Part 43 (1/2)

Rescue, liberty, and, not least, triumph over Landon! These were all possibilities, even probabilities, clear to Claire Van Arlen's intelligence as she bent over Aylmer--clear, but undefined. Yet the one outstanding, engrossing thought was that her champion had fallen in the moment of victory. The blood was flowing from a deep cut on his forehead; he was unconscious; the color had ebbed from his very lips. An agony of apprehension seized upon her. He was dead! He was dead!

And then--the pulse of that relief will be quick in her to her dying day--his eyes opened, he stirred. He did more than stir; he made efforts to rise.

She held him masterfully; her voice was stern in her command to him to lie still. And he looked up at her with an incredulous glance in which humor had its part. He smiled--a puzzled smile. Suddenly remembrance came back to him and his bewilderment became anxiety.

”The gunboat?” he asked hoa.r.s.ely. ”They saw me, they were slowing down!”

She nodded silently as she looked about her. They had floated within the shadow cast by the towering bulk of the island nearest them. The last red rim of the sun's disc had pa.s.sed below the horizon. The dusk was gathering. A mile away the gunboat was turning ponderously.

Rapidly she told him what she saw and he nodded a satisfied a.s.sent.

”They're done, now,” he whispered triumphantly. ”We have them in a cleft stick!”

But Fate--listening Fate--shook her head.

It was Muhammed who had taken command of the situation, Muhammed who roared his orders to hoist again the half-lowered sail, to let drift the dingy from the stern, to stand by the halliards for a tack. He leaped upon the tiller and flung the boat's prow round to point directly for the land.

The freshening breeze from the northwest swelled out the great sail as the panting sailors swung the yard aslant the mast. The water sang and bubbled from the prow. The _Santa Margarita_ leaped landwards like a living thing, straight for the cliffs of shadowing stone.

Captain Luigi, completely unnerved by the sudden crisis to which events had soared, wailed protests without attempting interference.

”I call you to witness that I said he had the evil eye!” he cried. ”I call you to witness! Capture or destruction--there are no two ways to it!”

”There is One G.o.d and one road to safety for a brave man,” answered Muhammed, as he leaned his strength upon the helm. ”They call it courage. Run out the French flag, _amigo_! They dare not fire on that, here, in debatable waters, for all their claim to these islands as within the grip of Spain.”

A sudden pang of doubt shook Claire. The gunboat was completing its turning movement--slowly--ah, how slowly! And yet? How could the felucca, with no more than a fresh breeze to rely on, hope to evade that greyhound of the seas? A spout of gray smoke burst from the gray painted sides; the sound of a cannon shot echoed down to them among the crags.

Muhammed laughed.

”Blank cartridge,” he said derisively. ”Within five minutes their faces will be as blank. Sons of dirt, I spit upon you!”

The girl's apprehension grew. Confidence rang in the Moor's voice. He smiled as one who had already triumphed. And still the felucca drove sh.o.r.ewards, relentlessly towards the bare face of stone.

But the torpedo boat was gaining speed. The white lift of the foam was veiling her bows; she ripped through the waters as a blade rips through calico, directly, cleanly, tossing aside the waves. Another few minutes--seven--six--perhaps less--and she must be alongside. And the island cliff seemed to overhang them now; the great sail flapped as the breeze beat back from the sheer rock against its breadth.

A second time Muhammed roared his orders. The sailors s.h.i.+fted the huge spar around the mast, swinging it as on a pivot. The _Santa Margarita_ came about, dancingly.

The rush and boil of breaking foam on the seaward bow caught Claire's ear. She glanced over the taffrail.

A comber was breaking on a great tooth of black rock within half a cable's length of the boat. Not far ahead she saw the white after-spume of another--and beyond that a third--a fourth--countless ones. They were within a very labyrinth of reefs. And Muhammed, swerving the tiller delicately from side to side, steered unshaken, his eyes piercing into the swiftly coming gloom, the smile of victory growing round his lips.

She understood, and before she turned her eyes astern knew hope was lost. The torpedo boat was slackening speed; the cream of her wake began to slide past her sides and swirl round her bow as she slowed, went astern, halted on the lips of danger, and then reluctantly turned.

A yell went up from the felucca as the crew saw themselves saved--a yell of defiance.

Again the gray jet of smoke spurted from the gray port, and this time the background of purple dusk showed the red tongue of the flame. The sound of the report reached them, but not so swiftly as another sound--a nerve-rending menace which shrieked in their very ears, as it seemed, and pa.s.sed, to thunder cras.h.i.+ngly against the forehead of the crag. And again Muhammed laughed and showed his white teeth, and roared to his fellows to swing the yard-arm about as he spun the boat between two waiting jaws of rock and sent her bounding out into the open before the lash of the favoring breeze. And night fell over them--for Claire Van Arlen the hopeless night of despair.

She looked up to find Miller standing beside her, looking down at Aylmer's face with sombre, inquiring eyes. And she realized for the first time that in that face the eyes were closed again, the lips bloodless, the cheeks sunken. She gave an exclamation; she bent and stanched the blood which still flowed from the wounded temple.

Miller picked up a bucket, seized a rope, attached it to the handle, and slung it overboard. He placed it, brimmed with water, at her feet. She looked up again, eyed him silently and without thanks, dipped her handkerchief in the water and laved Aylmer's face. And Miller himself remained silent, as if he would force the first comment from her, as if he probed for information by mere inertness. Had he been heard? She guessed that he was asking himself--and by force of silence, her--this question.