y had the Governor got back to the house when his boys, his men,
and the maids returned from Ramsey. Very full they all were of the
doings of the day, and Adam, who never asked that son or servant of
his should abridge the flow of talk for his presence, sat with his
face to the fire and smoked, dozed, dreamt or thought, and left his
people to gossip on. What chance had brought the poor man to his door
that night? An Icelander, dumb for all uses of speech, who had lain
in the chains of some tyrant captain--a lone man, a seaman without
wife or child in his own country, and a fugitive, a runaway, a
hunted dog in this one! What angel of pleading had that very night
been busy in his own memory with the story of his similar sufferings?

All at once his ear was arrested by what was being said behind him.
The talk was of a sailor who had passed through the town, and of the
blue-jackets who were in pursuit of him. He had stolen something. No,
he had murdered somebody. Anyway there was a warrant for his arrest,
for the High Bailiff had drawn it. An ill-looking fellow, but he
would be caught yet, thank goodness, in God's good time.

The Governor twisted about, and asked what the sailor was like, and
his boys answered him that he was a foreigneering sort of a man in
a skin cap and long stockings, and bigger by half a head than
Billy-by-Nite.

Just then there was the tramp of feet on the gravel outside and a
loud rap at the door. Four men entered. They were the blue-jackets.
The foreign seaman that they were in search of had been seen creeping
up Ballure, and turning down towards Lague. Had he been there?

At that one of the boys, saying that his father had been at home all
evening, turned to the Governor and repeated the question. But the
good Adam had twisted back to the fire, and with the shank of his
pipe hanging loosely from his lips, was now snoring heavily.

"His Excellency is asleep," said the blue-jacket.

No, no; that could not be, for he had been talking as they entered.
"Father," cried the lad, and pushed him.

Then the Governor opened his eyes, and yawned heavily. The
blue-jacket, cap in hand, told his story again, and the good Adam
seemed to struggle hard in the effort to grasp it through the mists
of sleep. At length he said, "What has the man done?"

"Deserted his ship, your Excellency."

"Nothing else--no crime?"

"Nothing else, your Excellency. Has he been here?"

"No;" said the Governor.

And at tha