Richard took his place beside the weather rigging.
Except for the ship’s own lantern, and for
some lights in Shoreby town, that were already fading
to leeward, the whole world of air was as black as
in a pit. Only from time to time, as the Good
Hope swooped dizzily down into the valley of the rollers,
a crest would break—a great cataract of
snowy foam would leap in one instant into being—and,
in an instant more, would stream into the wake and
vanish.
Many of the men lay holding on and praying aloud;
many more were sick, and had crept into the bottom,
where they sprawled among the cargo. And what
with the extreme violence of the motion, and the continued
drunken bravado of Lawless, still shouting and singing
at the helm, the stoutest heart on board may have
nourished a shrewd misgiving as to the result.
But Lawless, as if guided by an instinct, steered
the ship across the breakers, struck the lee of a
great sandbank, where they sailed for awhile in smooth
water, and presently after laid her alongside a rude,
stone pier, where she was hastily made fast, and lay
ducking and grinding in the dark.
The pier was not far distant from the house in which
Joanna lay; it now only remained to get the men on
shore, to surround the house with a strong party,
burst in the door and carry off the captive.
They might then regard themselves as done with the
Good Hope; it had placed them on the rear of their
enemies; and the retreat, whether they should succeed
or fail in the main enterprise, would be directed
with a greater measure of hope in the direction of
the forest and my Lord Foxham’s reserve.
To get the men on shore, however, was no easy task;
many had been sick, all were pierced with cold; the
promiscuity and disorder on board had shaken their
discipline; the movement of the ship and the darkness
of the night had cowed their spirits. They made
a rush upon the pier; my lord, with his sword drawn
on his own retainers, must throw himself in front;
and this impulse of rabblement was not restrained
without a certain clamour of voices, highly to be
regretted in the case.
When some degree of order had been restored, Dick,
with a few chosen men, set forth in advance.
The darkness on shore, by contrast with the flashing
of the surf, appeared before him like a solid body;
and the howling and whistling of the gale drowned any
lesser noise.
He had scarce reached the end of the pier, however,
when there fell a lull of the wind; and in this he
seemed to hear on shore the hollow footing of horses
and the clash of arms. Checking his immediate
followers, he passed forward a step or two alone, even
setting foot upon the down; and here he made sure he
could detect the shape of men and horses moving.
A strong discouragement assailed him. If their
enemies were really on the watch, if they had beleaguered
the shoreward end of the pier, he and Lord Foxham
were taken in a posture of very poor defence, the sea
behind, the men jostled in the dark upon a narrow
causeway. He gave a cautious whistle, the signal
previously agreed upon.
