Carette of Sark Part 51

"I don't want to have killed him."

"Then you must get him to a doctor. You can't go to Guernsey, so that means Jersey--And afterwards--I don't know--you'll have to see what is best. Wait a moment,"--as we came to his house at La Vauroque. "You'll need money, and take what you can find to eat. I've got a bottle or two of wine somewhere.

Before daylight you must be out of sight of Sercq."

"Where will you say I've gone?"

"Bidemme! I don't know ... You can trust old Krok?"

"Absolutely."

"Then, as soon as you have had the other patched up and settled somewhere in safety, you'd better leave him in Krok's care and get back here. And the sooner the better. The people in Guernsey will want your story from your own lips in this matter."

"How soon can we get into the cave?"

"Nom-de-Dieu, yes!... Voyons donc!--About two o'clock with a wet shirt.

This wind will pile the water up, and the Race will be against us in the Gouliot. The sooner we're off the better."

He handed me a sum of money, packed into a basket all the eatables he could find and two bottles of wine, and lit a lantern, and we set off through the gusty night, past the deserted houses, past Beaumanoir all dark and dead, and so down into Havre Gosselin, where the waves were roaring white.

We drew in Uncle George's small boat by its ropes and got aboard his larger one, and tied the smaller to drag astern.

The west wind was still blowing strong, but it had slackened somewhat with the turn of the tide. But when we tried to breast the Gouliot pa.s.sage with that heavy boat, we found it impossible. Three times we nosed inch by inch into the swirling black waters, which leaped and spat and bit at us with fierce white fangs, and three times we were swept away down past Pierre au Norman, drooping over our oars like broken men.

"Guyabble! This is no good!" gasped Uncle George, as we came whirling back the third time. "We must go round." So we drew in the oars, and hoisted a bit of our lug, and ran straight out past Les Dents, whose black heads were sheets of flying foam, to make a long tack round Brecqhou. Then, with the wind full on our port quarter, we made a quick, straight run for the Boutiques, and found ourselves not very far astray. Dropping the sail, and leaving Krok in charge, Uncle George and I pulled in the small boat to the channel into which his cave opened. It was still awash, but we could not wait. We dragged the boat up onto the shingle just showing at the head of the chasm, then wading out up to our shoulders to the leaning slab, we pulled down the rock screen and crawled into the tunnel.

The wounded man lay just as we had left him, breathing slowly and regularly, but showing no other sign of life. We dropped a little cognac into him, and took him by the shoulders and feet and carried him into the tunnel. How we got him through I cannot tell--inch by inch, shoving and hauling, till the sweat poured down us in that narrow place.

But we got him to the opening at last, and hauled the boat down and hoisted him in, soaked to the skin each one of us. Uncle George carefully closed his door, and we pulled out to Krok, waiting in the lugger.

"Mon Dieu! I have had enough of him," said Uncle George, worn out, I suppose, with all the night's doings. "If he dies, I shall not care much.

He is better dead."

We laid him in the bottom of the boat and covered him with the mizzen sail.

"Keep well out round Bec du Nez," said Uncle George, "and run so for half an hour. Then run due east for two hours, and then make for Jersey. G.o.d keep you, my boy! It's a bitter duty, but you're doing the right thing."

He wrung my hand, and pushed off and disappeared in the darkness, and we ran up the lug and went thrashing out into Great Russel.

We turned and ran before the west wind straight for the French coast, till the sun rose and the cliffs of Sercq, about twelve miles away, gleamed as though they had but just been made--or had newly risen out of the sea. Then we turned to the south-west and made for Jersey.

As soon as it was light I saw Krok's eyes dwelling on our pa.s.senger with a very natural curiosity. Torode was unknown to him as to most of us, but there was a whole world of enquiry in his face as he sat looking down on the unconscious face below--studying it, pondering it, catching, I thought, at times half glimpses of the past in it.

I saw that I must tell him a part of the truth, at all events, for I should need much help from him. My mind had been running ahead of the boat, and trying the ways in front, and it seemed to me that Jersey was no safe refuge for a forfeited life.

Torode of Herm was a name known in all those coasts. The news of his treacheries and uprooting was bound to get there before long. Some long-headed busybody might stumble on our secret and undo us. My mind had been seeking a more solitary place, and, ranging to and fro, had lighted on the Ecrehou rocks, which I had visited once with my grandfather and Krok and had never forgotten.

"Do you know who this is, Krok?" I asked, and he raised his puzzled face and fixed his deep-set eyes on mine.

He shook his head, and sat, with his chin in his hands and his elbows on his knees, gazing down into the face below, and I sat watching him what time I could spare from my steering.

And at last he knelt down suddenly and did exactly as Uncle George had done--lifted the black moustache from off the unconscious man's mouth, and threw back his own head to study the result. Then I saw a wave of hot blood rush into his face and neck, and when it went it left his face gray.

He looked at me with eyes full of wonder and pain, and then nodded his big head heavily.

"Who, then?" and he looked round in dumb impatience for something to write with, and quivered with excitement. But the ballast was bars of iron rescued from the sea, and there was nothing that would serve.

Then of a sudden he whipped out his knife, and with the point of it jerkily traced on the thwart where I sat, the word "FATHER," and pointed his knife at me.

"Yes," I nodded. "It is my father come back, when we all thought him dead.

He comes in disgrace, and his life would be forfeited if they found him, so you and I are going to hide him for a time--till he is himself, and can go away again."

Krok nodded, and he was probably thinking of my mother, for his fist clenched and he shook it bitterly at the unconscious man.

Then he knelt again, and looked at his wound, and shook his head.

"It was I shot him, not knowing who he was. And so I must save his life, or have his blood on my hands."

From Krok's grim face I judged that the latter would have been most to his mind.

"I thought of trying the Ecrehous. We could build a shelter with some of the old stones, and he will be safer there than in Jersey. But I must get a doctor to him, or he'll slip through our hands."

Krok pondered all this, and then, pointing ahead to the bristle of rocks in front and to himself, and then to me and the wounded man and to Jersey, I understood that he would land on the Ecrehous and build the shelter, while I took the wounded man on to Jersey to find a doctor. And that chimed well with my ideas.

The sun had been up about three hours when we ran past the Dirouilles, with sharp eyes and a wide berth for outlying fragments, and edged cautiously in towards the Ecrehous. The sea was set so thick with rocks, some above and some below water, that we dropped our sail and felt our way in with the oars, and so came slowly past the Nipple to the islet, where once a chapel stood.

It was as lonely and likely a shelter for a shipwrecked soul as could be found, at once a hiding-place and a sanctuary. Spa.r.s.e gra.s.s grew among the rocks, but no tree or shrub of any kind at that time. The ruins of the holy place alone spoke of man and his handiwork.

All around was the free breath of life,--which, at times, indeed, might sound more akin to rushing death,--and the sea and the voice of it; and the stark rocks sticking up through it like the fragments of a broken world.

And above was the great dome of the sky--peaceful, pitiless, according to that which was within a man.

Krok scrambled ash.o.r.e, and I handed him all that was left of our provisioning, then with a wave of the hand I turned and pulled clear of the traps and ran for Rozel Bay.

There was a little inn at the head of the bay, which had seen many a stranger sight than a wounded man. I had no difficulty in securing accommodation there, and the display of my money ensured me fullest service, such as it was. I told them plainly that the unconscious man was related to me, and that he had received his wound at my hands. I let them believe it was an accident, and that we came from the coast of France. They were full of rough sympathy, and when I had seen him put into a comfortable bed, and had dropped some more cognac into him, I started at once for St.

Heliers to find a doctor.

There was no difficulty in that. I went to the first I was told of, and fell fortunately. I described the nature of the wound, so far as I knew it, and told him the bullet was still there. He got the necessary instruments and we drove back to Rozel in his two-wheeled gig. Dr. Le Gros wore a great blue cloak, and his manner was brusque, but cloak and manner covered a very kind heart. Moreover, he had had a very large experience in gun-shot wounds, and he was a man of much discretion.

As soon as he set eyes on the wound he rated me soundly for not having it seen to before, and I bore it meekly. His patient was his only concern. He did not ask a single question as to how it was caused, or where we came from. It seemed, however, to puzzle or annoy him. He pinched his lips and shook his head over it, and said angrily, "'Cre nom-de-Dieu! It should have been seen to before!"

"But, monsieur," I said, "we have no doctor, else I would not have brought him here."

"But, nom-de-Dieu! that bullet should have been got out at once. It is pressing on the brain. It may have set up inflammation, and what _that_ may lead to the good G.o.d alone knows!"

"Pray get it out at once, monsieur."

"Ay, ay, that's all very well, but the damage may be done, and now, 'cre nom-de-Dieu, you expect me to undo it."

"I am sorry."