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Once again he caught Pierre hard by the shoulder, then ran to the cliff and swung down the ladder. All at once there shot through Pierre’s body an impulse, and his eyes lighted with excitement. He sprang towards the cliff. “Gaspard, come back!” he called; then paused, and, with an enigmatical smile, shrugged his shoulders, drew back, and waited.

The vessel was hove to outside the bay, as if hesitating. Brigond was considering whether it were better, with his scant chart, to attempt the bay, or to take small boats and make for the shore. He remembered the reefs, but he did not know of the needle of rock. Presently he saw Gaspard’s boat coming. “Someone who knows the bay,” he said; “I see a hut on the cliff.”

“Hello, who are you?” Brigond called down as Gaspard drew alongside.

“A Hudson’s Bay Company’s man,” answered Gaspard.

“How many are there of you?”

“Myself alone.”

“Can you pilot us in?”

“I know the way.”

“Come up.”

Gaspard remembered Brigond, and he veiled his eyes lest the hate he felt should reveal him. No one could have recognised him as the young pilot of twenty years before. Then his face was cheerful and bright, and in his eye was the fire of youth. Now a thick beard and furrowing lines hid all the look of the past. His voice, too, was desolate and distant.

Brigond clapped him on the shoulder. “How long have you lived off there?” he asked, as he jerked his finger towards the shore.

“A good many years.”

“Did anything strange ever happen there?” Gaspard felt his heart contract again, as it did when Brigond’s hand touched his shoulder.

“Nothing strange is known.”

A vicious joy came into Brigond’s face. His fingers opened and shut. “Safe, by the holy heaven!” he grunted.

“‘By the holy heaven!'” repeated Gaspard, under his breath.

They walked forward. Almost as they did so there came a big puff of wind across the bay: one of those sudden currents that run in from the ocean and the gulf stream. Gaspard saw, and smiled. In a moment the vessel’s nose was towards the bay, and she sailed in, dipping a shoulder to the sudden foam. On she came past reef and bar, a pretty tumbril to the slaughter. The spray feathered up to her sails, the sun caught her on deck and beam; she was running dead for the needle of rock.

Brigond stood at Gaspard’s side. All at once Gaspard made the sacred gesture and said, in a low tone, as if only to himself: “Pardon, mon capitaine, mon Jesu!” Then he turned triumphantly, fiercely, upon Brigond. The pirate was startled. “What’s the matter?” he said.

Not Gaspard, but the needle rock replied. There was a sudden shock; the vessel stood still and shivered; lurched, swung shoulder downwards, reeled and struggled. Instantly she began to sink.

“The boats! lower the boats!” cried Brigond. “This cursed fool has run us on a rock!”

The waves, running high, now swept over the deck. Brigond started aft, but Gaspard sprang before him. “Stand back!” he called. “Where you are you die!”

Brigond, wild with terror and rage, ran at him. Gaspard caught him as he came. With vast strength he lifted him and dashed him to the deck. “Die there, murderer!” he cried.

Brigond crouched upon the deck, looking at him with fearful eyes. “Who-are you?” he asked.

“I am Gaspard the pilot. I have waited for you twenty years. Up there, in the snow, my wife and child died. Here, in this bay, you die.”

There was noise and racketing behind them, but they two heard nothing. The one was alone with his terror, the other with his soul. Once, twice, thrice, the vessel heaved, then went suddenly still.

Gaspard understood. One look at his victim, then he made the sacred gesture again, and folded his arms. Pierre, from the height of the cliff, looking down, saw the vessel dip at the bow, and then the waters divided and swallowed it up.

“Gaspard should have lived,” he said. “But–who can tell! Perhaps Mamette was waiting for him.”