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Suddenly he was met by a cry of Qui va la! and he stopped short at the point of Elie Mattingley's bayonet. "Hush!" said Ranulph, and gave his name. Mattingley nearly dropped his musket in surprise. He soon knew the tale of Ranulph's misfortunes, but he had not yet been told of his present plans when there came a quick footstep, and Carterette was at her father's side.
He fell back from the edge to a place in the grass where, tying the rope round his body, and seating himself, he could brace his feet against a ledge of rock. Then he pulled on the rope. It was round Carterette's waist! Carterette had told her falsehood without shame, for she was of those to whom the end is more than the means. She began climbing, and Ranulph pulled steadily.
If he had but known it, that very morning as he passed Mattingley's house Ranulph had looked down at him with infinite scorn and loathing but with triumph too, for the Chevalier had just shown him a certain page in a certain parish-register long lost, left with him by Carterette Mattingley. Philip knew naught of Ranulph save the story babbled by the islanders.
Carterette was quick of instinct in her way, but yet she had not seen any marked change in her friend during the past few months. She had been so busy thinking of her own particular secret that she was not observant of others. At times she met Ranulph, and then she was uplifted, to be at once cast down again; for she saw that his old cheerfulness was gone, that a sombreness had settled on him.
"Guess who's wrote me a letter?" she asked of Guida, who had taken up some sewing, and was now industriously regarding the stitches. At Carterette's question, Guida looked up and said with a smile, "Some one you like, I see." Carterette laughed gaily. "Ba su, I should think I did in a way. But what's his name? Come, guess, Ma'm'selle Dignity."
There were no affecting messages; they understood each other. He knew that when it was possible she would never fail to come to the mark where he was concerned, and she had equal faith in him. So the letter was sealed, addressed with flourishes, he was proud of his handwriting, and handed to the chaplain for Carterette. He had scarcely drunk his coffee when there was a roll of drums outside.
Carterette took no note, but said to Ranulph: "Of course he had to pilot the Frenchmen back, or they'd have killed him, and it'd done no good to refuse. He was the first man that fought the French on the day of the battle, wasn't he? I've always heard that." Unconsciously she was building up a defence for Olivier Delagarde. She was, as it were, anticipating insinuation from other quarters.
But he struggled on and on, and at last reached a sort of flying pinnacle of rock, like a hook for the shields of the gods. Here he ventured to look below, expecting to see Carterette, but there was only the white sand, and no sound save the long wash of the gulf. He drew a horn of arrack from his pocket and drank.
Elie Mattingley, pirate, smuggler, and sometime master of a privateer, had had dealings with people high and low in the island, and they had not always, nor often, been conducted in the open Vier Marchi. Fifteen years ago he used to have his little daughter Carterette always beside him when he sold his wares. Philip wondered what had become of her.
He took the sight once more coolly, then blew on the match. Now the girl was within thirty feet of the gun. He quickly blew on the match again, and fired. When the smoke cleared away he saw that the gun was dismounted, and not ten feet from it stood Carterette looking at it dazedly. He heard a laugh behind him.
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