he long room of the Black Boy. Now, I tell you he were a fox-ship
intriguer--grand, I should call him, in the aloneness of his villainy. He
would play his dark games out of his own hand; and sure, of all his
wickedness, this game must have seemed the sum.

"I say he sat by hisself; and I hear the listening ghost of him call me a
liar. For there were another body present, though invisible to mortal
eye; and that second party were Exciseman Jones, who was hidden up the
chimney.

"How had he inveigled him there? Ah, they've met and worried that point
out since. No other will ever know the truth this side the grave. But
reports come to be whispered; and reports said as how Dignum had made an
appointment with a bodiless master of a smack as never floated, to meet
him in the Black Boy and arrange for to run a cargo as would never be
shipped; and that somehow he managed to acquent Exciseman Jones o' this
dissembling appointment, and to secure his presence in hidin' to witness
it.

"That's conjecture; for Dignum never let on so far. But what is known for
certain is that Exciseman Jones, who were as daring and determined as
his enemy--p'r'aps more so--for some reason was in the chimney, on to a
grating in which he had managed to lower hisself from the roof; and that
he could, if given time, have scrambled up again with difficulty, but was
debarred from going lower. And, further, this is known--that, as Dignum
sat on, pretendin' to yawn and huggin' his black intent, a little sut
plopped down the chimney and scattered on the coals of the laid fire
beneath.

"At that--'Curse this waitin'!' said he. 'The room's as chill as a
belfry'; and he got to his feet, with a secret grin, and strolled to the
hearthstone.

"'I wonder,' said he, 'will the landlord object if I ventur' upon a glint
of fire for comfort's sake?' and he pulled out his flint and steel,
struck a spark, and with no more feelin' than he'd express in lighting
a pipe, set the flame to the sticks.

"The trapt rat above never stirred or give tongue. My God! what a man!
Sich a nature could afford to bide and bide--ay, for twenty year, if need
be.

"Dignum would have enjoyed the sound of a cry; but he never got it. He
listened with the grin fixed on his face; and of a sudden he heard a
scrambling struggle, like as a dog with the colic jumping at a wall; and
presently, as the sticks blazed and the smoke rose denser, a thick
coughin', as of a consumptive man under bed-cl