Part 74 (2/2)
”Ronsard!” he cried; ”The King--the King!”
He paused, gasping for breath. Ronsard looked at him wonderingly. His clothes were saturated with sea-water,--his face was pale--and his eyes expressed some fear that his tongue seemed incapable of uttering. He was one of the coral-fishers of the coast, and Ronsard knew him well.
”What ails you, man?” he asked; ”What say you of the King?”
Holding the door of the cottage open with some difficulty, the coral-fisher pointed to the sky overhead. It was flecked with great ma.s.ses of white cloud, through which the moon appeared to roll rapidly like a ball of yellow fire. The wind howled furiously, and the pines in the near distance could be seen bending to and fro like reeds in its breath, while the roar of the sea beyond the rocks was fierce and deafening.
”It is all storm!” cried the man, excitedly; ”The billows are running mountains high!--there is no chance for him!”
”No chance for whom?” demanded Von Glauben, impatiently; ”What would you tell us? Speak plainly!”
”It was the King!” said the coral-fisher again, trying to express himself more collectedly--”I saw his face lit up by the after-glow of the sky--white--white as the foam on the wave! Listen! When the body of the woman Lotys was borne away on that vessel, a man came to me out of the thickest of the crowd (I was on one of the furthest quays)--and offered me a purse of gold to take him out to sea--and to steer him in such a way that we should meet the funeral barque just as she was cut adrift and sent forth to be wrecked in the ocean. I did not know him then. He kept his face hidden,--he spoke low, and he was evidently in trouble. I thought he was a lover of the dead woman, and sought perhaps to comfort himself by looking at her coffin for the last time. So I consented to do what he asked. I had my sailing skiff, and we went at once. The wind was strong; we sailed swiftly--and at the appointed place--” He paused to take breath. Ronsard seized him by the arm.
”Quick! Go on--what next?”
”At the appointed place when the vessel stopped,--when her ropes were cut and she afterwards sprang out to sea, I, by his orders, ran my skiff close beside her as she came,--and before I knew how it happened, my pa.s.senger sprang aboard her--Ay!--with a spring as light and sure as the flight of a bird! 'Farewell!' he said, and flung me the promised gold; 'May all be prosperous with you and yours!' And then the wind swooped down and bore the s.h.i.+p a mile or more ere I could follow it; but the strong light in the west fell full upon the man's face--and I saw--I knew it was the King!”
”Gott in Himmel! May you for ever be confounded and mistaken!” exclaimed Von Glauben,--”I left the King in his own grounds but an hour before I myself started to witness this accursed sea-funeral!”
”I say it was the King!” repeated the man emphatically. ”I would swear it was the King! And the vessel going out to meet the storm tonight, holds the living, as well as the dead!”
With a sudden movement, as active as it was decided, old Ronsard went to a corner in the room and drew out a thick coil of rope with an iron hook at the end, and slinging it round his waist with the alert quickness of youth, made for the open door.
”Where is your skiff?” he demanded.
”Ash.o.r.e down yonder;” answered the coral-fisher; ”But you--what are you going to do? You cannot sail her in such a night as this!”
”I will adventure!” said Ronsard. ”If, as you say, it was the King, I will save him if he can be saved! Once a King's life was nothing to me; now it is something! The tide veers round these Islands, and the vessel on which they have placed the body of Lotys, can scarcely drift away from the circle till morning, unless the waves are too strong for it--”
”They are too strong!” cried the coral-fisher; ”Ronsard, believe me!
There is no rain to soften or abate the wind--and the sea grows greater with every breath of the rising gale!”
”I care nothing!” replied Ronsard; ”Let be! If you are afraid, I will go alone!”
At these words, the Professor suddenly awoke to the situation.
”What would you attempt, Ronsard?” he exclaimed; ”You can do nothing!
You are weak and ailing!--there is no force in you to combat with the elements on such a night as this--”
”There _is_ force!” said Ronsard; ”The force of my thirst for atonement!
Let me be, for G.o.d's sake! Let me do something useful in my life!--let me try to save the King! If I die, so much the better.”
”Then I will go with you!” said Von Glauben, desperately.
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