'Give them a moment more,' Vidocq interposed. 'Time at least to say good-bye.'
Marianne shut her eyes and a tearing sob broke from her. She clung to Jason with all her strength, as though hoping for some miracle from heaven to make them into a single person. She felt his arms holding her tightly, his breath on her neck and in a moment a tear rolled down her cheek.
'Not good-bye!' she implored desperately. 'Not good-bye for ever. I could not bear it.'
Jason tightened his hold. 'Nor could I. We shall be together again, Marianne, I swear it!' The words were whispered close into her ear. 'They are stronger than we are and we must obey. But they are sure to send you back to Italy, and I will meet you there…'
'Meet me?'
In the agony of her grief, the sense of what he said had scarcely penetrated, despite the hope it held.
'Yes. I will meet you, in Venice – in six months. My ship will lie offshore and wait for as long as need be.'
Slowly, he was inspiring her with the same indomitable fighting spirit which he himself had never lost, forcing the words into her ear as if he would have forced them into her mind and, little by little, life seemed to return and her brain began to function once again.
'Why Venice? Leghorn is the nearest port to Lucca.'
'Because Venice is not a French possession. It is Austrian. If your husband will not release you, you must fly there to me. Napoleon cannot touch you in Venice… Do you understand? You will come? In six months…'
'I shall come, but Jason—'
He stopped her mouth with a kiss, infusing into it all the passion of his love for her. When he let her go at last, his blue eyes looked earnestly into her tear-filled ones as he said in a low, vibrant murmur:
'Before God, Marianne, I will never give you up! I want you and I am going to have you. Even if I must go to the end of the world to find you… Jolival, you will take care of her? I have your promise?'
'What else have I ever done?' the Vicomte said gruffly, tenderly receiving on his chest the trembling form given into his care. 'Have no fears on that score.'
Jason turned resolutely and, making his way to Surcouf, bowed gravely.
'I'm no great hand at thanks,' he said, 'but you may command me, Baron, as and where you like. I am your most grateful servant.'
'My name is Robert Surcouf,' the baron retorted. 'Come here and let me embrace you, lad!' And added, for Jason's ear alone: 'Try and come back for her. She's worth it.'
'I have known that for a long time,' Jason said with a fleeting smile, returning the Malouin's vigorous embrace. 'I shall be back.'
Last of all, he turned to Vidocq and offered him his hand, unreservedly.
'We have been through too much together, you and I, François,' he said, 'for us to be aught but brothers. You did your duty, that was all. You had no other choice.'
'Thank you,' Vidocq said simply. 'Don't worry over her. I, too, shall be watching. Come, I'll help you up.'
He indicated the rope ladder, now banging in the rising wind, that climbed the sheer sides of the brig above them. But even as he spoke men were descending on the deck from the American vessel, hoisting up their captain like a parcel. Ledru's men, reaching out to shake Jason's hand in a crushing grip as he was borne past, held the ladder stiff and steady.
Leaning against Jolival, Marianne watched his progress, following him with her eyes until he reached the frieze of human heads and bodies lining the rail above. Jason's arrival on deck was the signal for a rousing cheer which rang like a death knell in Marianne's already breaking heart. To her, it sounded like the voice of that distant country of his, claiming him from her, back again to a place where she was not allowed to follow.
Meanwhile, Vidocq had gone to the lugger's stern and signalled three times by opening and closing the shutter of a lantern, and away beyond the promontory of rocks the frigate was already going about for Brest. Already, the sky above the coast was almost imperceptibly lighter, though the wind was strengthening, filling the sails as they were set once more, and the lugger's crew, armed with long gaffs, fended her off from the brig's side. Jean Ledru was back at the tiller and, slowly, inexorably, the gap of water between the two vessels widened. The lugger slipped astern of the great sailing ship and lay for a moment in the pool of light cast by her two gilded stern lanterns. And there, high above her as she stood unable any longer to restrain her tears, Marianne saw Jason, his tall figure supported by his own men. He raised one arm in a gesture of farewell, but already he seemed very far away… so far, indeed, that for a moment Marianne forgot the promise she had made only a moment before, forgot to be brave, forgot that this parting was not good-bye but only au revoir. She was only a desperate broken woman, seeing the best part of herself borne away from her on the wind. With a last, terrible effort, she tore herself from Jolival's comforting arms and flung herself at the rail.
'Jason!' she screamed, oblivious of the tossing bow wave which drenched her in spray. 'Jason!… Come back!… Come back!… I love you…'
She clung with dripping fingers to the slippery wood, tossing back the sodden tangles of her hair in an automatic gesture. The lugger plunged deeply into a trough of the waves, nearly sending her sprawling on the deck, but all the strength that she possessed was in her clinging hands, her whole life in the eyes which still gazed at the fast-dwindling shape of Jason's ship. At last, two strong arms came to encircle her, drawing her back from her desperate watch, and from the peril in which she stood.
'Are you out of your mind?' Vidocq's voice scolded. 'Do you want to fall overboard?'
'I want to see him again… I want to be with him!'
'And he with you! But it's not a corpse he'd hope to find, it's you, yourself, alive! Good God! Do you want to die before his eyes to prove your love? For the love of heaven, live! Live at least until the time he appointed for your meeting.'
Marianne's eyes widened in amazement. Already the instinct for life was reviving in her, willing her to fight on towards the goal which at this moment had eluded her.
'How did you know?'
'He loves you. He would never have parted from you without something of the kind. Now go and get under cover. You are soaking wet and the dawn mist is rising. It's as easy to die of an inflammation of the lungs as it is by drowning.'
She submitted docilely when he led her to a more sheltered spot on the deck and wrapped a heavy canvas sailcloth about her, but rejected all attempts to make her go below. While Jason's ship was still there to be seen, she was determined not to lose sight of it.
Far out, near the islands with their attendant train of rocky reefs and islets, the Sea Witch was heading out to sea, dipping gracefully under the frail, towering white peaks of her crowded sails. In the grey light of dawn, she looked like a gull, gliding among the black rocks. For a moment, as the vessel went about to pass between two jagged islets, she presented herself to Marianne's eyes broadside on and she recalled then what it was that Talleyrand had told her one day about that figure shaped like a woman on the prow. He had said that the figurehead was carved in her own image, that Jason had had it made to adorn the prow of his ship, and Marianne found herself wishing passionately that she could be that woman made of wood whom he had caused to be created, and on whom his eyes must often rest.
A moment later, the American brig had gone about again and nothing more remained to be seen but the stern, with its two lanterns vanishing into the mist.