"Never! Never! Let me out!"
"Do not fear, count," I answered. "Our pilot--"
"Our pilot! Ah, sacrament! We are lost! Our pilot is a mere girl!"
"But a wonder, count, a wonder. There is no waterman on the river in
whose hands we should be safer," I replied, expressing my confidence in
stronger terms than it really deserved. To shoot London Bridge when the
tide was running out, as it then was, would give pause to the hardiest
waterman. A misstroke of the steering oar, the slightest faltering in the
hands that held it, the mere touch of the boat's nose against the jagged
rocks and logs of the pier, and all would be lost.
We could not stop to put De Grammont on shore, and presently recognizing
that fact, he sat down in resignation in the bow of the boat, remarking
with a sigh, as though speaking to himself:--
"Ah, the beautiful land!"
By that time the flambeau was blazing not two hundred yards ahead of us.
The current had caught us, and the waves of the running tide came almost
to the gunwale of the boat. Bettina had risen to her feet, leaving her
hat, vizard, and cloak in the bottom of the boat, and was standing on the
stern thwart, her back towards us and her face up-stream. Behind us,
perhaps three hundred yards, came the king's great barge, ablaze with
torches. The men in the barge had ceased firing, supposing, probably,
that we should be forced to land above the Bridge, and should then become
an easy prey.
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