Kilgorman Part 29

As for me, I took my skipper's advice, and sat smoking my cigar and saying nothing while the ceremony lasted.

But when at length we were ordered to pa.s.s, you may guess how thankfully I cast off the rope and found myself gliding down the quick current of the Seine out of that horrible city in which for nearly a year I had been cooped, expecting every day to be my last I showed my grat.i.tude by undertaking any hard work my skipper chose to put upon me; and when he found me so willing, and on the whole so handy, he was content enough, and we became tolerably good messmates. Only I had learned enough to keep my mouth pretty close respecting matters which did not concern me.

I professed to know very little of what had pa.s.sed in Paris during the past few months, and in what I did to agree entirely with the opinions of Citizen Benoit, my captain. I c.u.mbered him with few questions or opinions of my own, and was never backward to take an extra watch or trudge an extra mile on the bank beside the occasional horses which here and there we engaged to help us on.

It was a tedious and dull journey, threading our way through endless twists and between numerous islands, halting only between the late summer dusk and the early summer dawn, quitting our barge only in search of provender or a horse, parleying only with officials and returning barges.

One or two of the skippers on the latter inquired of Benoit what had become of his former a.s.sistant, and alarmed me somewhat by questioning me as to my previous calling. But my skipper's explanation was generally enough, and I was admitted into the n.o.ble fraternity of Seine bargees without much objection. The few who did object sailed the other way, so that their objection mattered little.

Our longest stay was at Rouen, where once more my master reminded me that I was Citizen Plon, and that my policy was to hold my tongue and lie low.

The police here were very suspicious, and insisted on searching our cargo thoroughly for fugitives, of whom reports from Paris said there were a good many lying hid in boats and barges.

However, they found none with us. How I toiled and sweated to a.s.sist their search! and what a reputation poor Plon acquired for zeal in the service of the Republic One and Indivisible!

After leaving Rouen we used our sail a good deal in the broad reaches of the river. Monsieur Benoit (who had quite forgotten my pay) was good enough to compliment me on my skill in handling canvas, and as we neared our destination his civility became almost embarra.s.sing. He sought to engage me as his permanent lieutenant, and promised to make all sorts of excellent reports on my behalf to the officials. I humoured him as best I could; but the scent of the sea-breezes as we gradually reached the wide estuary and saw before us the masts and towers of the city of Havre, set me longing for old Ireland, and determined me, Benoit or no Benoit, to set my foot once more on Fanad.

I requested of Benoit a few days' leave of absence, after our stores were duly delivered at the depot, which he agreed to on the understanding that my wages should not be paid me till I returned to the barge. In this way he imagined he made sure of me, and I was content to leave him in that simple faith.

But now, as I wandered through the squalid streets of the city of Havre, and looked out at the great Atlantic waves beating in on the sh.o.r.e, I began to realise that France itself was only a trap on a larger scale than Paris. True, I might possibly find a berth as an able-bodied sailor on a French ship; but that was not what I wanted. As for English ships, it was a time of war, and none durst show their prows in the harbour, save under a false flag. Yet the longing for home was so strong in me, that I think, had I found one, I would even have seized a small rowing-boat and attempted to cross the Channel in it single- handed.

For two days I prowled hither and thither, vainly looking for a chance of escape, and was beginning to wonder whether after all I should have to return to Benoit, when I chanced one evening on a fellow who, for all his French airs and talk, I guessed the moment he spoke to be an Irishman. He was, I must confess, not quite sober, which perhaps made him less careful about appearances than he should have been.

It was on the cliffs of La Heve we foregathered. He was walking so unsteadily on the very margin that I deemed it only brotherly to lend him an arm.

"Thank you, my lad," said he, beginning the speech in French, but relapsing into his native tongue as he went on; "these abominable French cliffs move about more than the cliffs at Bantry. Nothing moves there-- not even custom-house runners. Bless your dear heart, we can land our bales there under their very noses! Steady, my friend, you were nearly slipping there. You French dogs never could walk on your hind legs.

There she lies, as snug and taut as a revenue cutter, and just as many teeth. What did I come ash.o.r.e for now? Not to see you, was it? 'Pon my word, monsieur, I owe you a hundred pardons. I quite forgot. You look a worthy fellow. I press you into the service, and the man that objects shall have an ounce of lead through him. Come, my lad, row me aboard. The anchor's apeak, and we're off for the ould country, and a murrain on this land of yours!"

So saying he stumbled along, down a zigzag path that led to the foot of the cliff, where lay moored a small boat and two men in her.

"Belay there, hearties! I've got the villain. Clap him in irons, I say! He tried to send me over the cliff, but-- how are you, my friend?

Give us your hand. You're one of the right sort.--Pull away, boys. The wind's in the east, and the tide's swung round the _cap_. This time to- morrow we shall be sc.r.a.ping the nose of ould Ireland--glory to her!"

The men, who evidently were used to their captain's eccentricities, made no demur, and laid on with their oars. Presently I volunteered to lend a hand, which was readily accepted. The captain meanwhile lay in a comfortable slumber in the stern-sheets, uttering occasional greetings to the world at large, and to me in particular.

"Where does she lie?" said I presently to the man in front of me in plain English.

He turned round sharply.

"What! you're not a Frenchman then?" said he.

"Heaven forbid! I'm as good an Irishman as you."

"How came you to know Captain Keogh?"

"Sure he found me out and engaged me."

"It's no lie," gurgled Captain Keogh from the bottom of the boat. "I should have been over but for him. Enter him as sailing-master or cook, for he's the right sort."

"We're for the _Kestrel_. She lies a mile or two up the coast, with a cargo for Bantry."

"Lace; I know that. I've been in the business before," said I.

This completed my recognition as a proper shipmate, and no more questions were asked.

When we reached the _Kestrel_ it was pitch dark, but we could tell by the grating of the chain as we came up that no time was to be lost in getting under way.

Not a light was shown, only a whistle from our men, answered by another from the ship and a voice over the bulwarks,--

"Boat ahoy!"

"_Kestrel_ ahoy!" sang out our men, and in a moment a rope was thrown to us and we were alongside.

Captain Keogh, happily asleep, was hauled up the gangway, and we followed.

"A new hand, lieutenant," said my comrade, pointing at me with his thumb over his shoulder.

"All right. Send him forward to help with the anchor."

At the sound of this voice in the dark I staggered like one struck. It called to mind days spent under the drifting clouds at the edge of Fanad, boyish quarrels and battles, winter nights over the peat fire of our little cabin. Who but Tim had that ring in his voice? Whose voice, if it was not his, could set my heart beating and swelling in my breast so that I could scarcely hold it?

Just now, however, I was hurried forward to the business of weighing anchor, and the lieutenant had gone aft to take charge of the helm.

In a minute or two the _Kestrel_ floated free on the water. The sails spread out to the wind, the welcome splash of the bows proclaimed that we had way on us already, and the twinkling lights of Havre in the distance reminded us that France, land of terrors, was dropping astern at every pitch we took.

But the excitement of all this was as nothing to the echo in my ears of that voice in the dark.

CHAPTER TWENTY ONE.

THE WRECK OF THE "KESTREL."

The crew of the _Kestrel_ consisted of less than fifty men, most of them Irishmen. While the work of setting sails and making all snug lasted I had little chance of looking about me, but the impression I formed was that the schooner was not at all worthy of the praise her tipsy captain had bestowed upon her. She was an old craft, with a labouring way of sailing that compared very unfavourably with the _Cigale_ or the _Arrow_. Her guns, about a dozen in all, were of an antiquated type, and badly mounted, and her timbers were old and faulty. As long as we had a sharp east wind astern we had not much to concern us, but I had my misgivings how she would behave in dirty weather with a lee-sh.o.r.e on her quarter.

That, however, concerned me less just then than my impatience to get a glimpse of the face of the lieutenant. I volunteered for an extra watch for this purpose, and longed for some excuse to take me aft.

Sure enough it came. The same voice rang out again through the darkness:--

"Hand there! come and set the stern light."

"Ay, ay, sir," cried I, hurrying to the place.

For the first hour or so after slipping our moorings off Havre the _Kestrel_ had remained in perfect darkness. But now that we were beyond sight of the lights ash.o.r.e there was no occasion for so dangerous a precaution. I unlashed the lantern and took it down to the galley for a light, and then returned with it to the helm.

As I did so I could not help turning it full on the face of the man at the tiller.

Sure enough it was Tim, grown into a man, with down on his chin, and the weather wrinkles at the corner of his eyes. Every inch a sailor and a gentleman he looked as he stood there in his blue flannel suit and peaked cap; the same easy-going, gusty, reckless Tim I had fought with many a time on Fanad cliffs, loving him more for every blow I gave him.

When I thought I had lost him, it seemed as if I had lost a part of myself. Now I had found him, I had found myself.