They had reached the Adur beach in full dark, with the moonlight patches less frequent than the night before. From a mile away Celine had discovered two luggers of the trade, both French, one of which she thought she recognised. They were anchored well off, with small boats going in, but the landing was extremely difficult because of the rising storm. When they approached the beach themselves the prospect was daunting for a yawl of light construction. The free trade men were using heavy beach-boats, and had dozens of hands to hold and haul them. If they put the yawl within the breakers, she would likely smash to pieces.
There was the sighting problem, too, for the gang had lookers-out on shore and ship, and would hardly tolerate intrusion. While a single small boat could pose no threat it would not be welcome, although they were handier than the heavy landing vessels and could get away if chased. Dark-sailed and unexpected, they hoped, simply, not to be seen. Indeed they were not, for some while, but ranged up and down the beach in indecision. They were here, the landing was on as they'd expected what could they do? They were unarmed, one woman and a man, and Sam, alive or dead, was where? If they put the boat ashore she would stay there, of that they had no doubt. She would go to pieces in the surf, and in any way, they could not get her off and out again; they were too few. For fifteen minutes they hardly spoke; they backed and filled, and went about, and ranged. They were both beset by growing hopelessness.
It was being sighted that was the salvation they were praying for. As they swooped in close, in agony as to what to do for best, a shaft of moon broke through, a cry went up, and a volley of shots went off in quick succession. At the same instant, a lone figure broke from his cover behind the men firing at the yawl, who had, in fact, been beating through the undergrowth in search of him. He ha red off down the beach towards the eastward the yawl was sailing west and Celine, as if she had not seen, put her about, ran off the beach against the rolling waves, then sliced along it to reach the point that the running man was heading for. The limping man, in fact, for Sam had received one ball already, in the leg, when flushed out of his hideaway and into thicker cover.
By the time they'd reached the point of no return, where the waves were breaking and they could not go, Sam had reached the edge and was plunging out to meet them. The batmen and the musket men had seen him also, and were racing down upon him like a dervish horde. Some had discharged their pieces, others were in the line of fire, but it was too much to hope he would get away unscathed. Before he was waist-deep he took a ball below the shoulder, and as he swam close enough for Will to seize his coat to drag him across the gunwale, another hit him in the neck. Sam, whose mouth was open for a greeting, snapped it shut, went blank about the eyes, and folded into the bottom like a boneless heap. He was bleeding. Celine bore off, then gybed her round without a hand from Will, and ran offshore like an arrow into the seething blackness. There could be no pursuit.
It was forty miles or so to Langstone, but both knew that there was no alternative to going on. As they made their offing Will lay with Samuel in the bottom and tried to save his life. For some minutes he was not certain there was life to save, but he rubbed the pallid face with brandy, substituted his drier, warmer coat and cloak for the soaking shore man togs, and dribbled some spirit between the icy lips. At one point Samuel coughed, then gagged, then came to life and smiled the faintest smile. "Ho, Will," he said, 'fine life upon the sea, what?" then slipped off again. But his face got warmer, and from time to time he moved. Later, Will took the helm and Celine lay beside Sam, and wrapped both in her boat cloak, and rubbed his cheeks and hands. From time to time she moved, to lift her head and smile towards frozen Will, hunched beside the tiller, one hand upon the sheet as he fought to keep the yawl afloat in the violence. From time to time she got up on her knees to bail.
They could not go ashore, if for no other reason, because of the level of the seas. The wind was hard offshore still, which gave them some sort of lee, but the Sussex shingle beaches had breaking surf never less than a cable's length in depth. Even if they had found a landing and Will had little idea of where they were within a mile or five the chances were they would have ended in a lonely, isolated spot, and found not even a shepherd's hut to shelter in. Also there were offshore shoals, there had to be, it was in nature, which if they found would mean their ending. By morning light, he hoped, they would see Selsey, which he could recognise, and after that he knew the waters intimately, and they would fetch. Had it not been for his intense cold, Will would have dreamed of landfall in Langstone Haven which he realised it then, and not before -he loved. The very strangeness of this thought brought him to his senses, for he was drifting off, cold or no cold. The yawl was falling off, a gust caught her with the sheet not free to run, and she lurched and took a swipe of green sea inboard as the lee side dipped. Will thrust the tiller down, let fly, and woke Celine with his frantic shout. The water washed Sam's face while she plied the bucket.
Worst was off of Selsey, where the tide was running hard against them, contrary with the wind, which was bitter now, and stronger, from the north east. The tidal rip was terrible, the wind fought it relentlessly, and Celine was letting fly, and sheeting in, and letting fly almost without cease. The halliard was led underneath a thwart and made up in a jam so that she could release it with a jerk and lose the sail if need be, but by the grace of God as she said it -that necessity was spared them.
And then, with the sun burning down the Channel after them, and round the Bill, and the sea miraculously sane again, if still exceeding wild, Will saw the South Downs leading him along the coast, and the point where they appeared to drop away to nothing, which was where, when coming from the east, he knew he'd find his landfall at the Langstone entrance.
"Celine," he said. "It's there. Follow the line of hills. Perhaps two hours. I think the tide's turning west, it's easier. We'll come to Mary's at high water. How's Sam?"
He was lying flat on his back on the bottom boards swathed in black, nothing of him visible to Will. She sat beside him like an eastern doll, one small area of pale skin peeping from her hood. A small hand emerged from out her cloak and gently touched his face.
"He's not so cold. I hope this sun can chase the clouds away. I hope that he can live."
"What shall we do?" said Will. "When we come to Langstone?"
The question was meaningless, but both knew what he meant by it. She was a spy, a smuggler, an escaper, a Frenchwoman. He and Sam were deserters maybe, mutineers or heroes, God knew what. They'd set out to uncover murderers and they had been sucked into a swamp. All three of them could hang, in probability. In truth, he realised with a sudden swoop, he was a murderer himself, of that there was no doubt. And probably, he thought, I've killed Deb, too.
"It is too hard," she said. "Too complique. I'm tired, I want to sleep and cry, and say hallo to Mary and the children. I think that things will go on as before. That is what I think we have to do."
Go on as before. But everything he'd learned about and found. About Swift, and his society, and even she had said other members of his family, whom he would have to ask after; not now. And his position in the world, an officer of the King, a gentleman. Fighting to uphold the right. And honour.
"You can't change anything," said Celine. "You do know that, don't you, Will? You will change nothing, so you will have to change. You understand that, don't you? Will? Will?"