CHAPTER XLV

THE PARSON AT HOME

I

A clap of thunder, followed by a monstrous hissing overhead, awoke Kit from dreams of blackberrying with Gwen in the dew-white dawn.

He started up.

"What's that?" he cried, seeking his mind.

"The privateer barking good-bye, sir," came old Piper's voice from across the room. "She's stood in with the tide, and had a slap with her bow-chaser. Now she's going about."

The memories swooped back on Kit; Nelson, the despatches, the swim in the dark.

In a moment he was at the loop-hole, peering over the old man's shoulder.

On these in the sunshine he saw the brown-patched sails of the privateer lifted ladder-like from behind the shingle-bank, and strangely close. Then her bows slid into view, and he realised that she was standing out to sea:

The boy's heart soared.

They were free!

A great hand pulled him gently back from the loop-hole.

"By your leave, sir. They've a marksman on the knoll keeps on a-peckin at us."

The boy's heart sank.

"Then we _aren't_ free?"

"Oh, no, sir. All round us, sir--a cord on em, Muster Joy calls it, soldier-fashion."

From above the Parson's cheery voice rang out.

"So she's left you in the lurch, my lord. That comes o trusting to a Frenchman."

Piper chuckled.

"Muster Joy and the Gentleman! Must keep on a-chaffin. At it all day yesterday they was, atween scrimmages."

A gay voice came sailing back from the open.

"Ah, Reverend Father, good morning! Yes, you must excuse her for the moment. She has an engagement to keep round the corner to-morrow."

"To-morrow!" echoed Kit, aghast. "Piper! how long have I been asleep?"

"Why, sir, you've slept round the clock and a bit more. It's nigh noon of what was to-morrow when you turned in."

No wonder he was hungry; no wonder he was fresh; no wonder that sound of hammering, which had disturbed him as he passed from a half-swoon into sleep, seemed so far off.

"Wednesday! Then to-morrow's Thursday!" he cried, rushing into his clothes. "O Nelson!" and he raced up the ladder.

The loft was full of light, dazzling after the twilight of the kitchen.

II

A mattress, stuffed clumsily in the seaward window, half blocked it. In the dormer looking towards the Downs, two biscuit-boxes crammed with earth sat on the sill, forming a rough head-cover.

Behind these Knapp sprawled on his stomach. Beside him was a wooden porringer full of bullets, and a basin of black powder; in his hand a musket.

In a cobweb corner by a barrel, Blob crouched covetously; while beside the mattress-curtain sat the Parson in his shirt-sleeves, furbishing Polly, and pausing every now and then to spy out through the bulges.

As Kit clambered on to the floor, the Parson turned, his blue eyes merry, and curls a-ripple.

"Ah, Kit, my boy, how are you?"

"Alive and well, sir, thanks to you. And you, sir?"

"I!" laughed the Parson. "I'm another man." A bullet whizzed by. The Parson listened sentimentally. "That's the music!" raising his face with a rapt smile. "Always makes me think of angels' wings."

He seemed to have grown, body and soul. His eyes shone, his cheeks glowed; he was crisp as a rimy apple.

Kit felt the change.

Responsibility, the searcher out of souls, had exhilarated and sobered the man. He was graver yet gayer, inspiring and inspired.

"Duck up aloft!" came a sudden roar from beneath.

The Parson smote Kit a blow on the chest that sent him staggering back against the wall.

A bullet whistled in at one window and out at the other.

The Parson crawled across to Knapp, lying on his face, and dealt him a tremendous buffet.

"Dog!" he thundered. "Why don't you shout?"

The little man's body leapt to the blow, but he made no answer.

"Go below!" ordered the Parson savagely. "What's the good of you? I set you there to warn us and all you can do is to grovel on your stomach and snivel."

The little Cockney rose without a word and crept away, his tail between his legs. Kit saw his face. One eye was black; and his face was so woebegone that but for the misery in it Kit would have smiled.

"Their shooting is exquisite," said the Parson with professional delight. "You can't show a finger.... They've nearly had Blob already --ain't they, Blob?"

Blob, cuddling in the corner, shook his head cunningly.

"Oi've had them," he said. "Three pennorth of em," pointing to the little pile of coppers at his side.

"I'm giving him a penny apiece for each Gang-er he gets, and twice the money for a Frenchman," the Parson explained. "It stimulates effort," he added, prim as a pedagogue, but with twinkling eye. "And now, Kit, your story."

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