He let go of her suddenly and she saw him run toward the site of the new arsenal. He came back holding an unlighted lantern.

"Have you got a light?" he asked Jolival.

"Of course. But do we need one?"

"No. I know. Only lend me flint and tinder and wait for me. I shouldn't be long but if I'm not back in, say, half an hour, then go without me."

"Jason!" Marianne cried, struggling to keep her voice down. "Where are you going? I am coming with you."

He turned and took her hand and squeezed it tightly before putting it in Jolival's.

"No. I forbid you. What I am going to do is my business. She is my ship."

The Irishman already understood.

"But I am coming with you," he said firmly. "The rest of you, wait for us. Rouse Gracchus and try to find some kind of vehicle for the journey. We can't walk to St. Petersburg."

In another moment he was running after the dark figure of Beaufort, who was making for the small beach where some boats lay drawn up out of the water.

"This is madness!" Jolival cried, no longer bothering to keep his voice down. "We won't find one, except at the post house by the Kiev gate, and for that we must climb the hill again to the other side of the town. And even then we may have trouble—"

Craig paused for a moment and they heard him laugh.

"Sure and you may have somewhat less trouble if we are successful. The folk hereabouts will have enough doing at the harbor to keep them busy awhile. They'll not be troubling themselves about the likes of us. Now hurry."

A moment later Marianne and Jolival saw with a sudden chill a small boat put out from the shore and creep slowly and silently over the dark water.

"What are they going to do?" Marianne whispered fearfully. "They surely wouldn't—"

"Yes. They are going to set fire to the Sea Witch. I was expecting something of the sort. A man like Beaufort could never have consented to leave his ship behind… Come, we too have work to do. You can say your prayers later," he added, not without a touch of irritation, as he became aware that Marianne was murmuring softly over her clasped hands.

The house of which the Greek tavern occupied the ground floor was small and square with only a single upper floor. There was one large window enclosed with a latticework balcony in the Arab style and next to it another, much smaller one, closed by a single wooden shutter. Feeling that there was a strong likelihood that this would be where young Gracchus slept, Jolival picked up a stone and threw it hard against the shutter.

He had guessed right, for after a moment a hand pushed the shutter open with a faint creak and a tousled head looked out. Before he could say anything, Jolival called up softly: "Gracchus! Is that you?"

"Yes, but who—"

"It's us, Gracchus," Marianne said, "Monsieur de Jolival and—"

"Mademoiselle Marianne! By all the saints! I'm coming down."

The next instant Gracchus-Hannibal Pioche dropped quite literally into their arms and hugged them both with the utmost enthusiasm, seeing them in that moment not as his employers but as friends miraculously restored to him. They returned his greeting just as warmly, but Jolival saw to it that their transports did not last too long.

"Listen here, my lad," he said firmly, breaking in on the young man's exclamations of delight, which even in whispers were still penetrating enough. "We aren't here for a reunion. We need your help."

Leaving Jolival to explain hurriedly what had been happening,

Marianne made her way back to the waterfront. Already it was less dark. The forest of masts stood out more clearly, and so did the white crests of the small choppy waves. A sudden gust of wind whirled around her, filling the wide cloak she was wearing and making it clap like a flag. She stood with every sense on the alert, straining her ears to catch the slightest sound of oars amid the rattle of small bits of wood blown by the wind, and peering out into the shadows of the harbor.

It seemed to her that Jason and Craig had been gone for hours and his last words reechoed in her mind: "If I am not back in half an hour…" It was too dark for her to see her watch, but according to the pendulum of her heart that half hour must have been up weeks ago.

Suddenly, just when she could bear it no longer, and was on the point of setting out along the mole whose long stone causeway lost itself in shadow, she saw a tongue of fire leap up in the darkness ahead, lighting up a thick cloud of smoke shot with a red glow along its underside. At the same moment she saw two vagrants jump up like rats fleeing a sinking ship from behind the pile of casks, where they must have sought refuge for the night, and run toward the houses uttering some harsh cries she could not understand but which could no doubt have been translated as "Fire! Fire!"

Immediately the harbor was wide awake. Lights sprang up and windows were thrown open. There were shouts and cries and dogs began to bark. Realizing that she was likely to be cut off from her friends, Marianne turned back to find Jolival and Gracchus. She met Jolival halfway to the tavern and saw that he was alone.

"Where has Gracchus gone to now?"

"He's arranging our departure. I've given him money and we'll join him later in the upper town. He'll be waiting for us at the end of the main street, the Deribasovskaya, not far from the posting house. Let's hope Jason and Craig will not be much longer."

"They've been gone so long already. You don't think—"

He took her arm and slipped it through his own, patting it reassuringly.

"No, I don't. It seems a long time to you, and that's quite natural. But it's barely a quarter of an hour since they left us and if you ask me, they've not been wasting any time."

The fire, in fact, seemed to be spreading. Tall flames licked up into the night and the wind was blowing thick waves of choking black smoke in toward the shore. Men with buckets were beginning to run toward the mole and the light of the fire showed more and more people crowding onto the waterfront. A bell somewhere began to toll wildly.

"It's a good thing the brig was anchored at the far end of the mole. Otherwise, with this wind, those two madmen would have stood a good chance of setting fire to half the town," Jolival grunted.

His next words were swallowed up in a deafening roar, accompanied by a tremendous explosion of fire. Jolival scrambled quickly onto a stone block attached to a nearby house, dragging Marianne after him. They cried out at the sight that met their eyes.

Evidently the Sea Witch had blown up and now the fire was traveling to the other ships moored nearby. It seemed as if the sea itself were on fire and the screams of the crowd were drowned in the roaring of the flames, driven by the wind.

"Jason knew his ship," Jolival muttered. "He must have set fire to the magazine. That explosion was a ton of powder going up."

In fact the after part of the stricken brig was still spitting fire like a volcano. The mizzenmast flared like a torch and crashed in a shower of sparks onto the prow of a neighboring frigate, which was already alight. Marianne swallowed suddenly and found that there were tears in her eyes. She had been jealous of the ship, seeing her as a rival for Jason's love, but to see her perish thus, by her master's own hand, was a shocking thing. It was as if she were watching the death of a friend, or even her own death. She thought of the figurehead, the figure of the green-eyed siren carved in her own likeness, which in another moment would be burned to ashes.

She heard Jolival at her side give a slight sniff and she knew that he too was having difficulty with his feelings.

"She was a beautiful ship," he said quietly.

Jason's voice, breathless and rasping, answered him.

"Yes, she was beautiful… and I loved her like my own child. But I'd rather see her burn than know her in another's hands."

Marianne saw by the light of the fire that both he and Craig were white and dripping with sea water. But neither seemed aware of it. Both their eyes were on the Sea Witch and in both there was the same fury of grief.

"Our boat capsized from the force of the explosion," the Irishman explained. "We had to swim for it."

All at once Marianne flung her arms around Jason's neck, shaking with convulsive sobs. Tenderly, his arm went around her while with the other he drew her head down onto his shoulder and gently stroked her hair.

"Don't cry," he said quietly. "We'll have another ship, bigger and still more beautiful. It was my own fault in a way. I ought never to have called her Sea Witch. She was fated to be burned… like a real witch."

Marianne gulped miserably. "Jason… are you superstitious?"

"No… not in the usual way. But it grieves me and maybe I am not quite myself. Shall we go? The whole town seems to be converging on the harbor. No one will notice us."

"But you're soaking wet and your clothes are in rags! You can't travel like that."

"Why not? I may be all you say, but at least I'm free, thanks to you, and that in itself is wonderful."

With that, he swung her almost gaily off the stone bench onto the ground and, still holding her hand, pulled her after him up the street that led up the hill to the new town. Jolival and Craig hurried after them, keeping close to the walls to avoid being swept away by the ever-increasing crowds of people flowing downhill to the harbor.

Seen from above, the fire had assumed such proportions that the whole port area seemed to be alight. In fact, only three ships, those nearest to the brig, had been attacked by the flames. The four fugitives paused under the branches of a gigantic sycamore that overhung a garden wall to regain their breath after the climb and looked back for a moment.