily, "and I hope it will not be for long."

"Not for long," nodded my grandfather, with a.s.surance. "We must give Monsieur Torode business of his own to attend to nearer home. Once Peter Port knows all we know, his fat will be in the fire."

"And the sooner the better," said Carette.

"And Krok?" I asked, tardily enough, though not through lack of thought of him.

"Your grandfather thinks he must have broken a blood-vessel yesterday. He is in there."

And I went in, and found him sitting up in great excitement at all the talking. I shook him very heartily by the hand and clapped him on the back and told him how much we were indebted to him, and how it was his prompt warning that enabled me to get across to Herm before they set their patrol boats--and very briefly of what had pa.s.sed and was toward, and so left him, content and cheerful.

My mother would have added to our supplies, but we had as much as we could carry, and enough, we thought, for the term of our probable imprisonment.

So we bade her farewell, and went on across the fields, past La Moinerie towards the Eperquerie.

"We are going to the Boutiques," I said.

"My Boutiques," said Uncle George, with a laugh. And, instead of going on to that dark chasm whose steep black walls and upstanding boulders lead one precariously into the caves with which we were familiar, he turned aside to another narrower gash in the tumbled rocks, and we stood on the brink wondering where he would take us. For, well as we knew the nooks and crannies thereabouts, we had never found entrance here.

We stood looking down into the narrow chasm. The tide was still churning among its slabs and boulders, and the inner end showed no opening into the cliff, nothing but piles of rounded pebbles and stranded tangles of vraic.

We thought he had made a mistake.

But he looked quietly down into the boiling pot below, and said, "We have still an hour to wait. The tide is higher than I thought." So we sat on the short salt turf and waited.