“It’s only sometimes,” said Carette lamely.  “You let him go and maybe he’ll speak.”

“See, my lad,” said the burly one, letting go the boy’s ear but keeping a grip on his shoulder.  “I’m not going to harm you.  All I want to know is whether you’ve seen any sizable ships banging about here lately.—­You know what I mean!”

The small boy knew perfectly what he meant, and his lip curled at thought of being mistaken for the kind of boy who would open his mouth to a preventive man.  He shook his head, however.

“Not, eh?  Well, you know the neighbourhood anyway.  Take me to the Boutiques.”

“The Boutiques?” cried Carette.

“Ah!  The Boutiques.  You know where the Boutiques are, I can see.”

They both knew the Boutiques.  It would be a very small child on Sercq who did not know that much.  The small boy knew, too, that both the Boutiques and the Gouliot caves had nooks and niches in their higher ranges, boarded off and secured with stout padlocked doors, where goods were stored for transfer to the cutters and chasse-marees as occasion offered, just as they were in the great warehouses of the Guernsey merchants.  He had vague ideas that so long as the goods were on dry land the preventive men could not touch them, but of that he was not perfectly certain.  These troublesome Customs’ officers were constantly having new powers conferred on them.  He had overheard the men discussing them many a time, and the very fact of this man trying to find the Boutiques was in itself suspicious.  But the man was a stranger.  That was evident from his uncouth talk and foolish ways, and the small boy’s mind was made up in a moment.

Carette was watching anxiously, with a wild idea in her mind that if she flung herself at the preventive man’s feet and held them tightly, the boy might wriggle away and escape.

But the boy had a brighter scheme than that.  He turned and led the way inland, and dropped a wink to Carette as he did so, and her anxious little brain jumped to the fact that the stranger was to be misled.

Her sharpened faculties perceived that the best way to second his efforts was to pretend a vehement objection to his action and so lend colour to it.

“Don’t you do it, Phil!” she cried, dancing round them.  “Don’t you do it, or I’ll never speak to you again as long as I live.”

Phil marched steadily on with the heavy hand gripping his shoulder.

“Sensible boy!” said the preventive man.

As everyone knows, the Boutiques lie hid among the northern cliffs by the Eperquerie.  But, once lose sight of the sea, amid the tangle of wooded lanes which traverse the Island, and, without the guidance of the sun, it needs a certain amount of familiarity with the district to know exactly where one will come out.

The small boy stolidly led the way past Beaumanoir, and Carette wailed like a lost soul alongside.  Jeanne Falla looked out as they passed and called out to know what was happening.