t, her heart beating hard, her eyes shining with the light
of purpose, her step elastic with the vigour of youth and health. A
quarter-hour's walking brought her to the cliff of the Couperon.
As she gazed out over the sea, however, a voice in the bay below caught
her ear. She looked down. On the deck of the little craft which had
entered the harbour when the vesper bell was ringing stood a man who
waved a hand up towards her, then gave a peculiar call. She stared with
amazement: it was Buonespoir the pirate. What did this mean? Had God
sent this man to her, by his presence to suggest what she should do in
this crisis in her life? For even as she ran down the shore towards
him, it came to her mind that Buonespoir should take her in his craft to
England.
What to do in England? Who could tell? She only knew that a voice called
her to England, to follow the footsteps of Michel de la Foret, who
even this night would be setting forth in the Governor's brigantine for
London.
Buonespoir met her upon the shore, grinning like a boy.
"God save you, lady!" he said.
"What brings you hither, friend?" she asked.
If he had said that a voice had called him hither as one called her to
England, it had not sounded strange; for she was not thinking that this
was one who superstitiously swore by the little finger of St. Peter, but
only that he was the man who had brought her Michel from France, who had
been a faithful friend to her and to her father.
"What brings me hither?" Buonespoir laughed low in his chest. "Even
to fetch to the Seigneur of Rozel, a friend of mine by every token of
remembrance, a dozen flagons of golden muscadella."
To Angele no suggestion flashed that these flagons of muscadella had
come from the cellar of the Seigneur of St. Ouen's, where they had been
reserved for a certain royal visit. Nothing was in her mind save the one
thought-that she must follow Michel.
"Will you take me to England?" she asked, putting a hand quickly on his
arm.
He had been laughing hard, picturing to himself what Lempriere of Rozel
would say when he sniffed the flagon of St. Ouen's best wine, and for an
instant he did not take in the question; but he stared at her now as the
laugh slowly subsided through notes of abstraction and her words worked
their way into his brain.
"Will you take me, Buonespoir?" she urged. "Take you--?" he questioned.
"To England."
"And myself to Tyburn?"
"Nay, to the Queen."
"'Tis the
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