Aramis made no reply; the ship still gained upon them. Then, of their own accord, two of the sailors, by the direction of the skipper Yves, lowered the sail, in order that that single point which appeared above the surface of the waters should cease to be a guide to the eye of the enemy who was pursuing them. On the part of the ship in sight, on the contrary, two more small sails were run up at the extremities of the masts. Unfortunately, it was the time of the finest and longest days of the year, and the moon, in all her brilliancy, succeeded to that inauspicious day. The vessel which was pursuing the little boat before the wind had then still half an hour of twilight, and a whole night almost as light as day.
“Monseigneur! Monseigneur! we are lost!” said the skipper. “Look! they see us although we have lowered our sail.”
“That is not to be wondered at,” murmured one of the sailors, “since they say that, by the aid of the devil, the people of the cities have made instruments with which they see as well at a distance as near, by night as well as by day.”
Aramis took a telescope from the bottom of the boat, arranged it silently, and passing it to the sailor, “Here,” said he, “look!” The sailor hesitated.
“Don’t be alarmed,” said the bishop, “there is no sin in it; and if there is any sin, I will take it upon myself.”
The sailor lifted the glass to his eye, and uttered a cry. He believed that the vessel, which appeared to be distant about cannon-shot, had suddenly and at a single bound cleared the distance. But on withdrawing the instrument from his eye, he saw that, except the way which the vessel had been able to make during that short instant, it was still at the same distance.
“So,” murmured the sailor, “they can see us as we see them?”
“They see us,” said Aramis, and sank again into his impassiveness.
“How,- they see us?” said the skipper Yves. “Impossible!”
“Well, Skipper, look for yourself,” said the sailor. And he passed to him the glass.
“Monseigneur assures me that the devil has nothing to do with this?” asked the skipper.
Aramis shrugged his shoulders.
The skipper lifted the glass to his eye. “Oh, Monseigneur,” said he, “it is a miracle. They are there; it seems as if I were going to touch them. Twenty-five men at least! Ah! I see the captain forward. He holds a glass like this, and is looking at us. Ah! he turns round and gives an order; they are rolling a piece of cannon forward- they are charging it- they are pointing it. Misericorde! they are firing at us!
And by a mechanical movement the skipper took the glass off, and the objects, sent back to the horizon, appeared again in their true aspect. The vessel was still at the distance of nearly a league, but the manoeuvre announced by the skipper was not less real. A light cloud of smoke appeared under the sails, more blue than they, and spreading like a flower opening; then, at about a mile from the little canoe, they saw the ball take the crown off two or three waves, dig a white furrow in the sea and disappear at the end of that furrow, as inoffensive as the stone with which, at play, a boy “makes ducks and drakes.” That was at once a menace and a warning.
“What is to be done?” asked the skipper.
“They will sink us!” said Goennec, give us absolution, Monseigneur!” And the sailors fell on their knees before him.
“You forget that they can see you,” said he.
“That is true!” said the sailors, ashamed of their weakness. “Give us your orders, Monseigneur; we are ready to die for you.”
“Let us wait,” said Aramis.
“How,- let us wait?”
“Yes; do you not see, as you just now said, that if we endeavor to fly, they will sink us?”
“But perhaps,” the skipper ventured to say,- “perhaps by the favor of the night we could escape them.”
“Oh!” said Aramis, “they probably have some Greek fire to light their own course and ours likewise.”