The streaming horses plunged through the echoing vault of the huge St Vincent gate and instantly their panic ceased. Behind the great ramparts, where the sea could not reach, all was comparative peace and Marianne was a little surprised to find the people going about their business as naturally as in the finest weather. Hardly a soul seemed to take notice of her tempestuous arrival. Only one of the soldiers mounting a somewhat casual guard upon the gate took the clay pipe from his mouth and remarked to Gracchus, who was shaking the water from his dripping hat: 'Bit of a blow like, eh, lad? Nor'wester… 'orses ever takes agin it.'
'So I noticed,' Gracchus responded amiably. 'And grateful I am to know it's a nor-wester, but if it's all the same to you I'd be gladder still to know where Monsieur Surcouf lives.'
The words had been addressed to the man on the gate but almost before the words were out of his mouth a crowd of people had gathered round the vehicle, all talking at once: women in calico bonnets who set down their baskets and pointed, sailors in hard waxed hats and aged fishermen in red stocking caps so prolific of hair and whisker that there was little of their faces to be seen beyond a red nose and a pipe. Everyone was offering to show the way. Gracchus stood on the box and endeavoured to make sense of the hubbub.
'Not all at once, now… for pity's sake! Is that the way?' He had gathered that all the arms seemed to be pointing in much the same direction, but still no one would consent to be quiet. He was just going to sit down again and prepare to wait patiently for the rumpus to die down when two men rather more determined than the rest took hold of the horses' bridles and began leading the chaise sedately along the street that ran like a deep cutting in between the wall and tall houses within. Marianne stuck her head out of the window in puzzlement:
'What is happening? Have we been arrested?'
'No, Mademoiselle Marianne, taken over, more like. Seems to me Monsieur Surcouf is something of a king in these parts, all these folks is so eager to serve him.'
They were led for some way, passing two more gates and then, still following the line of the wall, bearing right until at last the procession reached a large, rather grim house built of grey granite whose tall windows and lofty doorway adorned with armorial bearings above and a bronze dolphin below pointed to a residence of some importance. Marianne's willing escort thereupon pronounced unanimously that this was it and all that remained to be done was for Gracchus to distribute a number of small coins with the recommendation that the thirstier among them should go and quench their thirst to the health of Baron Surcouf and his friends.
The various persons then dispersed happily, the old salts setting a course for the nearest tavern for a mug of mulled cider, well known to be the most comforting drink in the world when the nor'wester was blowing. Meanwhile, Gracchus had taken hold of the bronze dolphin door-knocker and was gravely asking the ancient serving man who answered it, and who bore a strong suggestion of the retired seaman about him, whether his master was at home to Mademoiselle d'Asselnat. Of all the many names which Marianne had borne, this was certainly the one the privateer knew best.
He was informed that 'Monsieur Surcouf' was at present down at the dry dock but that he would not be long and if the young lady liked she could 'heave to and come aboard', a mode of expression which confirmed Marianne in her first impression of the old man's earlier profession. She was admitted to an entrance hall with a black and white tiled floor and old oak panelling. There was little furniture beyond a sideboard bearing, between a pair of heavy bronze candelabra, a superb model of a flute in full sail, armed for war, gun-ports open and guns run out. A pair of high-back oak chairs stood guard on either side.
The whole house breathed the smell of new wax, suggesting to the visitor that the Baronne was a proud housewife. Indeed, everything about the house shone with cleanliness: even in white gloves it would have been hard to pick up a grain of dust. The effect was striking, but also slightly chilling.
Surcouf's 'cabin', when she was shown into it, turned out to be panelled in the same dark wood as the hall but was altogether more human. It was the room of a man of action, redolent of adventure and the sea and rumbustious life, a cheerfully untidy room, the desk heaped high with maps and compasses, papers, pipes and quills, in the middle of which was a spirit-lamp and a candlestick with a candle and a few sticks of sealing wax. Barbaric, brightly coloured rugs were scattered on the gleaming, polished floor, on which sprawled a huge map of the world, held down by a sextant and a brass meridian. Exotic weapons and tattered colours still with the stains of battle on them were arranged about a large chart on the wall and every piece of furniture in the room, with the exception of a bookcase stuffed with books, was covered with a clutter of telescopes, cases of pistols and instruments of navigation.
Marianne had scarcely seated herself in the straight-backed chair, as rigid as its fellows in the hall, which the old man had brought forward for her before there was a sound of booted feet. A door slammed somewhere and almost at once the big room seemed to fill with a great gust of sea air, smelling of iodine and spindrift, and Surcouf himself burst into his private domain. His arrival reminded Marianne so strongly of what she felt each time Jason appeared that something seemed to twist inside her. They were strangely alike, these men of the sea, as if they bore the insignia of some secret brotherhood to which all belonged. Just how far, she wondered, would that brotherhood carry him?
'Now, here's a surprise!' the privateer cried thunderously. 'You, here in St Malo? I can't believe my eyes!'
'You may quite safely do so,' Marianne said, submitting to a smacking kiss on both cheeks, country fashion. 'I am really here! I hope my coming is not disagreeable to you.'
'Disagreeable! Never think it! It's not every day I get the chance of kissing a princess! Damned if I don't do it again!'
He suited the action to the word and Marianne felt herself blushing. She had announced herself by her maiden name.
'How – how did you know—?'
Surcouf's great laughter rang out so heartily that all the lustres in the crystal chandelier tinkled softly in answer:
'That you were a princess? My dear girl, I do believe you think we Bretons are so cut-off it takes us three or four years to get the latest news from Paris! Not a bit of it! We are well up in all the news. Especially' – and here his joyous laugh boomed out again – 'especially when one numbers Baron Corvisart among one's friends. He attended you a short while ago and I got news of you from him. That is all there is to it. And now sit down and tell me what fair wind blows you here. But first, a glass of port to celebrate your coming.'
While Marianne resumed her seat and tried to get over her surprise, Surcouf went to a carved wooden chest and took out a decanter of dark red Bohemian glass and a pair of tall glasses which he filled three-quarters full of a golden brown liquid. Feeling better already for his bracing presence, Marianne watched his movements with a smile.
Surcouf was never anything less than himself. His broad face, framed in a pair of handsome sidewhiskers, was still the same coppery brown and his blue eyes as direct as ever. He had put on a little weight, perhaps, and his broad chest had filled out until the everlasting blue redingote was bursting at the seams and dragging at the massive gold buttons which, when she looked closer, Marianne saw in a kind of daze were none other than Spanish gold doubloons, pierced for the purpose.
After a ritual toast to the Emperor, they drank their port in silence, nibbling little airy ginger biscuits which seemed to the traveller the most delicious food on earth. Then Surcouf swung round a chair and, seating himself astride it, regarded his young friend with an encouraging smile.