lear Ken's Island of fog," cried I. "Ah, of course,
it will. We shall breathe just now and go about like sane men. I am
younger for hearing it, doctor."

He said, "Yes, it was good news," and then put some sticks into the
grate and began to make a fire. The others still slept heavily. Little
Dolly Venn muttered in his sleep a name I thought I had heard before,
and, truth to tell, it was something like "Rosamunda." The doctor
himself was as busy as a housemaid.

"Yes," he continued, presently, "we should be pretty well through with
the sleep-time, and after that, waking. Does anything occur to you?"

I sat up in the chair and looked at him closely. His own manner of
speech was catching.

"Why, yes," said I, "something does occur. For one thing, we may have
company."

He lit a match and watched the wood blazing up the chimney. A bit of
fire is always a cheerful thing, and it did me good to see it that
morning.

"Czerny has more than a hundred men," said he, after some reflection.
"We are four and one, which makes five; five exactly."

Now, this was the first time he had confessed to anything which might
let a man know where his sympathies lay. Friend or enemy, yesterday
taught me nothing about him. I learnt afterwards that he had once known
Kenrick Bellenden in Philadelphia. I think he was glad to have four
comrades with him on Ken's Island.

"If you mean thereby, doctor, that you'd join us," was my reply, "you
couldn't tell me better news. You know why I came here and you know why
I stay. It may mean much to Mme. Czerny to have such a friend as you.
What can be done by five men on this cursed shore shall be done, I
swear; but I am glad that you are with us--very glad."

I really meant it, and spoke from my heart: but he was not a
demonstrative man, and he rarely answered one directly as one might
have wished. On this occasion, I remember, he went about his work for a
little while before he spoke again; and it was not until the coffee was
boiling on the hob that he came across to me and, seating himself on
the arm of my chair, asked, abruptly:

"Do you know what fool's errand brought me to this place?"

"I have imagined it," said I. "You wanted to know the truth about the
sleep-time."

He laughed that queer little laugh which expressed so much when you
heard it.

"No," said he, "I do not care a dime either way! I just came along to
advertise myself. Ken's Island and its secrets are my newspaper. When I
g