A company of men were there, but he could not distinguish their faces.
The single lantern they carried was now turned with its face to the
ground. One of them had a crowbar with which he was prizing up a stone.
It was a gravestone. The men were tearing open an old vault.
There was some muttering, and one of the men seemed to protest. "Stop!"
he cried; "I'm not going to have a hand in a job like this. I'm bad
enough, God knows, but no man shall say that I helped to violate a
grave."
Danny shook from head to foot. He knew that voice. Just then the
sea-swallow shot again overhead, uttering its low, mournful cry. At the
same instant Danny thought he heard a half-stiffed moan not far from his
side, and once more his ear caught that soft rustling sound. Quivering
in every limb, he could not stir. He must stand and be silent. He clung
to the stone wall with convulsive fingers.
The man with the crowbar laughed. "Dowse that now," he said, and laughed
again.
"Och, the timid he is to be sure, and the religious, too, all at once."
Danny knew that voice also, and knew as well that to utter a word or
sound at that moment might be as much as his life was worth. The men
were raising the stone.
"Here, bear a hand," said one.
"Never," said the first speaker.
There was a low, grating laugh. One of the men leaped into the vault.
"Now, then, tail on here more hands. Let's have it, quick."
Then Danny saw that, lying on the ground, was something that he had not
observed before. It was like a thick black roll some four feet long. Two
of the men got hold of it to hand it to the man below.
"Come! lay down, d'ye hear?"
Danny's terror mastered him. He turned to run. Then the man who had
spoken first cried, "What's that?"
There was a moment's pause.
"What's what?" said the man in the vault.
"I'll swear on my soul I saw a woman pass the porch."
A bitter little laugh followed.
"Och, it's always a woman he's seeing."
Danny had found his legs at last. Flying along the grass as softly as a
lapwing, he reached the old gate. Then he turned and listened. No; there
was nothing to show that he had been heard. He crept down the steps to
the water's edge. There in a creek he saw a boat which he had not
observed on going up. He looked at the name.
It was "Ben-my-Chree."
Danny turned to the ford. The tide had risen a foot since he crossed,
but he paddled through the water and gained the pier. Then he ran home
as fast as his long legs would carry him, wet with sweat and speechless
with dismay.
Next morning Danny remembered that he had forgotten all about the
harbor-master and the light.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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