"Well, then"--he leant forward, his palm resting amid a bed of
nettles. He did not appear to feel their sting, although, while he
spoke, I saw the bark of his hand whiten slowly with blisters--
"well, then, you can't go for to argue with me that the A'mighty
would go for to strike the chap that repented by means o' the chap
that didn'. Tisn' reasonable nor religious to think such a thing--is
it now?"

"He might punish the one first," said I, judicially, "and keep the
other--the wicked man--for a worse punishment in the end. A great
deal," I added, "might depend on what sort of crime they'd committed.
If 'twas a murder, now--"

"Murder?" He caught me up sharply, and his eyes turned from watching
me, to throw a quick glance back along the footpath, then fastened
themselves on the horizon. "Who's a-talkin' of any such thing?"

"I was putting a case, sir--putting it as bad as possible.
'Murder will out,' they say; but with smaller crimes it may be
different."

"Murder?" He sprang up and began to pace to and fro. "How came that
in your head, eh?" He threw me a furtive sidelong look, and halted
before me mopping his forehead. "I'll tell you what, though: Murder
there'll be if you don't help me give that devil the slip."

"But, sir, he never offered to follow you."

"Because he reckoned I couldn' run--or wouldn', as I've never run
from him yet. But with you in the secret I must give him leg-bail,
no matter what it costs me. And, see here, Brooks: you're clever for
your age, an' I want your advice. In the first place, I daren't go
home; that's where he'll be watchin' for me sooner or later. Next,
our plans ain't laid for startin' straight off--here as we be--an'
givin' him the go-by. Third an' last, I daren't go carryin' the
secret about with me; he might happen on me any moment, an' I'm not
in trainin'. The drink's done for me, boy, whereas _he_'ve been
farin' hard an' livin' clean." Captain Coffin, with his hands deep
in his pockets, stared down at the transport at anchor below, and
bent his brows. "I can't turn it over to you, neither," he mused.
"That might ha' done well enough if he hadn' seen you in my company;
but now we can't trust to it."

He took another dozen paces forth and back, and halted before me
again.

"Brooks," he said, "how about your father?"

"The very man, sir," I answered; "that is, if you would trust him."

"Cap'n Branscome tells me he's one in a thousand. I thought firs