The Queen's Cup Part 49

"One of the men grasped me," he said, "and I should have turned the boat over if I had not let go. However, thanks to George Lechmere, who came to my rescue, I have shaken him off.

"Ah! here is help."

Three or four boats from the yachts were indeed rowing up. The four clinging to the gig were taken on board by one of them, while the others picked up the men who were floating supported by their oars.

"Don't say a word about it, George," Frank whispered.

The Osprey was lying but two or three hundred yards away, and they were soon alongside.

"This is not the sort of welcome I thought to give you on board, dear," he said, as he helped Bertha on deck, and went down the companion with her.

Anna burst into exclamations of dismay at seeing the dripping figures.

"We have had an accident, Anna," Frank said, cheerfully, "but I don't think that we are any the worse for it. Please take your mistress aft and get her into dry things at once.

"Steward, open one of those bottles of champagne, and give me half a tumbler full."

He hurried after the others with it.

"Please drink this at once, Bertha," he said. "Yes, you shall have some tea directly, but start with this. It will soon put you in a glow. Oh! yes, I am going to have one, too; but a ducking is no odds to me."

Then he ran up on deck.

"You have saved my life again, George, for that scoundrel would have drowned us both."

"I saw the knife in his hand as you went down, and knew that you wanted me more than Miss--I mean Mrs. Mallett did."

"How did you make him let go so quickly?"

"I had a sort of fear that, sooner or later, that villain would be up to something; and had made up my mind that I would always have a weapon handy. This morning I stuck that dagger of mine inside the lining of my waistcoat, so that it might be handy. And it was handy. You were not five yards from me when you went down, and I dived for you, but could not find you at first, and had to come up once for air. Of course, I could not use the dagger until I found which was which, and then I put an end to it."

"Then you killed him, George?"

"I don't think that he will trouble you any more, sir; and if ever a chap deserved his fate that villain did. Why, sir, do you know how it all happened?"

"No, I did not catch what the man at the bow said. There was such a confusion forward."

"He said that he had staved the boat in somehow. He must have taken the place of one of the men on purpose to do it."

"Well, George, I can't say that I'm sorry."

"I am heartily glad, sir. I am no more sorry for killing him than for shooting one of those murderous n.i.g.g.e.rs. Less sorry, a great deal. The man deserved hanging. He was intending to murder you, and perhaps Mrs. Mallett, and I killed him as I should have killed a mad dog that was attacking you."

"Well, say nothing about it at present, George. It would be a great shock to my wife if she were to know it. Now you had better go and change your things at once, as I am going to do. Are all the men rescued?"

"Yes, sir, they are all five on board."

"Hawkins," Frank said, putting his hand in his pocket, "give the men who came to help us a couple of sovereigns each, and tell our men that I don't want them to talk about the affair. I will see you about it again."

Frank was not long in getting into dry clothes, and a few minutes later Bertha came in.

"Are you none the worse for it, dear?"

"Not a bit, Frank. That champagne has thoroughly warmed me. What a sudden affair it all was. Is everyone safe?"

"Yes, they stuck to the oars, and all our crew were picked up. It was a bad start, was it not? But it has never happened to me before, and I hope that it will never happen to me again."

"Some people would be inclined to think this an unlucky beginning,"

said Bertha, with a slight tone of interrogation.

"I am certainly not one of them," he laughed. "I had only one superst.i.tion, and that is at an end. You know what it was, dear, but the spell is broken. He had a long run of minor successes, but I have won the only prize worth having, for which we have been rivals."

Some days later the body of a sailor was washed ash.o.r.e near Selsey Bill. An inquest was held, and a verdict returned that the man had been murdered by some person or persons unknown; but although the police of Portsmouth, Southampton, Cowes, and Ryde made vigilant inquiries, they were unable to ascertain that any yacht sailor hailing from those ports had suddenly disappeared.

There was much discussion, in the forecastle of the Osprey, as to the ident.i.ty and motives of the man who had first got into conversation with Jackson, and then asked him to take a drink, which must have been hocussed, for Jackson remembered nothing afterwards. It was evident that the fellow had done it in order to take his place. He had staved in the boat, and, as they supposed, afterwards swam to sh.o.r.e; but the crime seemed so singularly motiveless that they finally put it down as the work of a madman.

It was not until the day before the Osprey anch.o.r.ed again in Cowes, three months later, that Bertha, on expressing some apprehension of further trouble from Carthew, if he had survived the wound George Lechmere gave him, learned the true account of the sinking of the gig, as she went on board at Southampton on her wedding day.