Scevola, receiving no answer, remained in a stooping position. He could not detect the slightest sound of breathing down there. He remained in this position so long that Symons became quite interested. “He must think I am still down there,” he whispered to himself. The next proceeding was quite astonishing. The man, taking up a position on one side of the cuddy scuttle and holding his horrid weapon as one would a boarding pike, uttered a terrific whoop and went on yelling in French with such volubility that he quite frightened Symons. Suddenly he left off, moved away from the scuttle and looked at a loss what to do next. Anybody who could have then seen Symons’ protruded head with his face turned aft would have seen on it an expression of horror. “The cunning beast,” he thought. “If I had been down there, with the row he made, I would have surely rushed on deck and then he would have had me.” Symons experienced the feeling of a very narrow escape; yet it brought not much relief. It was simply a matter of time. The fellow’s homicidal purpose was evident. He was bound before long to come forward. Symons saw him move, and thought, “Now he’s coming,” and prepared himself for a dash. “If I can dodge past these blamed prongs I might be able to take him by the throat,” he reflected, without, however, feeling much confidence in himself.
But to his great relief Scevola’s purpose was simply to conceal the fork in the hold in such a manner that the handle of it just reached the edge of the after-deck. In that position it was of course invisible to anybody coming from the shore. Scevola had made up his mind that the lieutenant was out of the tartane. He had wandered away along the shore and would probably be back in a moment. Meantime it had occurred to him to see if he could discover anything compromising in the cabin. He did not take the fork down with him because in that confined space it would have been useless and rather a source of embarrassment than otherwise should the returning lieutenant find him there. He cast a circular glance around the basin and then prepared to go down.
Every movement of his was watched by Symons. He guessed Scevola’s purpose by his movements, and said to himself: “Here’s my only chance, and not a second to be lost either.” Directly Scevola turned his back on the forepart of the tartane in order to go down the little cabin ladder, Symons crawled out from his concealment. He ran along the hold on all fours for fear the other should turn his head round before disappearing below, but directly he judged that the man had touched bottom, he stood on his feet and catching hold of the main rigging swung himself on the after-deck and, as it were in the same movement, flung himself on the doors of the cabin, which came together with a crash. How he could secure them he had not thought, but as a matter of fact he saw the padlock hanging on a staple on one side; the key was in it, and it was a matter of a fraction of a second to secure the doors effectually.