s she took
the envelope from the mate; "why, the address is printed by hand."

Mother and daughter looked at each other. It was evident that their
thoughts were similar, and that one could have known them without the
expenditure of the proverbial penny.

"I'll give it to him when I see him," remarked Ben, thrusting the letter
in his pocket. "It don't seem to be important. He ain't in London, at
present, I don't think."

"I shouldn't think it was important at all," said Mrs. Tipping,
soothingly.

"Not at all," echoed her daughter, whose cheek was burning with
excitement. "Good-night, Mr. Brown."

Ben bade them good-night, and in his capacity of host walked up the
wharf with them and saw them depart.

"Nice little thing, ain't she?" said the watchman who was standing
there, after Mrs. Tipping had bidden the mate good-bye; "be careful wot
you're a-doin' of, Ben. Don't go and spile yourself by a early marriage,
just as you're a-beginning to get on in life. Besides, a mate might do
better than that, and she'd only marry you for your persition."

CHAPTER XII.

In happy ignorance of the changes caused by his sudden and tragic end,
Captain Flower sat at the open window of his shabby Walworth lodging,
smoking an after-breakfast pipe, and gazing idly into the dismal,
littered yard beneath. Time--owing to his injured foot, which, neatly
bandaged at a local dispensary, rested upon a second chair--hung rather
heavily upon his hands as he sat thinking of ways and means of spending
the next six months profitably and pleasantly. He had looked at the
oleographs on the walls until he was tired, and even the marvels of the
wax fruit under a cracked glass shade began to pall upon him.

"I'll go and stay in the country a bit," he muttered; "I shall choke
here."

He took a slice of bread from the tray, and breaking it into small
pieces, began to give breakfast to three hens which passed a precarious
existence in the yard below.

"They get quite to know you now," said the small but shrewd daughter of
the house, who had come in to clear the breakfast things away. "How'd
you like your egg?"

"Very good," said Flower.

"It was new laid," said the small girl.

She came up to the window and critically inspected the birds. "She laid
it," she said, indicating one of the three.

"She's not much to look at," said Flower, regarding the weirdest-looking
of the three with some interest.

"She's a wonderful layer," said Miss Ch