laws? Look here--I'm going for a run in my bit of a
yacht--come with me! How soon can you be ready?"

"As soon as I've taken my dinner, Sir Gilbert," I answered, pleased
enough at the invitation. "Would an hour do?"

"You needn't bother about your dinner," he said. "I'm having a lunch
basket packed now at the hotel, and I'll step in and tell them to put in
enough for two. Go and get a good thick coat, and meet me down at the
front in half an hour."

I ran off home, told my mother where I was going, and hurried away to the
river-side. The Tweed was like a mirror flashing back the sunlight that
day, and out beyond its mouth the open sea was bright and blue as the sky
above. How could I foresee that out there, in those far-off dancing
waters, there was that awaiting me of which I can only think now, when it
is long past, with fear and horror?

CHAPTER XIX

MY TURN

I had known for some time that Sir Gilbert Carstairs had a small yacht
lying at one of the boathouses on the riverside; indeed, I had seen her
before ever I saw him. She was a trim, graceful thing, with all the
appearance of an excellent sea-boat, and though she looked like a craft
that could stand a lot of heavy weather, she had the advantage of being
so light in draught--something under three feet--that it was possible for
her to enter the shallowest harbour. I had heard that Sir Gilbert was
constantly sailing her up and down the coast, and sometimes going well
out to sea in her. On these occasions he was usually accompanied by a
fisherlad whom he had picked up somehow or other: this lad, Wattie Mason,
was down by the yacht when I reached her, and he gave me a glowering look
when he found that I was to put his nose out for this time at any rate.
He hung around us until we got off, as a hungry dog hangs around a table
on the chance of a bone being thrown to him; but he got no recognition
from Sir Gilbert, who, though the lad had been useful enough to him
before, took no more notice of him that day than of one of the pebbles on
the beach. And if I had been more of a student of human nature, I should
have gained some idea of my future employer's character from that small
circumstance, and have seen that he had no feeling or consideration for
anybody unless it happened to be serving and suiting his purpose.

But at that moment I was thinking of nothing but the pleasure of taking a
cruise in the yacht, in the company of a man in whom I was naturally