suspicions as to the thief?' inquired Miss Conway.

'I believe he is a dirty little forecastle hand, who got scent that I was carrying the money ashore, and followed me,' answered Captain Jackman. 'I saw such a figure disappear as it threw my bag down an area.'

'Fifteen hundred pounds is a considerable slice for a merchant vessel to lose in these times, sir,' said the commander.

'And a merchant vessel is a considerable slice for a master to lose at all times, sir,' answered Captain Jackman.

'Have they dismissed you?' inquired Ada.

'Yes,' said the captain with a careless laugh, 'and so I came down here to enjoy myself by getting locked down in a cave, and making for one of the ugliest of deaths. How can I thank you—how can I thank you, madam?' he said, languishing towards Ada.

Just then a single knock fell upon the hall door, and the commander returned with Captain Jackman's round hat.

'Thanks for all things,' he exclaimed, as he took it.

'I wonder, sir,' remarked the commander, 'that you should have thought proper to venture your life in an underground cutting with one candle only.'

'It was a tall candle,' answered the captain; 'and I did not think that I was going below to be locked down.'

'True!' exclaimed old Conway.

Captain Jackman, in these few moments of pause in the talk, seemed to make an askant study of the commander, who sat opposite. The light was poor for facial revelations. He distinguished a rather stern expression, brows heavily thatched with white hair, a nearly bald head, with the white hair cut short about the ears. He was disproportionately square, and sat a massive figure. The captain's scrutiny was brief. He turned his eyes upon the young lady, whose eyes met his; then he looked at the clock.

'I am the cause of keeping you out of bed,' he said, rising. 'Will you permit me to retire?'

'Show the captain his room, Ada,' said the commander.

The girl lighted a rush-light that was upon the hall table, and led the way upstairs, and the commander followed, calmly receiving the impassioned shake of the hand Captain Jackman bestowed upon him.

That morning at ten o'clock Captain Jackman awoke, and found himself in a snug little bedroom of white dimity, trembling with brilliance that streamed upon the blinds from the sea. As he got out of bed, he heard a woman singing low and clear. He raised the blinds, and beheld a prospect that assuredly justified Commander Conway's choice of residence. No loftiest mast-head yields you a grander scene. It was painted here and there with a ship, and was coloured blue and white, and the heavens bent blue to the edge of it; but a number of clouds of delicate shape, and charged with a dark softness of rain, were rolling up from the south-west.

'This is a home to suit me,' thought the captain, and, hearing the girl singing either next door or downstairs, he fell a-musing.

The maidservant, answering his bell, brought him the commander's razor and some hot water, and in twenty minutes he was downstairs. The house door was open, and the commander walked up and down his lawn, smoking a pipe of Dutch pattern. He showed himself by daylight as a man of strong features, heavily bronzed, as by years of travel. His eyes were a keen blue, and deep set, and his mouth a curl, the under lip slightly protruding.

'Good-morning, sir!' he exclaimed to the captain. 'I hope you slept well.'

The usual civilities were exchanged.

'Breakfast will be ready when my daughter is pleased to appear. She is risen,' said the commander.

'I have been listening to her charming voice. Is she your only child, sir?'

'I lost a promising young son in the navy eight years ago,' answered the commander.

'I served as midshipman in the navy,' exclaimed Captain Jackman.

'Oh!' said the commander, with sudden interest. 'What ship and captain, sir?'

'The Parkhurst; Captain Trottman.'

'I knew them both. A fine frigate, and a stout seaman. Why didn't you stick to the service?'

'Why, the life of the mercantile flag was free and easy; it offered more money; it provided plenty of voyages and chances. I never particularly coveted the glory that was to be got in the navy. I should want my flag first.'

'That sort of glory is a slow sunrise with us, sir,' said the commander.

'Then, again, I was to a certain degree independent,' continued Captain Jackman, talking in a careless, confidential way. 'My father had left me an annuity—not, indeed, enough to roll on wheels with—that and a small, handsome brig under two hundred tons, now lying in the East India Dock. I have often been tempted to sell her. Now that my kindly owners have given me my quietus through no fault of my own, I have a very great mind to fit her out——'

'And go for a cruise on the Account,' interrupted the clear voice of a girl.

And Captain Jackman, turning, clasped the extended hand of Miss Conway.

Her garb was simple and charming. The hat she held was a kind of helmet, with a wreath and a tuft of feathers. She stood in the pride of her fine but simple apparel.

'Breakfast should be ready,' said the commander.

He led the way into the house. Captain Jackman and Miss Conway followed, chatting with life and spirit over the wonderful incident of yesterday. How could such a heart-shaking sensation be exhausted! The commander had furnished a savoury breakfast of large fried soles and delicate fried whiting, and bacon and eggs. They seated themselves; and when the captain had concluded his apologies for detaining the commander, he turned to Miss Conway, and said—

'You have read books which deal with pirates?'

'Yes. Papa will tell you that I was ever a lover of the pirate. I mean the real thing, not the Byronic dandy with his bright costume and four or five houris and lovely homes on coral strands. I love the rough brute with a slash across his brow—the man who has lost a piece of his nose, who, perhaps, has captured a Spanish galleon whilst skipper of a vessel of twenty or thirty tons.'

'It has been done,' said the commander. 'If there's a scoundrel this side the moon, it's the pirate. All the woods of Scotland could not furnish gibbets enough for him. Give the piccaroon the stem, you know. That's the cry through the service, sir. We'd show mercy to anything else.'

'In spite of my father's objections to pirates, Captain Jackman,' said Ada Conway, leaning back in her chair, and beginning to laugh, and showing a fine set of white and even teeth, 'if I had your ship, I would equip her as a privateer, and sail away as a sea-robber. What splendid luck should always attend such enterprises, seeing that your quarry is the clumsy, unprepared, easily-frightened merchantman! whilst you—a single broadside might settle the matter, and win you enough treasure to fill you a large cave with.'

Captain Jackman, laughing lightly and gazing with admiration at the young lady, tapped applause of her sentiments with his knife upon the table.

'I would advise you to stick to the honourable red flag,' said the commander.

'Freights are always ruling low, as they call it,' answered the captain, 'and a man wants an office and a book-keeper; and there are expenses ashore going on,' said he, addressing the commander, but with occasional side looks at Ada. 'But, depend on't, any scheme I may form shall provide for my neck.'

'I cannot, I will say, consider the revenue worth the loss of a drop of blood, were it not for the officials of it,' said the commander, who was making a