The Haute Noblesse - Part 65
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Part 65

"George!"

Two figures suddenly appeared out of the darkness, and stopped before them.

"Luke? You here?"

"Yes; have you seen him?"

"No; but is--is he--"

"No, Mr Vine," said Leslie quickly. "I have been up to the station twice."

"Sir!"

"For heaven's sake don't speak to me like that, Mr Vine," cried Leslie.

"I know everything, and I am working for him as I would for my own brother."

"Yes, it's all right, George," said Uncle Luke, with his voice softening a little. "Leslie's a good fellow. Look here; we must get the young dog away. Leslie has chartered a fast boat, and she lies in the head of the harbour ready."

"Ah!"

It was an involuntary e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n from Louise.

"We'll have him taken across the Channel if we can find him. Where can he be hidden?"

"We have been twice on to your house, Mr Vine," said Leslie, who kept right away from Louise, and out of delicacy seemed to ignore her presence, but spoke so that she could hear every word. "I have three of my miners on the look-out--men I can trust, and law or no law, we must save him from arrest."

"Heaven bless you, Mr Leslie. Forgive--"

"Hush, sir. There is no time for words. The men from London with our own police are searching in every direction. He got right away, and he is hiding somewhere, for he certainly would not take to the hills or the road, and it would be madness to try the rail."

"Yes," said Uncle Luke. "He's safe to make for the sea, and so get over yonder. There's a boat lying off though, and I'm afraid that's keeping him back. The police have that outside to stop him."

"No; that is a boat I have chartered, Luke, waiting to save my poor boy."

"Then before many hours are gone he'll be down by the harbour, that's my impression," said Uncle Luke. "Confound you, George, why did you ever have a boy?"

George Vine drew a long breath and remained silent.

"If you will allow me, gentlemen," said Leslie, "I think we ought not to stay here like this. The poor fellow will not know what precautions his friends have taken, and some one ought to be on the look-out to give him warning whenever he comes down to the harbour."

"Yes; that's true."

"Then if I may advise, I should suggest, sir, that you patrol this side to and fro, where you must see him if he comes down to make for the west point; I'll cross over and watch the east pier, and if Mr Luke Vine here will stop about the head of the harbour, we shall have three chances of seeing him instead of one."

Louise pressed her hand to her throbbing heart, as she listened to these words, and in spite of her agony of spirits, noted how Leslie avoided speaking to her, devoting himself solely to the task of helping her brother; and as she felt this, and saw that in future they could be nothing more than the most distant friends, a suffocating feeling of misery seemed to come over her, and she longed to hurry away, and sob to relieve her overcharged breast.

"Leslie's right," said Uncle Luke, in a decisive way. "Let's separate at once. And look here, whoever sees him is to act, give him some money, and get him off at once. He must go. The trouble's bad enough now, it would be worse if he were taken, and it's the last thing Van Heldre would do, hand him to the police. Leslie!"

He held up his hand, but the steps he heard were only those of some fishermen going home from the river.

"Now, then, let's act; and for goodness' sake, let's get the young idiot away, for I warn you all, if that boy's taken there'll be far worse trouble than you know of now."

"Uncle Luke!" cried Louise piteously.

"Can't help it, my dear. There will, for I shall end a respectable life by killing old Crampton and being hung. Come along, Leslie."

The little party separated without a word, and Louise and her father stood listening till the steps of their late companions died away.

CHAPTER THIRTY.

IN THE QUEEN'S NAME.

As they stood together at the lower end of the rocky point listening and waiting, it seemed to Louise Vine as if she were about to be an actor in some terrible scene.

Vine muttered a few words now and then, but they were inaudible to his child, who clung to his arm as he walked untiringly to and fro, watching the harbour and the way back into the town, while when he paused it was to fix his eyes upon the dimly-seen lantern of the lugger lying out beyond the point. The portion of their walk nearest the town was well kept and roughly paved with great slabs of granite, in which were here and there great rings for mooring purposes, while at some distance apart were projecting ma.s.ses roughly hewn into posts. But as the distance from the town increased and the harbour widened, the jutting point was almost as if it had been formed by nature, and the footing was difficult, even dangerous at times.

But in his excitement Vine did not heed this, going on and on regardless of the difficulties, and Louise unmurmuringly walked or at times climbed along, till they were right out at the extreme point where, some feet below them, the water rushed and gurgled in and out of the crevices with terrible gasping noises, such as might be made by hungry sea-monsters thronging round to seize them if either of them should make a slip.

Here Vine paused again and again to watch the lantern in the lugger, and listen for the rattle of oars in the rowlocks, the oars of the boat conveying his son to the men who would at once hoist the sails and bear him away to a place of safety. But the dim light of the horn lantern rose and fell, there was no rattle of oars, not even the murmur of a voice; nothing but the sucking, gasping noises at their feet, as the tide swirled by like the race of waters from some huge mill.

Louise clung more tightly to her father's arm, as he stood again and again where she had often from a rock behind watched her uncle deftly throwing out his line to capture some silvery-sided ba.s.s or a mackerel, glowing with all the glories of the sea at sunrise.

"If he should slip," she said to herself, as she tightened her grasp of her father's thin arm, "if he should slip!" and she shuddered as she gazed down into the deep, black rushing water, where the star reflections were all broken up and sparkled deep down as if the current were charged with gold dust, swirling and eddying by. Then she started as her father spoke aloud to himself.

"No, no, no!" he murmured. Then sharply, "Come, let us get back."

Louise crept along by him in silence, her heart giving one violent leap, as Vine slipped once on the spray-wet rocks, but recovered himself and went on without a word. Again and again, she suffered that terrible catching of the breath, as her father slipped, caught his foot in some inequality, or would, but for her guidance, have stumbled over some projecting rock post and been thrown into the harbour. For as he walked on, his eyes were constantly searching the dark surface as he listened intently for some token of the escaping man.

But all was still as they neared the town, still with the silence of death. No one could have told that there were watchers by the ferry, where a rough boat was used for crossing from side to side of the harbour; that two boats were waiting, and that Duncan Leslie was patrolling the short arm of granite masonry that ran down to the tower-like building were the harbour lantern burned.

"Hist!" whispered Louise, for there was a step some little distance away, but it ceased, and as she looked in its direction, the cliffs seemed to tower up behind the town till a black, jagged ridge cut the starry sky.

"Let's go back," said her father, huskily. "I fancied I heard a boat stealing along the harbour; we cannot see the lugger light from here."

"George!" came from out of the darkness ahead.

"Yes, Luke!" was whispered back sharply, and the old man came up.

"Seen anything of him?"

"No. Have you?"

"Not a sign. I sent one of the fishermen up to the police to see what he could find out, and--"

"Uncle!" panted out Louise, as she left her father to cling to the old man.

"Poor little la.s.sie! poor little la.s.sie!" he said tenderly, as he took her and patted her head. "No news, and that's good news. They haven't got him, but they're all out on the watch; the man from London and our dunderheads. All on the watch, and I fancy they're on the look-out close here somewhere, and that's what keeps him back."