this side of the house lay so black against the fine, clear, starry dusk of the sky that it was impossible to see the outlines of the windows in it. i could manage, however, to faintly trace the line of the balcony. my heart beat fast as i thought that even now my darling might be standing at the window peering through it, waiting for the signal flash. caudel was thinking of her too.
"the young lady, begging of your pardon, sir, must be a gal of uncommon spirit, mr. barclay."
"she loves me, caudel, and love is the most animating of spirits, my friend."
"i dorn't doubt it, sir. what room will it be that she's to come out of?"
"the dining-room—a big, deserted apartment where the girls take their meals."
"'tain't her bedroom, then?"
"no. she is to steal dressed from her bedroom to the salle-à-manger—"
"the sally what, sir?"
"no matter, no matter," i answered.
i pulled out my watch, but there was no power in the starlight to reveal the dial-plate. all continued still as the tomb, saving at fitful intervals a low note of silken rustling that stole upon the ear with some tender, dream-like gushing of night-air, as though the atmosphere had been stirred by the sweep of a large, near, invisible pinion.
"this here posture ain't so agreeable as dancing," hoarsely grumbled caudel, "could almost wish myself a dwarf. that there word beginning with a sally—"
"not so loud, man; not so loud."
"it's oncommon queer," he persisted, "to feel one's self in a country where one's language ain't spoke. the werry soil don't seem natural. as to the language itself, burst me if i can understand how a man masters it. i was once trying to teach an irish sailor how to dance a quadrille. 'now, murphy,' says i to him, 'you onderstand you're my wiz-a-wee?' 'what's dat you call me?' he cried out. 'you're anoder and a damn scoundrel besoides!' half the words in this here tongue sound like cussing of a man. and to think of a dining-room being called a sally—"
the convent clock struck one.
"now," said i, "stand by."
i held up the lamp, and so turned the darkened part as to produce two flashes. a moment after a tiny flame showed and vanished above the balcony.
"my brave darling!" i exclaimed. "have you the ladder in your hand?"
"ay, sir."
"mind these confounded hooks don't chink."
we stepped across the sward and stood under the balcony.
"grace, my darling, is that you?" i called in a low voice.
"yes, herbert. oh, please be quick. i am fancying i hear footsteps. my heart is scarcely beating for fright."
but despite the tremble in her low, sweet voice my ear seemed to find strength of purpose enough in it to satisfy me that there would be no failure from want of courage on her part. i could just discern the outline of her figure as she leaned over the balcony, and see the white of her face vague as a fancy.
"my darling, lower the line to pull the ladder up with—very softly, my pet—there are iron hooks which make a noise."
in a few moments she called: "i have lowered the line."
i felt about with my hand and grasped the end of it—a piece of twine, but strong enough to support the ladder. the deep, blood-hound-like baying of the dog recommenced, and at the same time i heard a sound of footsteps in the lane.
"hist! not a stir—not a whisper," i breathed out.
it was the staggering step of a drunken man. he broke maudlingly into a song when immediately abreast of us, ceased his noise suddenly and halted. this was a little passage of agony, i can assure you! the dog continued to utter its sullen, deep-throated bark in single strokes like the beat of a bell. presently there was a sound as of the scrambling and crunching of feet, followed with the noise of a lurching tread; the man fell to drunkenly singing to himself again and so passed away up the lane.
caudel fastened the end of the twine to the ladder, and then grunted out: "all ready for hoisting."
"grace, my sweet," i whispered, "do you hear me?"
"distinctly, dearest; but i am so frightened!"
"pull up this ladder softly and hook the irons on to the rim of the balcony."
"blast that dawg!" growled caudel, "dummed if i don't think he smells us."
the ladder went rising into the air.
"it is hooked, herbert."
"all right, caudel, swing off upon the end of it—test it, and then aloft with you for mercy's sake!"
the three metal rungs held the ropes bravely stretched apart. the seaman sprang, and the ladder held as though it had been the shrouds of a man-of-war.
"now, caudel, you are a seaman—you must do the rest," said i.
he had removed his boots, and, mounting with cat-like agility, gained the balcony; then taking my sweetheart in his arms he lifted her over the rail and lowered her with his powerful arms until her little feet were half-way down the ladder. she uttered one or two faint exclamations, but was happily too frightened to cry out.
"now, mr. barclay," hoarsely whispered caudel, "you kitch hold of her, sir."
i grasped the ladder with one hand, and passed my arm round her waist; my stature made the feat an easy one; thus holding her to me i sprang back, then for an instant strained her to my heart with a whisper of joy, gratitude, and encouragement.
"you are as brave as you are true and sweet, grace."
"oh, herbert!" she panted, "i can think of nothing. i am very wicked and feel horribly frightened."
"mr. barclay," softly called caudel from the balcony, "what's to be done with this here ladder?"
"let it be, let it be," i answered. "bear a hand, caudel, and come down."
he was alongside of us in a trice, pulling on his boots. i held my darling's hand, and the three of us made for the hole in the hedge with all possible speed. but the cabbages were very much in the way of grace's dress, and so urgent was the need to make haste that, i believe, in my fashion of helping her, i carried her one way or another more than half the distance across that wide tract of kitchen-garden stuff.
the dog continued to bark. i asked grace if the brute belonged to the house, and she answered yes. there seemed little doubt, from the persistency of the creature's deep delivery, that it scented some sort of mischief going forward, despite its kennel standing some considerable distance away on the other side of the house. i glanced back as caudel was squeezing through the hole—i had told him to go first to make sure that all was right with the aperture, and to receive and help my sweetheart across the ditch—i glanced back, i say, in this brief pause; but the building showed as an impenetrable shadow against the winking brilliance of the sky hovering over and past it rich with the radiance in places of meteoric dust; no light gleamed; the night-hush, deep as death, was upon the château.
in a few moments my captain and i had carefully handed grace through the hole and got her safe in the lane, and off we started, keeping well in the deep gloom cast by the convent wall, walking swiftly, yet noiselessly, and scarcely fetching our breath till we were clear of the lane, with the broad, glimmering st. omer road running in a rise upon our left.
by the aid of the three or four lamps we had passed i managed very early to get a view of my sweetheart, and found that she had warmly robed herself in a fur-trimmed jacket, and that her hat was a sort of turban as though chosen from her wardrobe with a view to her passage through the hole in the hedge. i had her hand under my arm; and pressed and caressed it as we walked. caudel taking the earth with sailorly strides bowled and rolled along at her right, keeping her between us. i spoke to her in hasty sentences, forever praising her for her courage and thanking her for her love, and trying to hearten her; for now that the first desperate step had been taken, now that the wild risks of escape were ended, the spirit that had supported her failed; she could scarcely answer me; at moments she would direct looks over her shoulder; the mere figure of a tree would cause her to tighten her hold of my arm, and press against me as though starting.
"i feel so wicked—i feel that i ought to return—oh! how frightened i am;—how late it is!—what will mam'selle think?—how the girls will talk in the morning!"
i could coax no more than this sort of exclamations from her.
as we passed through the gate in the rampart wall and entered the haute ville, my captain broke the silence he had kept since we quitted the lane.
"how little do the folks who's sleeping in them houses know, mr. barclay, of what's a-passing under their noses. there ain't no sort of innocence like sleep."
he said this and yawned with a noise that resembled a shout.
"this is captain caudel, grace," said i, "the master of the spitfire. his services to-night i shall never forget."
"i am too frightened to thank you, captain caudel," she exclaimed. "i will thank you when i am calm. but shall i ever be calm? and ought i to thank you then?"
"have no fear, miss. this here oneasiness 'll soon pass. i know the yarn—his honour spun it to me. what's been done, and what's yet to do is right and proper, and if it worn't—" his pause was more significant than had he proceeded.
until we reached the harbour we did not encounter a living creature. i could never have imagined of the old town of boulogne that its streets, late even as the hour was, would be so utterly deserted as we found them. i was satisfied with my judgment in not having ordered a carriage. the rattling of the wheels of a vehicle amid the vault-like stillness of those thoroughfares would have been heart-subduing to my mood of passionately nervous anxiety to get on board and away. i should have figured windows flung open and night-capped heads projected, and heard in imagination the clanking sabre of a gendarme trotting in our wake.
i did not breathe freely till the harbour lay before us. caudel said as we crossed to where the flight of steps fell to the water's edge:
"i believe there's a little air of wind amoving."
"i feel it," i answered; "what's its quarter?"
"seems to be off the land," said he.
"there is a man!" cried grace, arresting me by a drag at my arm.
a figure stood at the head of the steps, and i believed it one of our men until a few strides brought us near enough to witness the gleam of uniform buttons, showing by the pale light of a lamp at a short distance from him.
"a douanier," said i. "nothing to be afraid of, my pet."
"but if he should stop us, herbert?" cried she, halting.
"sooner than that should happen," rumbled caudel, "i'd chuck him overboard. but why should he stop us, miss? we ain't smugglers."
"i would rather throw myself into the water than be taken back," exclaimed my sweetheart. i gently induced her to walk, whilst my captain advancing to the edge of the quay and looking down, sang out:
"below there! are ye awake?"
"ay, wide awake," was the answer, floating up in hearty english accents from the cold, dark surface on which the boat lay.
the douanier drew back a few steps; it was impossible to see his face, but his steadfast suspicious regard was to be imagined. i have no doubt he understood exactly what was happening. he asked us the name of our vessel. i answered in french. "the small yacht spitfire lying astern of the folkestone steamer." nothing more passed and we descended the steps.
i felt grace shiver as i handed her into the boat. the harbour water washed black and cold to the dark line of pier and wharf opposite; there was an edge of chill, too, in the distant sound of surf crawling upon the sand, and the wide spread of stars carried the fancy to the broad, black breast of ocean over which they were trembling. the oars dipped, striking a dim cloud of phosphor into the eddies they made; and a few strokes of the blades carried us to the side of the little spitfire. i sprang on to the deck, and lifting my darling through the gangway, called to caudel to make haste to get the boat in and start, for the breeze, that had before been little more than a fancy to me, i could now hear as it brushed the surface of the harbour wall, making the reflection of the large stars in the water alongside twinkle and widen out, and putting a perfume of fresh seaweed into the atmosphere, though the draught, such as it was, came from a malodorous quarter.
i led grace to the little companion hatch, and together we entered the cabin. the lamp burnt brightly; the skylight lay open, and the interior was cool and sweet with several pots of flowers which i had sent aboard in the afternoon. it was a little box of a place, as you will suppose, of a dandy craft of twenty-six tons; but i had not spared my purse in decorating it, and i believe no prettier interior of the kind in a vessel of the size of the spitfire was in those times afloat. there were two sleeping-rooms, one forward and one aft. the after cabin was little better than a hole, and this i occupied. the berth forward, on the other hand, was as roomy as the dimensions of the little ship would allow, and i had taken care that it lacked nothing to render it a pleasant, i may say an elegant, sea bedroom. it was to be grace's until i got her ashore, and this i counted upon managing by the following friday, that is to say in about four days from the date of this night about which i am writing.
she stood at the table looking about her, breathing fast, her eyes large with alarm, excitement, i know not what other sensations and emotions. i wish i knew how to praise her, how to describe her. "sweet" is the best word to express her girlish beauty. though she was three months short of eighteen years of age, she might readily have passed for twenty-one, so womanly was her figure, as though, indeed, she was of tropic breeding and had been reared under suns which quickly ripen a maiden's beauty. but to say more would be to say what? the liquid brown of her large and glowing eyes—the dark and delicate bronze of her rich abundant hair—the suggestion of a pout in the turn of her lip, that gave an incomparable air of archness to her expression when her countenance was in repose—to enumerate these things—to deliver a catalogue of her graces in the most felicitous language that love and the memory of love could dictate, is yet to leave all that i could wish to say unsaid.
"at last, grace!" i exclaimed, lifting her hand to my lips. "how is it with you now, my pet?"
she seated herself, and hid her face in her hands upon the table, saying, "i don't know how i feel, herbert. but i know how i ought to feel."
"wait a little. you will regain your courage. you will find nothing wrong in all this presently. it was bound to happen. there was not the least occasion for this business of rope ladders and midnight sailings. it is lady amelia who forces this elopement upon us."
"what will she say?" she breathed through her fingers, still keeping her face hidden to conceal the crimson that had flushed her on a sudden and that was showing to the rim of her collar.
"do you care? do i care? we have forced her hand, and what can she do? if you were but twenty-one, grace!—and yet i don't know. you would be three years older—three years of sweetness gone for ever! but the old lady will have to give her consent now, and the rest will be for my cousin frank to manage. pray look at me, my sweet one."
"i can't. i am ashamed. it is a most desperate act. what will mam'selle say—and your sailors?" she murmured from behind her hands.
"my sailors! grace, shall i take you back whilst there is yet time?"
she flashed a look at me over her finger tips.
"certainly not!" she exclaimed with emphasis, then hid her face again.
i seated myself by her side, but it took me five minutes to get her to look at me, and another five minutes to coax a smile from her. in this while the men were busy about the decks. i heard caudel's growling lungs of leather delivering orders in a half-stifled hurricane note, but i did not know that we were under way until i put my head through the companion hatch, and saw the dusky fabrics of the piers on either side stealing almost insensibly past us. now that the wide expanse of sky had opened over the land, i could witness a dimness, as of the shadowing of clouds, in the quarter of the sky against which stood the unfinished block of the cathedral. this caused me to reckon upon the wind freshening presently. as it now blew it was a very light air indeed, scarce with weight enough to steady the light cloths of the yacht. there was an unwieldy lump of a french smack slowly grinding her way up the harbour close in against the pier on the port side, and astern of us were the triangular lights of a paddle-wheeled steamer, bound to london, timed for the tide that was now high, and filling the quietude of the night with the noise of the swift beats of revolving wheels.
"mind that steamer!" i called out to caudel, who was at the helm.
she passed us close, noisily shearing through it, with the white water at her stem throbbing like clouds of steam to the paddles, whence the race aft spread far into the gloom astern in a wide wake of yeast; a body of fire broke from her tall chimney and illuminated the long, thick line of smoke like the play of lightning upon the face of a thunder-cloud; her saloon was aglow, and the illuminated portholes went winking past upon the vision as though there lay a coil of flame along the length of the ebony black sides. she swept past and was away, leaving behind her a swell upon which the spitfire tumbled about so violently that i came very near to being thrown out of the hatch in which i was standing. the commotion presently ceased, and by this time we were abreast of the longer of the two pier-heads, clear of the harbour, but i waited still a moment or so to take another view of the night and to send a glance round. undoubtedly the stars shining low down over the old town of boulogne had dimmed greatly within the hour, though they still flashed with brilliance in the direction of the english coast. the surf rolling upon the sand on either side the piers broke with a hollow note that even to my inexperienced ears seemed prophetic of wind.
"what is the weather to be, caudel?" i called to him.
"we're going to get a breeze from the south'ard, sir," he answered; "nothing to harm, i dessay, if it don't draw westerly."
"what is your plan of sailing?"
"can't do better, i think, sir, than stand over for the english coast, and so run down, keeping the ports conveniently aboard."
"do you mark the noise of the surf?"
"ay, sir, that's along of this here ground swell."
i had hardly till this moment noticed the movement to which he referred. the swell was long and light, setting in flowing rounds of shadow dead on to the boulogne shore, too rhythmically gentle to take the attention.
i re-entered the cabin, and found my sweetheart with her elbows on the table and her cheeks resting in her hands. the blush had scarcely faded from her face when i had quitted her; now she was as white as a lily.
"why do you leave me alone, herbert?" she asked, turning her dark, liquid eyes upon me without shifting the posture of her head.
"my dearest, i wish to see our little ship clear of boulogne harbour. we shall be getting a pleasant breeze presently, and it cannot blow too soon to please us. a brisk fair wind should land us at our destination in three days, and then—and then—" said i, sitting down and bringing her to me.
she laid her cheek on my shoulder but said nothing.
"now," i exclaimed, "you are of course faint and wretched for the want of refreshments. what can i get you?" and i was about to give her a list of the wines and eatables i had laid in, but she languidly shook her head, as it rested on my shoulder, and faintly bade me not to speak of refreshments.
"i should like to lie down," she said.
"you are tired—worn out," i exclaimed, not yet seeing how it was with her; "yonder is your cabin. i believe you will find all you want in it. unhappily we have no maid aboard to help you. but you will be able to manage, grace—it is but for a day or two; and if you are not perfectly happy and comfortable, why, we will make for the nearest english port and finish the rest of the journey by rail. but our little yacht—"
"i must lie down," she interrupted; "this dreadful motion!—get me a pillow and a rug; i will lie on this sofa."
i could have heaped a hundred injurious names upon my head for not at once observing that the darling was suffering. i sprang from her side, hastily procured a pillow and rug, removed her hat, plunged afresh into her cabin for some eau de cologne and went to work to bathe her brow and to minister to her in other ways. to be afflicted with nausea in the most romantic passage of one's life! i had never thought of inquiring whether or not she was a "good sailor," as it is called, being much too sentimental, much, too much in love to be visited by misgivings or conjectures in a direction so horribly prosaic as this.
i thought to comfort her by saying that if her sufferings continued we would head direct for dover or some adjacent harbour. but, somehow, my scheme of elopement having comprised a yachting trip, the programme of it had grown into a habit of thought with me. for weeks i had been looking forward to the trip with the impassioned eagerness of a lover, delighting my mind with the fancy of having my sweetheart all to myself in a sense that no excursion on shore could possibly parallel. on shore there would be the rude conditions of the railway, the cab, the hotel, and all the vulgarity of dispatch when in motion. but the yacht gave my heart's trick of idealising a chance. the quiet surface of sea—i was too much in love to think of a gale of wind; the glories of the sunset; the new moon; the hushed night; we two on deck; our impassioned whispers set to music by the brook-like murmurings of waters alongside; the silken fannings of phantom-like pinions of canvas; the subdued voices of the men forward... yes! it was of these things i had thought; these were the engaging, the delightful fancies that had filled my brain.
nor, in this candid narrative which, i trust, will carry its own apology for our audacious behaviour as it progresses, must i omit to give the chief reason for my choice of a yacht as a means of eloping with grace. she was under twenty-one; her aunt, lady amelia roscoe, was her guardian, and no clergyman would marry the girl to me without her aunt's consent. that consent must be wrested from the old lady, and the business of wresting manifestly implies a violent measure; and what then, as i somewhat boyishly concluded, could follow our lonely association at sea for three or four days, or perhaps a week, but her ladyship's sanction?
a man, in describing his own passion, and in depicturing himself making love, cannot but present a foolish figure. unhappily, this story solely concerns my elopement with grace bellassys and what came of it, and, therefore, it is in the strictest sense a tale of love: a description of which sentiment, however, as it worked in me and my dearest girl, i will endeavour to trouble you as little as possible with.
