It was directly after we had sighted the Lizard that the wind began to fall light, and when we were just off the Point it failed us altogether. I remember that night as well as any other period in the course of these incidents. I was running a race with Cullen Mayle, and I was beginning to think that it was not after all only on account of his peril that it was needful for me to reach Tresco before he did. These last two days I had been entirely occupied with the stimulation of that race and the inspiriting companionship of the sea. The waves foaming away from the bows and bubbling and hissing under the lee of the boat, the flaws of wind blistering the surface of the water as they came off the land towards us, making visible their invisible approach; the responsive spring of the boat, like a horse under the touch of a spur--these mere commonplaces to my companions had for me an engrossing enchantment. But on that evening at the Lizard Point the sea lay under the sunset a smooth, heaving prism of colours; we could hear nothing but the groaning of the blocks, the creaking of the boom's collars against the masts; and the night came out from behind the land very peaceful and solemn, and solemnly the stars shone out in the sky. All the excitement of the last days died out of me. We swung up and down with the tide. Now the lights of Falmouth were visible to us at the bottom of the bay, now the Lizard obscured them from us. I was brought somehow to think of those last years of mine in London. They seemed very distant and strange to me in this clean air, and the pavement of St. James's Street, which I had daily trodden, became an unacceptable thing.
About two o'clock of the morning a broad moon rose out of the sea, and towards daybreak a little ruffing breeze sprang up, and we made a gentle progress across the bay towards Land's End; but the breeze sank as the sun came up, and all that day we loitered, gaining a little ground now and then and losing it again with the turn of the tide. It was not until the fifth evening that we dropped anchor in the road between St. Mary's Island and Tresco.
I waited until it was quite dark, and was then quietly rowed ashore with my valise in the ship's dinghy. I landed on Tresco near to the harbour of New Grimsby. It was at New Grimsby that Dick Parmiter lived, Clutterbuck had told me, and the first thing I had to do was to find Dick Parmiter without arousing any attention.