Chapter XIX: The Convict

If, on leaving Lymington River, the _Kestrel_ hadn’t run on the mud; if the tide had not changed and the wind fallen light; and if the _Merlin_ had not run out of petrol: then the Sea Scouts might have found themselves at the rendezvous for the Jamboree at eight o’clock that evening.

It was a combination of adverse circumstances. Running the _Kestrel_ aground was excusable but hardly avoidable. Many a yachtsman with local knowledge has done much the same, for the beacons, instead of marking the edge of the channel, are some distance away from it and well up on the mud. The _Kestrel_ “took the putty” badly and, in spite of the _Merlin’s_ efforts to tow her off, she remained there for nearly two hours.

The change of the direction of the tidal stream and the dropping of the wind, which finally backed to due east, were conditions for which the Sea Scouts could not be held responsible; but the same could not be said in excuse for the _Merlin_ running out of petrol.

As a matter of fact, the Sea Scout in charge of the motor had examined the gauge of the petrol tank, which registered eight gallons. Unfortunately the indicator had stuck, and the actual amount when the _Merlin_ went to her consort’s assistance was only one gallon. It was now _nil_.

This discovery was made when the two yachts were abreast of Egypt Point and within a mile or so of Cowes Harbour. In vain they attempted to beat up for that anchorage. Gripped by the steadily increasing foul tide they were rapidly swept down the Solent until, realising that any further efforts would only result in their being carried more to the west’ard, they dropped anchor off Newtown River.

“There’s a hamlet called Newtown and another place called Shalfleet,” observed Mr. Pendennis, after consulting the chart. “We may be able to get petrol at one of them. Are any of your fellows coming ashore with us?”

“We may as well go if we leave a couple of hands to look after the yachts,” replied Mr. Grant. “The glass is steady and the tide won’t change for another five hours. It’s good holding ground, and there’s no fear of either craft dragging her anchor. Right-o! Who’ll volunteer to remain?”

Craddock and Heavitree offered to act as ship-keepers. Two Cornish Sea Scouts also elected to stay on board the _Merlin_. The others manned the two dinghies and prepared to make for the mouth of the river.

“How about Molly?” asked Brandon. “Shall we take her?”

The pup showed such a disinclination to go in the boat that she was left behind. Usually she was quite excited at the sight of the dinghy being manned, and was one of the first to scramble over the gunwale. But that was only when Craddock was to form one of the party. She was fond of everyone on board, even Eric Little; but she was devoted to Peter. Where he went she would go, but if he remained on board it required forcible abduction to get the pup into the boat.

Left to themselves, Craddock and Heavitree had quite an enjoyable afternoon. They fished, exchanged semaphore and Morse messages with the _Merlin’s_ ship-keepers, wrote letters, and watched passing shipping.

Six o’clock came, but there were no signs of the two dinghies. The Sea Scouts had tea, washed up and stowed away the things, and came on deck again. Still the absent members of the two crews failed to put in an appearance.

“What’s happened to the others?” asked Peter, hailing the _Merlin_.

“Perhaps they can’t find a garage or a place where they sell petrol,” replied one of the Falmouth lads. “I’ve been aloft to look, but there’s only a small part of the harbour to be seen. It runs away behind that hill to the right of the entrance.”

“More likely they are high and dry on the mud,” added Heavitree. “Ah, well! We aren’t lonely, and we aren’t idle. I’ve caught enough fish for supper for all hands.”

“If they are aground they can hardly be blamed for that,” continued the Cornish Sea Scout. “These tides are fair puzzlers. Down our way we’re satisfied with two tides a day; here people get four.”

Craddock agreed. It was his first experience of the coast between Cowes and Weymouth, where a second high water follows the first at anything from two to four hours later. He had also been used to a rise and fall of about eighteen feet. Here the range of tide seemed to be about six feet.

At sunset the main ebb was almost done. The _Kestrel_, anchored nearer in shore than the _Merlin_, was within fifty yards of the now exposed gravel banks. Taking soundings, Peter found that the depth was a fathom and a half.

“So we won’t ground at low tide,” he remarked to his chum. “There’s nothing to worry about. Let’s go below and make ourselves snug. It’s pretty nippy this evening.”

Having lighted the riding-lamp and hoisted it on the forestay the two lads retired to the saloon. Soon they were making a literary feast, devouring the pages of their favourite weekly paper. Breathlessly they followed the fearfully exciting adventures. The flight of time passed unheeded. They had almost forgotten their immediate surroundings in visualising a stalwart sergeant riding hot-foot across the boundless prairie in close pursuit of a much-wanted desperado.

Suddenly, Molly gave a low growl.

“Quiet, little girl!” exclaimed Peter.

But the pup refused to keep still. Clambering up the three broad steps leading from the saloon to the cockpit, she changed her growl to a succession of shrill barks of defiance.

“What’s up, I wonder?” remarked Heavitree, coming back to earth, or rather to his floating home. “Are the others returning?”

“Don’t think so,” replied Peter, preparing to go on deck. “Molly’s welcome is very different from that.”

On gaining the cockpit Craddock stared in bewilderment. It was some moments before he grew accustomed to the change from the well lighted cabin to the faint moonlight. When he did he was all the more puzzled, for, instead of land showing a few hundred yards to starboard, there was nothing but an expanse of sea dotted with the flashing light of numerous buoys. Then he looked to port. There was the land—the low-lying ground to the east of the entrance of Newtown River. He had completely ignored the fact that the _Kestrel_ had swung to the young flood tide.

“What is it, Molly?” he asked.

The pup, crouching with her forepaws planted against the low rail, was barking furiously at a dark object floating in the water at less than ten yards from the yacht’s bows. In the faint moonlight Craddock saw that it was a basket drifting bottom upwards.

“That’s nothing, pup,” declared the lad. “Haven’t you seen a drifting basket before?”

But Molly would not be silenced. She seemed to be fascinated by the derelict wickerwork.

Then Craddock began to be interested, too. And for a very good reason: the basket was not drifting with the tide. It was moving decidedly against it and slowly yet surely approaching the _Kestrel’s_ bows.

“Come on deck, old man,” said Peter to his chum, in a low voice; but Heavitree, who had resumed his absorbing pastime, either did not hear or did not want to.

Presently the basket disappeared from Peter’s range of vision. From where he was standing in the cockpit he could not see the surface of the water in the vicinity of the yacht’s bows. He heard the rasping of the wickerwork against the _Kestrel’s_ side, and once more the basket appeared in view, bobbing astern and now drifting naturally with the tide.

Molly’s bark grew louder and shriller. She had lost all interest in the basket and was directing her attention to something under the bows.

Before Craddock could go for’ard to investigate, the dripping head and shoulders of a man appeared above the rail. Then, obtaining a foothold on the bobstay, the intruder swung himself on the fore-deck, stood up, and steadied himself by means of the forestay.

“Get that there dawg of yourn out of it afore I ’as to ’urt it,” he growled.

In the semi-darkness the stranger seemed to tower to a great height. Actually he was well over six feet, though narrow across the chest. He was clean-shaven, and wore an overcoat that was many inches too short for him. He was bare-legged, and it looked as if he were wearing shorts. Water drained steadily from his meagre and saturated garments.

“Come here, Molly!” exclaimed Peter, fearful lest the intruder should carry out the alternative he had mentioned.

The pup still refused.

The man, stooping suddenly, grasped the animal by the scruff of the neck and stepped aft as far as the mainmast.

“Ketch!” he said laconically. “Don’t want to ’urt no dawg, I don’t.”

With that he tossed the pup into Craddock’s hands, throwing her so gently that, beyond being frightened, no harm was done to her.

“Naw,” continued the intruder, “me an’ you are goin’ for a nice little cruise-like. ’Tain’t no use kickin’. I’ve been a-watchin’ yer, an’ I knows there’s only two of you. Ask for no trouble an’ you’ll get none. Got me?”

Just then Heavitree, hearing voices, was about to come on deck. To him Peter handed the pup.

“Lock her up and get back here as soon as you can,” he whispered.

Then he addressed the intruder. Already he had no doubt as to the fellow’s identity. The ill-fitting overcoat failed to conceal a rough suit of grey cloth liberally bedecked with broad arrows. Obviously this was the convict under sentence for robbery with violence, and in all probability he would not hesitate to take desperate measures to prolong his spell of liberty. Yet, Peter recalled, he had been gentle with a dumb animal even though Molly had attempted to snap at his gnarled fingers.

“What do you want?” demanded the Sea Scout. “It’s no use coming here.”

“Isn’t it, my young pal?” replied the convict. “That’s for me to say. Now look ’ere: all I want is a bite o’ food an’ summat to drink. Then I’ll trouble you to ’and over any clothes belongin’ to that tall bloke I seed go ashore this arternoon. Then you’ll put me across t’other side an’ you’ll get my best thanks. If you don’t——’Ere, you, get down out of it. You won’t be wanted this trip.”

The latter remarks were addressed to Heavitree, who having placed Molly out of harm’s way had come out of the saloon to “join in the argument,” as he expressed it. Far from complying with the convict’s demands he went to stand beside Craddock and unobtrusively unshipped a heavy belaying-pin. “Get out of it!” repeated the convict. Heavitree raising his arm resolutely remained where he was. Craddock gave one glance in the direction of the _Merlin_. No one was to be seen on her deck. More than likely her two ship-keepers were amusing themselves below. In any case, there was not much likelihood of help in that direction. The two Sea Scouts on the Cornish yacht were without a dinghy, and being further out in the tideway, they would run a serious risk of being carried away if they attempted to swim to the aid of their brother-Scouts on the _Kestrel_. If Peter and Heavitree were to “win through,” they would evidently have to do so on their own merits.

Realising this, Craddock picked up the boat-hook which was lying on the waterways by the side of the cockpit coaming. It was a formidable weapon, consisting of about eight feet of stout ash pole terminating in a combined point and hook of galvanised iron.

Armed resistance was one of the last things the miscreant had counted upon. He had staked his chances upon the likelihood of being able to overawe a couple of lads, but he had failed to estimate correctly the physical and moral fibre of the average Sea Scout. As a general rule, the burglar who employs brute force when dealing with a weak and terrified householder is an arrant coward, easily terrified when threatened with corporal punishment. When he finds that “the game is up,” he will refrain from violence because he knows that on conviction his sentence will be far heavier than if he had contented himself solely with ordinary house-breaking. On the other hand, if he thinks he can get clear he will not hesitate to stun or wound the person who attempts his capture.

The convict hesitated. He did not like the look of the business end of the boat-hook, the staff of which was held in a pair of firm, steady hands. Nor did he relish the probability of a crack across the head from the serviceable lump of iron which Heavitree gripped in readiness.

“Be reasonable, chums!” he whined. “’Ere’s a pore bloke wrongfully convicted who’s got a chance to get clear. Be sports an’ give him a ’elping ’and.”

“We will,” agreed Peter grimly. “We’ll give the police a helping hand, so you’d better surrender and give no further trouble.”

“S’pose I’d better,” rejoined the convict sullenly. “I sees myself back in quod, ’cause ’ere come your pals in their boat.”

Instinctively the two Sea Scouts turned their heads to follow the direction of the crafty rogue’s glance. It was exactly what the convict hoped they would do.

In a trice he leapt across the cabin-top. Before Peter could recover his guard the fellow was within the wavering point of the boat-hook. The next instant he grasped Heavitree’s right wrist, rendering the belaying-pin useless as a weapon either of defence or offence.

But there was one thing he forgot. Accustomed to having a dry and comparatively unyielding solid ground, he was quite unused to the motion of a vessel. Even a forty-foot yacht responds perceptibly to the weight of a person moving on deck. In his wild onslaught he lost his balance. His bare feet slipped on the wet painted canvas of the cabin-top. He fell heavily, bringing Heavitree down with him.

In vain Heavitree tried to get in his terrible upper cut to the point. The convict’s face seemed as if it were made of metal. He gave a grunt as the Sea Scout’s fist jolted his chin, then with a quick movement his fingers closed upon the lad’s throat.

For a moment Craddock was unable to distinguish friend from foe in the deep shadows of the cockpit. Then he heard his chum’s choking cry as he gasped for breath. Snatching another belaying-pin from the rack, Peter brought the iron bar down with considerable force upon the back of the convict’s closely cropped head.

The man seemed to crumple up. He subsided inertly across the body of the Sea Scout he had tried to choke into insensibility.

Extricating Heavitree from his decidedly unpleasant situation, Peter set his chum down upon one of the seats in the cockpit. For several minutes, Heavitree could do nothing but gasp, swallowing mouthfuls of the pure ozone-laden air, until his companion grew alarmed.

“It’s all right, I think,” spluttered Heavitree. “I don’t think I’m hurt much, but I feel like a jelly. What’s happened to the chap? You haven’t killed him?”

“Hardly,” replied Peter. “His skull is too thick for that. I gave him a tap to quiet him. Hello! more of them?”

A pair of hands appeared over the side of the yacht, followed by a head. It was one of the crew of the _Merlin_. Alarmed by the commotion on board the _Kestrel_, he had boldly dived overboard and swum to the aid of his brother-Scouts. It was a risky thing to do, and by the time he had battled against the strong flood tide he was nearly exhausted. Peter assisted the lad on board and explained matters.

“My word!” exclaimed the Cornish lad. “This is some trip! We can’t say the voyage has been dull, can we? Cheerful looking fellow, isn’t he? Hadn’t we better secure him before he comes round?”

“He looks as if he is about to recover consciousness,” said Peter.

“In that case we’ll get busy,” rejoined the _Merlin’s_ representative. “There’s no need to lash him up. Let me show you how we do things down our way.”

So saying, the Cornish Sea Scout picked up the mop which was lying on deck.

“Got another stick like this?” he asked.

Craddock produced a spare handle from one of the lockers.

“Capital!” exclaimed the other approvingly, and set to work to secure the still insensible man. This he did by inserting one handle in one leg of the convict’s shorts and passing lashings round both the knee and the ankle. The other leg was dealt with similarly, with the result that one end of each mop handle projected about six inches beyond the man’s feet, while, since he would be unable to bend his lower limbs, he would be unable to rise.

“We’ll secure his wrists later,” remarked the Cornish lad. “We must give the fellow a chance to recover.”

“Hello!” exclaimed Heavitree. “Oars!”

The others listened intently. Above the gentle sighing of the wind in the yacht’s rigging came the sound of the regular beats of oars. The long-absent Sea Scouts with their respective Scoutmasters were returning.

“Got any grub ready, Peter?” shouted Brandon, when within hailing distance. “We’re famishing.”

“Sorry, old son,” replied Craddock, “but we’ve been too busy entertaining. Matter of fact, sir,” he continued, addressing Mr. Grant, “we’ve a convict on board. What shall we do with him?”