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“Forgive me, old chap!” he said. “After all, I’ve got the hardest part.”

Fisher’s face softened.

“I’m sorry, boy,” he said, and took the proffered hand.

“I’ll clear out to-morrow,” Charlie said. “You’ll forget this foolery of mine?” gripping Fisher’s hand hard for a moment.

Fisher did not answer him. He struck him instead a sounding blow on the shoulder, and Charlie turned away satisfied. He had played a difficult game with considerable skill. That it had been a losing game did not at the moment enter into his calculations. He had not played for his own stakes.

IX

“Jove! It’s a wild night,” said Archie Croft comfortably, as he stretched out his legs to the smoking-room fire. “What’s become of Charlie? He doesn’t usually retire early.”

“I don’t believe he has retired,” said Bertie Richmond sleepily. “I saw him go out something over an hour ago.”

“Out?” said Croft. “What on earth for?”

“Up to some fool trick or other, no doubt,” said Fisher from the smoking-room sofa.

“Hullo, Fisher! I thought you were asleep,” said Bertie. “You ought to be. It’s after midnight. Time we all turned in if we mean to start early with the guns to-morrow.”

Croft stretched himself and rose leisurely.

“It’s a positively murderous night!” he remarked, strolling to the window. “There must be a tremendous sea.”

He drew aside the blind, staring at the blackness that seemed to press against the pane. A moment later, with a sharp exclamation, he ripped back the blind and flung the window wide open. An icy spout of rain and snow whirled into the room. Richmond turned round to expostulate, but was met by a face of such wild excitement that his protest remained unuttered.

“I saw a rocket!” Croft declared.

“Oh, rats!” murmured Fisher.

“It isn’t rats!” he said indignantly. “It’s a ship down among those infernal rocks. I’m off to see what’s doing.”

“Hi! Wait a minute!” exclaimed his host, starting up. “You are perfectly certain, are you, Croft? No humbug? I heard no report.”

“Who could hear anything in a gale like this?” returned Croft impatiently. “Yes, of course, I am certain. Are you coming?”

“I must send a man on horseback to the life-boat station,” said Bertie, starting towards the door. “It’s two miles round the headland. They may not know there is anything up.”

He was out of the room with the words. The rest of the men in the smoking-room followed. Fisher remained to shut the window. He stood a couple of seconds before it, facing the hurricane. The night was like pitch. The angry roar of the sea half-a-mile away surged up on the tearing gale like the voice of a devouring monster. He turned away into the cosy room and followed the others.

The whole party went out into the raging night. They groped their way after Bertie to the stables. A groom was dispatched on horseback to the life-boat station. Lanterns were then procured, and, with the blast full in their teeth, they fought their way to the shore.

Here were darkness and desolation unspeakable. The tide was high. Great waves, flashing white through the darkness, came smiting through the rocks as if they would rend the very surface of the earth apart. The clouds scurrying overhead uncovered a star or two and instantly drew together in impenetrable darkness.

Down by the sea-wall that protected the little village nestling between the cliffs and the sea they found a knot of men and women. A short distance away in the boiling tumult there shone a shifting light, but between it and the shore the storm-god held undisputed possession.

“That’s her!” explained one of the men to Bertie Richmond. “She’s sunk right down in them rocks, sir. It’s a little schooner. I see her masts a-stickin’ up just now.”

The man was one of his own gardeners. He yelled his information into Bertie’s ear with great enjoyment.

“Have you sent to the lifeboat chaps?” shouted Bertie.

“Young gentleman went an hour ago,” came the answer. “But they are off on another job to Mulworth, t’other side of the station. He wanted us to go out in a fishing-boat. But no one ‘ud go. He be gone for a bit o’ rope now. You see, sir, them rocks ‘ud dash a boat to pieces like a bit o’ eggshell. There’s only three chaps aboard as far as we could see awhile ago. And not a hundred yards off us. But it’s a hundred yards of death, as you might say. No boat could live through it. It ain’t worth the trying.”