at they looked at him in silent wonder.
Then they glanced at Sally, whose suppressed smile and downcast eyes
told eloquently that there was, as Adams would have said, "something in
the wind," and they tried to get her to reveal the secret, but Sall was
immovable. She would not add a single syllable to the information given
inadvertently by Adams, but she and he laughed a good deal in a quiet
way, and made frequent references to Rob in the course of the walk.

Of course, when the mysterious word was pronounced in the village in the
evening, and what had been said and hinted about it was repeated,
curiosity was kindled into a violent flame; and when the entire colony
was invited to a feast that night, the excitement was intense. From the
oldest to the youngest, excluding the more recently arrived sprawlers,
every eye was fixed on John Adams during the whole course of supper,
except at the commencement, when the customary blessing was asked, at
which point every eye was tightly closed.

Adams, conscious of increased importance, spoke little during the meal,
and maintained an air of profounder gravity than usual until the dishes
were cleared away. Then he looked round the assembled circle, and said,
"Women an' child'n, I'm goin' to tell 'ee a story."

CHAPTER TWENTY THREE.

THE PITCAIRNERS HAVE A NIGHT OF IT.

Although John Adams had often, in the course of his residence on
Pitcairn, jested and chatted and taken his share in relating many an
anecdote, he had never up till that time resolved to "go in," as he
said, "for a regular story, like a book."

"Women an' child'n," he began, "it may be that I'm goin' to attempt more
than I'm fit to carry out in this business, for my memory's none o' the
best. However, that won't matter much, for I tell 'ee, fair an'
aboveboard at the beginnin', that when I come to gaps that I can't fill
up from memory, I'll just bridge 'em over from imagination, d'ye see?"

"What's imagination?" demanded Dan McCoy, whose tendency to pert
interruption and reply nothing yet discovered could restrain.

"It's a puzzler," said Otaheitan Sally, in a low tone, which called
forth a laugh from the others.

It did not take much to make these people laugh, as the observant reader
will have perceived.

"Well, it _is_ a puzzler," said Adams, with a quiet smile and a
perplexed look. "I may say, Dan McCoy, in an off-hand rough-an'-ready
sort o' way, that imagination is that power o' the mind whic