Johnstone of the Border

"Is it cut?"

"Don't fuss!" Dick answered irritably. "She'll wash back up the beach if you don't pull."

Whitney occupied himself with the oars; but he felt puzzled. Dick seemed to have turned dizzy before he fell; and although it was possible that he struck his head, his statement that he had done so looked like an afterthought. It was, however, his business now to find the Rowan, and he could see by the way the cliff slid past that the tide was running down. He had to pull hard to get near the island, and the wind was rising, but soon he distinguished a patch of dark canvas, and a few minutes later he ran the dinghy alongside the yacht.

"Lash the helm and come below!" he called to Andrew, after helping Dick on board.

Andrew stopped to throw a sail over the skylight when Whitney lighted the lamps, and then went down and looked at Dick, who lay on a locker. His face was very white, his lips had a blue tint, and the veins showed dark on the back of his colorless hands.

"I think you had better have a drink," he said, taking out a whisky bottle.

Dick drained the glass.

"That's good; I'll soon be all right. I slipped when we were coming down the crag and pitched over the edge of the steep bottom part."

"He thinks he hit his head," Whitney added.

Andrew felt Dick's head in spite of his objections.

"There is a lump, but not large. It doesn't account for the shock you seem to have got."

"If you had fallen down that rock, I don't suppose you'd feel very fit. But give me a cigarette and ask Jim to tell you what we saw."

Andrew gave him the cigarette and then looked out the scuttle. A breeze had got up, blowing off the land, and the yacht was drifting seaward with her loose mainsail flapping and her jib aback. She would need no attention; so he closed the hatch and sat down to listen to Whitney's story.

"Do you think they heard Dick fall?" he asked.

"I can't say. It's possible, though the swell was breaking noisily on the beach."

"It's a curious affair," said Andrew. "I saw the light and was glad I'd kept the boat in the gloom of the island. It certainly looks as if the steamer that put her lights out and the whammel boat that crept in to the land at dusk had some connection with each other. Then I thought I heard oars shortly before you came off."

"Suppose the boatmen had meant to signal the vessel, why should they land when they could have lighted a flare on board?"

"It would have shone all round," said Andrew. "By coming ashore they got the crag for a screen and a high platform. The light could be seen farther off, but only from the sea."

"But what would they want to signal from a place like this, and whom would they signal to?"

"I don't pretend to know. It's a long distance from a main line, but a fast car would cover a good deal of ground in an hour or two."

Andrew stopped, and, taking a chart from a rack, pointed to the narrow channel between Scotland and Ireland.

"You see how close Fair Head is to Kintyre," he resumed. "Well, all the shipping from the Clyde and a good deal from Liverpool passes through that gap. You can imagine what would happen if it were filled with mines."

"The difficulty is that the mine-sowers would be seen. The lighthouses on Rathlin and Kintyre command the channel."

"It's hard to see a vessel that carries no lights, and a mine-sower wouldn't proclaim his intentions. There's a big fleet of trawlers working in the Irish Sea, and a stranger would excite no remark by slipping in among them. It wouldn't take long to paint on a registered number and copy the funnel of a steam fishing company."

"So Rankine has another duty besides taking soundings! A small survey vessel could cruise about among the shoals without attracting much notice. Her business would be obvious, but that needn't stop her crew from watching out."

"Well," said Andrew, "it isn't difficult to form a theory to fit the few things we know. However – "

"It would probably be all wrong when you'd made it," Dick broke in.

"I'm glad you're feeling better," Andrew smiled. "I'll go up and look after the boat."

He left the scuttle open and they heard blocks rattle as he hauled the main sheet, and the soft splashing at the bows as the yacht gathered speed.

"I'm not sure it was the blow on your head that knocked you out, Dick," Whitney said. "You reeled as if you were getting faint before you fell."

"Well, suppose I did? I may have been running harder than was good for me; but can't you understand that one shrinks from making a fuss about one's weaknesses?"

"Of course. This means you want to keep the real explanation from your cousin?"

"I'd very much rather nobody knew. Falling on your head is a good enough reason for feeling faint, and, as a matter of fact, I hit it hard enough."

"Very well," agreed Whitney. "I suppose I must say nothing, since you have taken me into your confidence."

"You might let my cot down and pull out the blankets. I'm not quite right yet, to tell the truth. I think I'll go to sleep."

Whitney arranged the cot for him, and then, going up on deck, sat in the cockpit while the Rowan stretched across the bay before a fresh easterly breeze.

CHAPTER XII

A FALSE ALARM

Heavy rains lashed the windows at Appleyard and a wild west wind buffeted the house. Between the gusts one could hear the wail of storm-tossed trees and the distant roar of the flood tide foaming across the Solway sands. It was, however, warm and bright within the thick granite walls, and Andrew lounged in a corner of the billiard-room after dinner, watching Elsie knit. She was making a soldier's woolen belt, and he noted the precise neatness of the work. Elsie was conscientious in all she did, but he thought this view of the matter did not go far enough. The care with which she linked up the stitches was deepened by love.

"It will be a lucky man who gets the belt," he remarked. "We must hope he isn't by any chance one of our enemies."

Elsie looked up with a smile.

"After all, I wouldn't mind that very much, so long as he needed it. It must be dreadful to lie out, cold and hungry, in the snow."

"It is," said Andrew. "I've done something of the kind. Of course you're right; but ordinary people would rather help their own side, particularly when the other seems to be singularly unchivalrous."

He stopped as he saw a tinge of color creep into her face; but she quietly met his apologetic glance.

"I know you didn't mean to hurt. I do remember sometimes, that, in a sense, I belong to the other side."

"You can't help that, and you're Scottish to the backbone in all that matters."

Elsie's eyes twinkled.

"You're not making it much better, but perhaps you'd lose something if you were not so frank. One distrusts people who always say the proper thing."

Andrew glanced at a well-dressed, handsome man who was playing billiards with Dick. He came to Appleyard for a day or two now and then, and had been there when Andrew arrived from Canada.

"Does that mean you don't quite trust Williamson? I've sometimes wondered whether it's his right name."