I scrambled gaily up to the path that leads into the Island, and everything was shining bright, like the inside of an ormer shell—­the sea as blue as the sky, except close under the headlands, where it was clear, soft green; the waves farther out flashed in the sunlight and showed their white teeth wherever they met the rocks; and the rocks were yellow and brown and black, and all fringed with tawny seaweed, and here beside me the golden-rod flamed yellow and orange, and the dark green bracken swung lazily in the breeze.

And then, of a sudden, a shot rang out, and a bullet flew past my head, and cut my whistling short.

“What fool’s that?” I shouted at the smoke that floated out from behind a lump of rock in front, and a young man got up lazily from behind it, and stood looking at me as he rammed home another charge.

“You’ll be hurting someone if you don’t take care,” I said.

“I do when I care to.  That was only a hint.  Who are you, and what do you want here?”

“I’m Phil Carre, of Belfontaine.  I want to see Monsieur Le Marchant—­and Ma’m’zelle Carette.”

“Oh, you do, do you?  And what do you want with them?”

“I’ll tell them when I see them.  Do you always wish your friends good-morning with a musket on Brecqhou?”

“Our friends don’t come till they’re asked.”

“Then you don’t have many visitors, I should say.”

“All we want,” was the curt reply.

He was a tall, well-built fellow, some years older than myself, good-looking, as all the Le Marchants were, defiant of face and careless in manner.  He looked, in fact, as though it would not have troubled him in the least if his bullet had gone through my head.

He had finished loading his gun, and stood blocking the way, with no intention of letting me pass.  And how long we might have stood there I do not know, when I saw another head bobbing along among the golden-rod, and another of the brothers came up and stood beside him.

“What is it, then, Martin?  Who is he?” he asked, staring at me.

“Says he’s Phil Carre, of Belfontaine, but—­”

And the other dark face broke into a smile.  “Tiens, I remember.  You came across once before—­”

“Yes.  You had the measles.”

“And what brings you this time, Phil Carre?”

“I want to speak with Monsieur Le Marchant.”

“And to see Carette, I think you said, Monsieur Phil Carre,” said the other.

“Certainly.”

“Come along, then,” said Helier, the new-comer.  “There is no harm in Phil Carre.  You have not by any chance gone into the preventive service, Monsieur Carre?” he laughed.

“Not quite.  I’m off to the privateering.  It’s that I want to speak to your father about.”

“How then?” he asked with interest, as we walked along towards the great wooden house in the hollow.  “How does it concern him?”

“Torode of Herm is the cleverest privateer round here, they say.  I thought to try with him, and your father knows more about him than anyone else.”