h was clear to me; "and by my last word," said I to myself, "I'll
know the truth this day, though there be one or a hundred yellow boys!"
None the less, I held my tongue as a wise man should, and what I said
was spoken to the party with the beard.

"You've a nice soft voice for a nightingale, that you have," says I;
"if you'd let yourself out for a fog-horn to the Scilly Isles, you'd go
near to make your fortune! Is the young lady deaf that you want to bawl
like a harbour-master? Easy, my man," says I, "you'll hurt your
beautiful throat."

Well, he turned round savage enough, but my mistress, who had stood all
the while like a statue, spoke now for the first time, and holding out
both her hands to me, she cried:

"Oh, Captain Begg, Captain Begg, is it you at last, to walk right here
like this? I can't believe it," she said; "I really can't believe it!"

"Why, that's so," said I, catching her American accent, which was the
prettiest thing you ever heard; "I'm on the way to 'Frisco, and I put
in here according to my promise. My ship's out yonder, Miss Ruth, and
there's some aboard that knows you--Peter Bligh and Mister Jacob; and
this one, this is little Dolly Venn," said I, presenting him, "though
he'll grow bigger by-and-bye."

With this I pushed the boy forward, and he, all silly and blushing as
sailors will be when they see a pretty woman above their station--he
took her hand and heaved it like a pump-handle; while old Aunt Rachel,
the funny old woman in the glasses, she began to talk a lot of nonsense
about seamen, as she always did, and for a minute or two we might have
been a party of friends met at a street corner.

"I'm glad to find you well, Captain Begg," said she. "Such a dangerous
life, too, the mariner's. I always pity you poor fellows when you climb
the rattlesnakes on winter's nights."

"Ratlins, you mean, ma'am," said I, "though for that matter, a syllable
or two don't count either way. And I hope you're not poorly, ma'am, on
this queer shore."

"I like the island," says she, solemn and stiff-like; "my dear nephew
is an eccentric, but we must take our bread as we find it on this
earth, Mister Begg, and thankful for it too. Poor Ruth, now, she is
dreadfully distressed and unhappy; but I tell her it will all come
right in the end. Let her be patient a little while and she will have
her own way. She wants for nothing here--she has every comfort. If her
husband chooses such a home for her, she must s