nine
o'clock
The meal over we dismissed Pedro for the night , and then proceeded to pack up our dilapidated uniforms in a small parcel , to assist in our identification as British officers should such prove necessary . This brought the time on to about half-past seven , at which hour we had arranged to meet again in the park , Inez having insisted -- much against my wish -- in accompanying us to the cove and satisfying herself as to the fact of our actual escape . The walk to the cove was not a long one , only some three miles or so , but it occupied us a full hour and a half , and a very wretched time it proved for both of us . We reached the place fixed upon as the point for our embarkation at nine o'clock , and a few minutes later a small wavering black blotch appeared through the intense darkness off the entrance . We heard the sound of a coil of rope being flung upon a deck , followed by a creaking of blocks ; then a scraping sound and a splash such as would be caused by the launching of a boat over the low gunwale of a small craft , an indistinct murmur of voices for a moment , and then the plash of oars in the water . The distance to be traversed by the boat was not more than three or four hundred feet ; I therefore had time only to breathe a hurried and inarticulate word or two of final farewell to Inez , during which I slipped on to her slender finger the only ring I possessed , when a grating sound down by the water 's edge told us that the boat had grounded , and we hurried away down the beach . The boat was a tiny cockle-shell of a craft , with only one man in her , and he was just hauling her nose up out of the water as we reached him .