The Last Hope

by Henry Seton Merriman

  CHAPTER XXV

  SANS RANCUNE

  A large French fishing-lugger was drifting northward on the ebb tide withits sails flapping idly against the spars. It had been a fine morning,and the Captain, a man from Fecamp, where every boy that is born is borna sailor, had been fortunate in working his way in clear weather acrossthe banks that lie northward of the Thames.

  He had predicted all along in a voice rendered husky by much shouting indirty weather that the fog-banks would be drifting in from the sea beforenightfall. And now he had that mournful satisfaction which is the specialprivilege of the pessimistic. These fog-banks, the pest of the eastcoast, are the materials that form the light fleecy clouds which driftwestward in sunny weather like a gauze veil across the face of the sky.They roll across the North Sea from their home in the marshes of Hollandon the face of the waters, and the mariner, groping his way with drippingeyelashes and a rosy face through them, can look up and see the blue skythrough the rifts overhead. When the fog-bank touches land it rises,slowly lifted by the warm breath of the field. On the coast-line it lieslow; a mile inland it begins to break into rifts, so that any one workinghis way down one of the tidal rivers, sails in the counting of twentyseconds from sunshine into a pearly shadow. Five miles inland there is atransparent veil across the blue sky slowly sweeping toward the west, andrising all the while, until those who dwell on the higher lands of Essexand Suffolk perceive nothing but a few fleecy clouds high in the heavens.

  The lugger was hardly moving, for the tide had only turned half an hourago.

  "Provided," the Captain had muttered within the folds of his woollenscarf rolled round and round his neck until it looked like a duskylife-belt--"provided that they are ringing their bell on the Shipwash, weshall find our way into the open. Always sea-sick, this traveller, alwayssea-sick!"

  And he turned with a kindly laugh to Loo Barebone, who was lying on aheap of old sails by the stern rail, concealing as well as he could thepangs of a consuming hunger.

  "One sees that you will never be a sailor," added the man from Fecamp,with that rough humour which sailors use.

  "Perhaps I do not want to be one," replied Barebone, with a ready gaietywhich had already made him several friends on this tarry vessel, althoughthe voyage had lasted but four days.

  "Listen," interrupted the Captain, holding up a mittened hand. "Listen! Ihear a bell, or else it is my conscience."

  Barebone had heard it for some time. It was the bell-buoy at the mouth ofHarwich River. But he did not deem it necessary for one who was aprisoner on board, and no sailor, to interfere in the navigation of avessel now making its way to the Faroee fisheries for the twentieth time.

  "My conscience," he observed, "rings louder than that."

  The Captain took a turn round the tiller with a rope made fast to therail for the purpose, and went to the side of the ship, lifting his nosetoward the west.

  "It is the land," he said. "I can smell it. But it is only the BlessedVirgin who knows where we are."

  He turned and gave a gruff order to a man half hidden in the mist in thewaist of the boat to try a heave of the lead.

  The sound of the bell could be heard clearly enough now--the uncertain,hesitating clang of a bell-buoy rocked in the tideway--with itsmelancholy note of warning. Indeed, there are few sounds on sea or landmore fraught with lonesomeness and fear. Behind it and beyond it a faint"tap-tap" was now audible. Barebone knew it to be the sound of acaulker's hammer in the Government repairing yard on the south side. Theywere drifting past the mouth of the Harwich River.

  The leadsman called out a depth which Loo could have told without thehelp of line or lead. For he had served a long apprenticeship on thesecoasts under a captain second to none in the North Sea.

  He turned a little on his bed of sails under repair, at which the Captainhad been plying his needle while the weather remained clear, and glancedover his shoulder toward the ship's dinghy towing astern. The rope thatheld it was made fast round the rail a few feet away from him. The boatitself was clumsy, shaped like a walnut, of a preposterous strength andweight. It was fitted with a short, stiff mast and a balance lug-sail. Itfloated more lightly on the water than the bigger vessel, which was ladenwith coal and provender and salt for the North Atlantic fishery, and thepainter hung loose, while the dinghy, tide-borne, sidled up to stern ofits big companion like a kitten following its mother with the uncertainsteps of infancy.

  The face of the water was glassy and of a yellow green. Although the scudswept in toward the land at a fair speed, there was not enough wind tofill the sails. Moreover, the bounty of Holland seemed inexhaustible.There was more to come. This fog-bank lay on the water halfway across theNorth Sea, and the brief winter sun having failed to disperse it, was nowsinking to the west, cold and pale.

  "The water seems shallow," said Barebone to the Captain. "What would youdo if the ship went aground?"

  "We should stay there, _mon bon monsieur_, until some one came to help usat the flood tide. We should shout until they heard us."

  "You might fire a gun," suggested Barebone.

  "We have no gun on board, mon bon monsieur," replied the Captain, who hadlong ago explained to his prisoner that there was no ill-feeling.

  "It is the fortune of war," he had explained before the white cliffs ofSt. Valerie had faded from sight. "I am a poor man who cannot afford torefuse a good offer. It is a Government job, as you no doubt know withoutmy telling you. You would seem to have incurred the displeasure or thedistrust of some one high placed in the Government. 'Treat him well,'they said to me. 'Give him your best, and see that he comes to no harmunless he tries to escape. And be careful that he does not return toFrance before the mackerel fishing begins.' And when we do return toFecamp, I have to lie to off Notre Dame de la Garde and signal to theDouane that I have you safe. They want you out of the way. You are adangerous man, it seems. _Salut_!"

  And the Captain raised his glass to one so distinguished by Government.He laughed as he set his glass down on the little cabin table.

  "No ill-feeling on either side," he added. "_C'est entendu_."

  He made a half-movement as if to shake hands across the table and thoughtbetter of it, remembering, perhaps, that his own palm was not innocent ofblood-money. For the rest they had been friendly enough on the voyage.And had the "Petite Jeanne" been in danger, it is probable that Barebonewould have warned his jailer, if only in obedience to a seaman's instinctagainst throwing away a good ship.

  He had noted every detail, however, of the dinghy while he lay on thedeck of the "Petite Jeanne"; how the runner fitted to the mast; whetherthe halliards were likely to run sweetly through the sheaves or wereknotted and would jamb. He knew the weight of the gaff and the greattan-soddened sail to a nicety. Some dark night, he had thought, on theDogger, he would slip overboard and take his chance. He had never lookedfor thick weather at this time of year off the Banks, so near home,within a few hours' sail of the mouth of Farlingford River.

  If a breeze would only come up from the south-east, as it almost alwaysdoes in these waters toward the evening of a still, fine day! Withoutlifting his head he scanned the weather, noting that the scud was blowingmore northward now. It might only be what is known as a slant. On theother hand, it might prove to be a true breeze, coming from the usualquarter. The "tap-tap" of the caulker's hammer on the slip-way in HarwichRiver was silent now. There must be a breeze in-shore that carried thesound away.

  The topsail of the "Petite Jeanne" filled with a jerk, and the Captain,standing at the tiller, looked up at it. The lower sails soon took theircue, and suddenly the slack sheets hummed taut in the breeze. The "PetiteJeanne" answered to it at once, and the waves gurgled and laughed beneathher counter as she moved through the water. She could sail quicker thanher dinghy: Barebone knew that. But he also knew that he could handle anopen boat as few even on the Cotes-du-Nord knew how.

  If the breeze came strong, it would blow the fog-bank away, and Barebonehad need of its covert. Though there must
be many English boats withinsight should the fog lift--indeed, the guardship in Harwich harbour wouldbe almost visible across the spit of land where Landguard Fort lieshidden--Barebone had no intention of asking help so compromising. He hadbut a queer story to tell to any in authority, and on the face of it hemust perforce appear to have run away with the dinghy of the "PetiteJeanne."

  He desired to get ashore as unobtrusively as possible. For he was notgoing to stay in England. The die was cast now. Where Dormer Colville'spersuasions had failed, where the memory of that journey through RoyalistFrance had yet left him doubting, the incidents of the last few days hadclinched the matter once for all. Barebone was going back to France.

  He moved as if to stretch his limbs and lay down once more, with hisshoulders against the rail and his elbow covering the stanchion roundwhich the dinghy's painter was made fast.

  The proper place for the dinghy was on deck should the breeze freshen.Barebone knew that as well as the French Captain of the "Petite Jeanne."For seamanship is like music--it is independent of language or race.There is only one right way and one wrong way at sea, all the world over.The dinghy was only towing behind while the fog continued to beimpenetrable. At any moment the Captain might give the order to bring itinboard.

  At any moment Barebone might have to make a dash for the boat.

  He watched the Captain, who continued to steer in silence. To drift onthe tide in a fog is a very different thing to sailing through it at tenmiles an hour on a strong breeze, and the steersman had no thought tospare for anything but his sails. Two men were keeping the look-out inthe bows. Another--the leadsman--was standing amidships peering over theside into the mist.

  Still Barebone waited. Captain Clubbe had taught him that most difficultart--to select with patience and a perfect judgment the right moment. The"Petite Jeanne" was rustling through the glassy water northward towardFarlingford.

  At a word from the Captain the man who had been heaving the lead came aftto the ship's bell and struck ten quick strokes. He waited and repeatedthe warning, but no one answered. They were alone in these shallowchannels. Fortunately the man faced forward, as sailors always do byinstinct, turning his back upon the Captain and Barebone.

  The painter was cast off now and, under his elbow, Barebone was slowlyhauling in. The dinghy was heavy and the "Petite Jeanne" was movingquickly through the water. Suddenly Barebone rose to his feet, hauled inhand over hand, and when the dinghy was near enough, leaped across twoyards of water to her gunwale.

  The Captain heard the thud of his feet on the thwart, and looking backover his shoulder saw and understood in a flash of thought. But eventhen he did not understand that Loo was aught else but a landsmanhalf-recovered from sea-sickness. He understood it a minute later,however, when the brown sail ran up the mast and, holding the tillerbetween his knees, Barebone hauled in the sheet hand over hand andsteered a course out to sea.

  He looked back over the foot of the sail and waved his hand. "_Sansrancune!_" he shouted. "_C'est entendu!_" The Captain's own words.

  The "Petite Jeanne" was already round to the wind, and the Captain wasbellowing to his crew to trim the sails. It could scarcely be a chase,for the huge deep-sea fishing-boat could sail half as fast again as herown dinghy. The Captain gave his instructions with all the quickness ofhis race, and the men were not slow to carry them out. The safe-keepingof the prisoner had been made of personal advantage to each member of thecrew.

  The Captain hailed Barebone with winged words which need not be set downhere, and explained to him the impossibility of escape.

  "How can you--a landsman," he shouted, "hope to get away from us? Comeback and it shall be as you say '_sans rancune._' Name of God! I bearyou no ill-will for making the attempt."

  They were so close together that all on board the "Petite Jeanne" couldsee Barebone laugh and shake his head. He knew that there was no gun onboard the fishing-boat. The lugger rushed on, sailing quicker, lying upcloser to the wind. She was within twenty yards of the little boatnow--would overhaul her in a minute.

  But in an instant Barebone was round on the other tack, and the Captainswore aloud, for he knew now that he was not dealing with a landsman. The"Petite Jeanne" spun round almost as quickly, but not quite. Every timethat Barebone put about, the "Petite Jeanne" must perforce do the same,and every time she lost a little in the manoeuvre. On a long tack orrunning before the wind the bigger boat was immeasurably superior.Barebone had but one chance--to make short tacks--and he knew it. TheCaptain knew it also, and no landsman would have possessed the knowledge.He was trying to run the boat down now.

  Barebone might succeed in getting far enough away to be lost in the fog.But in tacking so frequently he was liable to make a mistake. The biggerboat was not so likely to miss stays. He passed so close to her that hecould read the figures cut on her stern-post indicating her draught ofwater.

  There was another chance. The "Petite Jeanne" was drawing six feet; thedinghy could sail across a shoal covered by eighteen inches of water. Butsuch a shoal would be clearly visible on the surface of the water.Besides, there was no shallow like that nearer than the Goodwins.Barebone pressed out seaward. He knew every channel and every bankbetween the Thames and Thorpeness. He kept on pressing out to sea byshort tacks. All the while he was peeping over the gunwale out of thecorner of his eye. He was near, he must be near, a bank covered by fivefeet of water at low tide. A shoal of five feet is rarely visible on thesurface.

  Suddenly he rose from his seat on the gunwale, and stood with the tillerin one hand and the sheet in the other, half turning back to look at"Petite Jeanne" towering almost over him. And as he looked, her bluffblack bows rose upward with an odd climbing movement like a horsestepping up a bank. With a rattle of ropes and blocks she stood still.

  Barebone went about again and sailed past her.

  "_Sans rancune_!" he shouted. But no one heeded him, for they had othermatters to attend to. And the dinghy sailed into the veil of the misttoward the land.