The Launching of Roger Brook

'I'm shortly going into the Navy, Sir,' Roger replied promptly. 'And I came on this trip to try out my sea legs.'

' 'Tis strange company to find a young gentleman in,' Nixon frowned. 'I'll make no accusations I can't prove: but if there's con­traband in the vessel next time I board her 'twill be my duty to take you, if you're among her crew, and charge you with the rest.'

Roger flushed slightly as he lied: 'I'm sure Dan Izzard and his men intend nothing illegal, Sir.'

'I am entitled to my doubts of that, and if you're here for a lark it has lasted long enough. If 'tis no more than a sea trip you sought come with me, and I'll give you passage home.'

'Thanks, Sir, but I've never been abroad and I'm all agog to see Le Havre, so, if you'll excuse me, I prefer to stay with Dan.'

'Unless my wits deceive me, should you remain aboard the Albatross there's a chance of you finding yourself in a French galley instead of seeing Le Havre. Come now! Come home with me, and let me earn your mother's gratitude.'

Roger did not fully take in the meaning of this allusion to a French galley and, even had he done so, it seemed to him now that so much depended on his being able to land in France, that it is doubtful if he would have allowed the warning to influence him. As it was he simply shook his head and said again: 'Thanks, Sir, but I prefer to stay with Dan.'

Nixon shrugged his broad shoulders. 'So be it then; but I fear you'll have cause to repent of your folly before you're much older.'

With a curt nod to Dan he went over the snip's side, followed by his man, and a moment later the gig's crew were giving way lustily as they pulled him back to the Expedition.

The sails of the Albatross were re-set and, leaving the Revenue cutter behind, she was soon skimming over the water towards the French coast once more.

A little belatedly, and uneasily now, Roger was thinking over Mr. Nixon's sinister remark, that he might find himself in a French galley instead of seeing Le Havre. If Dan had a cargo of Lymington salt aboard it was obviously destined for France. The French, so Roger had heard, were forced to pay an exceptionally high price for this simple commodity, owing to an exorbitant tax that their king had put upon it. The tax was called the gabelle, and was one of the French people's principle reasons for discontent against the monarchy. Since Dan had for years earned his living by smuggling illicit spirits into England it seemed most unlikely that he would willingly pay a heavy import duty in order to land a cargo of salt in France.

Having reached the conclusion that Dan contemplated making a big illegal profit at both ends of his trip, Roger was not particularly perturbed by the additional risk in which he had unwittingly involved himself, because Dan had for so many years proved himself a capable and canny smuggler, but he became extremely worried at the thought that the Albatross might both unload her cargo of salt and take on a new one of spirits in some secluded cove, and not enter the port of Le Havre at all.

Striving to conceal his new anxiety he went up to Dan and asked: 'What time should we make Le Havre, Dan?'

'First light to-morrow morning, all bein' well, lad,' Dan replied quite casually. 'We've a rendezvous, as the Frenchies call it, wi' some friends o' mine farther down the coast to-night. Then we beats up channel to the port to pick up our nice drop o' liquor, an' sails for home at dusk.'

This was highly reassuring, and Roger smothered a sigh of relief, as it now seemed clear that they were not only really going to Le Havre, but that he would have the whole day in which to go ashore and dispose of his jewels.

'Do the French Preventives give you much trouble?' he asked after a moment.

'Nay. They's nothin' nigh so smart as our chaps, nor so numerous. 'Tis good money for old rope so long as 'e don't fall foul o' one o' they's men o' war. Look, lad! Dq'st see the dark streak on the horizon, yonder? 'Tis the coast of France.'

All else forgotten, Roger picked up Dan's spy-glass and, glueing his eye to it, endeavoured to make out the features of that strange land where lived England's traditional enemies, and of which he had heard so much.

Occasionally Dan glanced over his shoulder at Mr. Nixon's cutter. He had thought that after boarding him she would put back towards England, if only temporarily, but to his annoyance she continued to follow in the wake of the Albatross under three-quarter sail. Now, as he luffed and brought the schooner round on to a westward course so that she should run down the Normandy coast while still some miles distant from it, the cutter ignored his action and, somewhat to his surprise, continued on a course towards Le Havre.

Soon after this they took their evening meal, and when Roger came on deck again the cutter had disappeared from sight. But now they were considerably nearer the French coast and here and there could see small craft working their way along it.

About nine o'clock, just as the summer dusk was beginning to fall, they discerned twenty or thirty dots on the horizon astern, which Dan said were the Le Havre fishing fleet putting out to sea. Roger watched them idly through the spy-glass for a while. They too, seemed tu be on a westward course as, although they grew no larger, they did not drop from view; and one of them that seemed to be much larger than the rest even appeared to be gaining on the Albatross.

He was just about to draw Dan's attention to this bigger ship when he was distracted by the smuggler giving orders for the lowering of the main and fore sails; as they had now come opposite that part of the coast where he had his rendezvous and he intended to lay off there until full darkness would cover his landing operation.

When Roger looked through the glass again he saw that not one but two of the ships in the fishing fleet were of different build and, clearly now, much larger than the rest. Both had detached themselves from the scattered line of dots and were coming on ahead of them under full sail. Running over to Dan he pointed them out to him.

Dan took the glass and studied them for a moment. ' 'Tis two traders, what have sailed out o' Le Havre on the tide, like as not,' he declared. 'But take the glass, lad, and keep 'e's eye upon they.'

Again Roger focused the two oncoming ships for a few moments. There seemed something vaguely familiar about the rig of the smaller of the two, and suddenly he recognised her.

'The smaller one,' he cried, ' 'Tis Mr. Nixon's cutter.'

Dan snatched the telescope from him. 'Aye, lad, 'e's right!' he grunted. 'What devil's work would he be up to now? And what be other craft? Hi! Fred Mullins! What make 'e of yon ship? The bigger o' the two.'

The ex-naval rating took the glass and, steadying it against a stay, took a long look at the approaching ships. Identification was not easy, owing to the falling twilight and the fact that the stranger craft being dead astern only her bows and fore sails were visible.

'She's a Frenchie,' he muttered. 'And if I mistake not, a thirty-six gun frigate.'

'God's death!' swore Dan. ' 'Tis as I feared. That bastard Nixon has betrayed us. Just think on it. What sort o' Englishman is he who would bring the Frogs upon us, an' send we to a daily floggin' in they's galleys. Avast, there! Avast! Up sail an' away.'

Instantly every member of the crew flung himself into feverish activity. To be caught smuggling contraband into England was one thing, except on overwhelming evidence no bench of magistrates would convict; to be captured by the French quite another—it meant a hideous and long drawn-out death, rotting in chains shackled to an oar, in one of the French war galleys. In a bare ten minutes every sail the schooner could carry was set and she was standing out to sea, their one hope now being to escape in the gathering darkness.

As the light deepened they watched their pursuers with terrible anxiety. Both ships had altered course and were now beating sea­ward on lines converging with that of the schooner in the hope of cutting her off. The frigate and the Expedition were both faster ships than their prey and it was soon perceptible that they were gaining on her.

Roger prayed for darkness as he had never prayed before, yet it seemed that the long summer twilight scarcely deepened and that night would never fall. Dan stood grimly by the wheel getting every ounce of way out of the schooner of which she was capable. His crew had wrenched aside her hatches and, working like madmen, were now jettisoning her cargo, in the hope that if they could only get all the great blocks of salt overboard before the frigate came up with her they would be able to show a hold free of contraband.

As Roger lent a hand, he kept an anxious eye on the frigate. Staggering under the weight of one of the blocks he was just about to tip it overboard when he saw a little cloud of white smoke issue from her fo'c'sle head. A moment later he heard a sharp report. He did not see the shot but guessed that their pursuer had fired a round