He leaped from the boat and was lost in the darkness.
A minute later, and John Pooke, with a party of men among whom was Pasco Pepperill, came up.
“John,” said Kate, “he is gone--escaped.”
She drew the young man aside. “I will not deceive you--I let him go. He begged hard. He might have killed you. His little Joan is dead.”
John Pooke was at first staggered, and inclined to be angry, but he speedily recovered himself. He was a good-natured lad, and he said in a low tone, “Tell no one else. After all, it is best. I shouldn’t ha’ liked to have appeared against him, and been the occasion of his death.”
Kate returned with her uncle to Coombe Cellars.
“I hope my new boat is no worse,” said he. “How is it you’ve been out all night?”
“The boat is all right, I suppose. She cost me six pounds.”
“Yes; no harm is done to it. I hope aunt has not been anxious about me.”
“What, Zerah? Oh, she’s in bed. I waited up, and when there was a cry of fire ran out.”
“Your father? You come in, and you’ll hear his snore all over the house. He’s a terrible noisy sleeper.”
After the fierce north-east wind came one from the south-east, whose wings were laden with moisture, and which cast cold showers over the earth. It is said that a breath from this quarter brings a downpour that continues unintermittently for forty-eight hours. On this occasion, however, the rain was not incessant. The sky lowered when it did not send down its showers, and these latter were cold and unfertilising. “February fill dyke, March dry it up,” is the saying, but March this year was one of rain, and February had been a month of warmth and sunshine, which had forced on all vegetation, which March was cutting with its cruel frosts and beating down with its pitiless rains.
That had come about in Coombe Cellars which might have been anticipated. Kate had been sent across the water with the scantiest provision against cold, and with no instruction as to how to act in the event of delay of the atmospheric train. She was not a strong child, and the bitter cold had cut her to the marrow. On the morning following she was unable to rise, and by night she was in a burning fever.
Kate had an attic room where there was no grate--a room lighted by a tiny window that looked east across the river.