Page:Quiller-Couch--Old fires and profitable ghosts.djvu/183

Rh Admiral Brueys upwards; but fifteen little wooden dolls—jointed—at—the—knees!"

"I know the sort," I put in from the hearth, where my mother had set me to watch the bouillon. "You can get as many as you like in the very next street, and at two sols apiece. I will look to that part of the cargo."

"You, for example.…?"

"Yes, I; since you promised to take me on the very next voyage after I was twelve."

"But that's impossible. This is a straight run, as they call it, and not a mere matter of sinking the crop." "And next time," I muttered bitterly, "we shall be at war with England again, and then it will be the danger of privateers—always one excuse or another!"

My mother sighed as she looked out of window towards the Isle de Batz. I had been coaxing her half the morning, and she had promised me to say nothing.

Well, the result was that I went. My father's lugger carried twelve hands—I counted myself, of course; and indeed my father did the same when it came to charging for the crew. Still, twelve was not an out-of-the-way number, since in these chasse-martées one must lower and rehoist the big sails at every fresh tack. As it happened, however, we had a fair wind right across from Roscoff, and made a good landfall of the Dodman at four in the afternoon, just