I had meant to let myself down gently, hand over hand, to land in the shadows, but what I hadn’t reckoned on, being no seaman, was the waterborne lightness of a small ship. Even my slender weight, as I hitched myself down the rope, made her curtsy, sharply and disconcertingly, and then, tilting, swing her bow suddenly in towards the wharf. The hawser sagged, slackened, drooped under my weight as the strain was loosed, then went down into a loop. Where I swung, clinging like a monkey, it suddenly hung vertical. My feet lost their grip and slid away from me; my hands could not hold my weight. I went down the ship’s side on that hawser like a bead on a string.

If the ship had swung more slowly I would have been crushed as she ground against the wharf-side, or drowned as I reached the bottom of the loop, but she went like a horse shying. As she jarred the edge of the wharf I was just above it, and the jerk loosened what was left of my grip and flung me clear. I missed the bollard by inches, and landed sprawling on the frost-hard ground in the shadow of a wall.

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER TWO

THERE was no time to wonder whether I was hurt. I could hear the slap of bare feet on the deck above me as the watch raced along to see what had happened. I bunched, rolled, and was on my feet and running before his bobbing lantern reached the side. I heard him shout something, but I had already dodged round the corner of the buildings, and was sure he had not seen me. Even if he had, I thought I was safe enough. He would check my prison first, and even then I doubted if he would dare leave the ship. I leaned for a moment or two against the wall, hugging the rope burns on my hands, and trying to adjust my eyes to the night.

Since I had come from near-darkness in my prison, this took no more than a few seconds, and I looked quickly about me to get my bearings.

The shed that hid me was the end one of the row, and behind it—on the side away from the wharf—was the road, a straight ribbon of gravel, making for a cluster of lights some distance away. This no doubt was the town. Nearer, just where the road was swallowed by darkness, was a dim and shifting gleam, which must be the tail light of the last wagon. Nothing else moved.