CHAPTER XVII
_In Which Bill o' Burnt Bay Finds Himself in Jail and Archie Armstrong Discovers That Reality is Not as Diverting as Romance_
To be sure, Bill o' Burnt Bay had overcome the watchman! He hadblundered upon him in the cabin. Being observed before he couldwithdraw, he had leaped upon this functionary with resistlessimpetuosity--had overpowered him, gagged him, trussed him like aturkey cock and rolled him into his bunk. The waters roundabout gaveno sign of having been apprised of the capture. No cry of surpriserang out--no call for help--no hullabaloo of pursuit. The lights ofthe old town twinkled in the foggy night in undisturbed serenity.
The night was thick, and the wind swept furiously up from the sea. Itwould be a dead beat to windward to make the open--a sharp beatthrough a rock-strewn channel in a rising gale.
"Now we got her," Skipper Bill laughed, "what'll we do with her?"
Archie and Josiah laughed, too: a hearty explosion.
"We can never beat out in this wind," said Bill; "an' we couldn'thandle her if we did--not in a gale o' wind like this. All along," hechuckled, "I been 'lowin' for a fair wind an' good weather."
They heard the rattle and creak of oars approaching; to which, in afew minutes, the voices of two men added a poignant interest. Therowers rested on their oars, as though looking about; then the oarssplashed the water again, and the dory shot towards the _HeavenlyHome_. Bill o' Burnt Bay and his fellow pirates lay flat on the deck.The boat hung off the stern of the schooner.
"Jean!"
The hail was in French. It was not answered, you may be sure, from the_Heavenly Home_.
"Jean!"
"He's not aboard," spoke up the other man.
"He must be aboard. His dory's tied to the rail. Jean! Jean Morot!"
"Come--let's be off to the _Voyageur_. He's asleep." A pair of oarsfell in the water.
"Come--take your oars. It's too rough to lie here. And it's lateenough."
"But----"
"Take your oars!" with an oath.
The Newfoundlanders breathed easier when they heard the splash andcreak and rattle receding; but they did not rise until the sounds wereout of hearing, presumably in the direction of the _Voyageur_.
* * * * *
Bill o' Burnt Bay began to laugh again. Archie joined him. But JosiahCove pointed out the necessity of doing something--anything--and doingit quickly. It was all very well to laugh, said he; and although itmight seem a comical thing to be standing on the deck of a capturedschooner, the comedy would be the Frenchman's if they were caught inthe act. But Archie still chuckled away; the situation was quite tooridiculous to be taken seriously. Archie had never been a piratebefore; he didn't feel like one now--but he rather liked the feelinghe had.
"We can't stay aboard," said he, presently.
"Blest if I want t' go ashore," said Bill.
"We _got_ t' go ashore," Josiah put in.
Before they left the deck of the _Heavenly Home_ (the watchman havingthen been made more comfortable), it was agreed that the schoonercould not make the open sea in the teeth of the wind. That wasobvious; and it was just as obvious that the Newfoundlander could notstay aboard. The discovery of the watchman in the cabin must bechanced until such a time as a fair wind came in the night. On theirway to the obscure wharf at which they landed it was determined thatJosiah should board the schooner at nine o'clock, noon, and sixo'clock of the next day to feed the captured watchman and to set thegalley fire going for half an hour to allay suspicion.
"An' Skipper Bill," said Josiah, seriously, "you lie low. If you don'tyou're liable to be took up."
"Take your advice t' yourself," the skipper retorted. "Yourreputation's none o' the best in this harbour."
"We'll sail to-morrow night," said Archie.
"Given a dark night an' a fair wind," the skipper qualified.
Skipper Bill made his way to a quiet cafe of his acquaintance; andJosiah vanished in the fog to lie hidden with a shipmate of otherdays. Archie--depending upon his youth and air and accent andwell-tailored dress to avert suspicion--went boldly to the HotelJoinville and sat down to dinner. The dinner was good; he enjoyed it,and was presently delighting in the romance in which he had a part. Itall seemed too good to be true. How glad he was he had come! To behere--in the French Islands of Miquelon--to have captured aschooner--to have a prisoner in the cabin--to be about to run off withthe _Heavenly Home_. For the life of him, Archie could not take thething seriously. He chuckled--and chuckled--and chuckled again.
Presently he walked abroad; and in the quaint streets and old customsof the little town, here remote from all the things of the present andof the new world as we know it in this day, he found that which soonlifted him into a dream of times long past and of doughty deeds forhonour and a lady. Soft voices in the streets, forms flitting fromshadow to shadow, priest and strutting gendarme and veiled lady,gabled roofs, barred windows, low doorways, the clatter of sabots, thependant street lights, the rumble of the ten o'clock drums. Thesethings, seen in a mist, were all of the days when bold ventures weremade--of those days when a brave man would recover his own, come whatmight, if it had been wrongfully wrested from him. It was a raredream--and not broken until he turned into the Quai de la Ronciere.
As he rounded the corner he was almost knocked from his feet by aburly fellow in a Basque cap who was breathless with haste.
"Monsieur--if he will pardon--it was not----" this fellow stammered,apologetically.
Men were hurrying past toward the Cafe d'Espoir, appearing everywherefrom the mist and running with the speed of deep excitement. There wasa clamorous crowd about the door--pushing, scuffling, shouting.
"What has happened?" Archie asked in French.
"An American has killed a gendarme, monsieur. A ter-rible fellow! Oh,fear-r-rful!"
"And why--what----"
"He was a ter-rible fellow, monsieur. The gendarmes have been on thelookout for him for three years. And when they laid hands on him hefought, monsieur--fought with the strength of a savage. It took fivegendarmes to bind him--five, monsieur. Poor Louis Arnot! He isdead--killed, monsieur, by a pig of an American with his fist. Theyare to take the murderer to the jail. I am just now running to warnDeschamps to make ready the dungeon cell. If monsieur will but excuseme, I will----"
He was off; so Archie joined the crowd at the door of the cafe, whichwas that place to which Skipper Bill had repaired to hide. He hung onthe outskirts of the crowd, unable to push his way further. The wrathof these folk was so noisy that he could catch no word of what went onwithin. He devoutly hoped that Skipper Bill had kept to hishiding-place despite the suspicious sounds in the cafe. Then he wormedhis way to the door and entered. A moment later he had climbed on abarrel and was overlooking the squirming crowd and eagerly listeningto the clamour. Above every sound--above the cries and clatter andgabble--rang the fighting English of Bill o' Burnt Bay.
It was no American; it was Skipper Bill whom the gendarmes had taken,and he was now so seriously involved, apparently, that his worstenemies could wish him no deeper in the mesh. They had him bound handand foot and guarded with drawn swords, fearing, probably, thatsomewhere he had a crew of wild fellows at his back to make a rescue.To attempt a rescue was not to be thought of. It did not enter theboy's head. He was overcome by grief and terror. He withdrew into ashadow until they had carried Skipper Bill out with a crowd yelping athis heels. Then, white and shaking, he went to a group in the cornerwhere Louis Arnot, the gendarme, was stretched out on the floor.
Archie touched the surgeon on the shoulder. "Is he dead?" the boyasked, in French, his voice trembling.
"No, monsieur; he is alive."
"Will he live?"
"To be sure, monsieur!"
"Is there any doubt about it?" asked Archie.
"Doubt?" exclaimed the surgeon. "With _my_ skill, monsieur? It isimpossible--he _cannot_ die! He will be restored in three days.I--_I_--I will accomplish it!"
"
Thank God for that!" thought Archie.
The boy went gravely home to bed; and as he lay down the adventureseemed less romantic than it had.