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The Toilers of the Sea: Clubin
In one of his trips to the mainland Clubin encountered the thief Rantaine as he was about to leave the country with a fortune of 75,000 francs. At the point of a revolver Clubin took from Rantaine the 75,000 francs, and at once, although it was foggy, set sail in the Durande for St. Sampson. The Durande was wrecked on some rocks in the Channel. Clubin disembarked his passengers and crew in the long-boat. For himself, he would go down with his ship. The passengers and crew, arriving safely in St. Sampson, were loud in their praise of the heroic captain.
All Lethierry's hopes for Deruchette had lain in the Durande. He besought men to go out to the wreck to see if there was hope for her or if Clubin remained alive. They went, Gilliatt first of all, and returned to report that no Clubin was there and that the Durande was hopelessly wrecked. Only her engines remained intact.
Her engines! The word roused Lethierry from his despair. Her engines! His engines, which he had designed himself! They were the real value of the ship! If he could but recover the engines! But how? What man could devise the means to save them? The superhuman being who could do that, why--he should marry Deruchette.
A man pushed his way through the crowd surrounding Mess Lethierry and his niece. "You would marry him to Deruchette?" said the man. It was Gilliatt. Mess Lethierry raised a solemn hand. "I pledge myself to it in God's name!" Next day Gilliatt set sail. With extraordinary skill he maneuvered to the one spot near the wreck where it might be possible to moor his sloop. This nook was four hundred yards from the wreck, too far for the sleeping-place of a man who had not a minute to waste. Yet he could not bunk on the hull of the Durande--a sea might come in the night and sweep him away. He discovered a little plateau on the top of one of the Douvres pinnacles. He ascended the pinnacle by means of a knotted cord; every time he made his way up or down he risked his life, but there his bed must be, for time was everything. And for weeks he lived on the Douvres rocks at his work--work that demanded the knowledge of a sailor, a carpenter, an engineer, a blacksmith. Incredible toil! To repair pulley-blocks and construct hoisting-tackle; to reshape broken joists and make old sails into twine; to cut iron bars into files and long spikes; to take apart and stow the paddle-wheels; to resharpen hatchets and renew saw teeth--these were but the beginning of his preparations.
And more than toil. Part of the food which he had brought with him was washed into the sea, and he dared not leave the wreck unguarded to sail to Guernsey for a fresh supply; so he gathered the tiny shell-fish from the rocks and hunted the crabs which ran in and out of crevices.
One day he pursued a crab into a cave. While peering about, up to his waist in water, he felt something rough, cold, slimy coil itself around his right arm. Its pressure was like a tightening cord, its steady persistence like that of a screw. A second cold coil wound itself around his body; a third, a fourth, a fifth lashed themselves around him. He could scarcely breathe. Suddenly a round slimy mass darted toward him. It was the head of the devilfish.
Gilliatt had his knife; his left arm was still free. The monster stretched out a sixth tentacle for the free arm, which would mean Gilliatt's sure death; but with one superb circular stroke Gilliatt whipped off the slimy head. The tentacles relaxed, fell away; he was dead.
Gilliatt had still to get his crab. He looked into the deeper recesses of the cave and found the skeleton of a man. Around the ribs was a leather belt. On the belt was a name, Clubin. Attached to the belt was a flat, tightly sealed little iron box. Within the box were three sheets of paper, Bank of England notes of 1,000 each; in all, 75,000 francs.
But the engines were what he had come for. He toiled on, and one evening he sailed into St. Sampson and tied his sloop, weighted down with the Durande's engines, to Lethierry's wharf. He hummed a plaintive air which he had once heard Deruchette play on her piano.
It was five years since Gilliatt had first seen Deruchette. In all that time he had never spoken to her. He knew her as men know the morning star, at a distance. Once, seeing her with her uncle--he had dared to pass quite near. He fancied that she smiled.