od order again, and
was all ready to start off on a new stream of jabber. "Dat's so--Clump
not ole nuff ter know dat fire-lite more good dan lam-lite. Hi! hi! he
only chile yit."

Drake interrupted there, to turn the conversation into another channel,
by saying that we should leave the old house soon to go back to Bristol,
and Clump asked, having taken a seat on the wood-box directly under the
trap-door, "An you'se glad--glad? 'Spects de ole house git cole an dull
to yous now; 'spects de yun Massas want git home?"

"Well, no, Clump," answered Drake; "I don't want to go away--that is, we
would not want to go if--if--if we had not been somewhat frightened this
evening."

Juno, because of her deafness, did not plainly hear what Drake had said,
but she judged it in part from his manner and the assumed look of terror
that he cast over his shoulder. So she bent forward anxiously, and
asked him in a voice full of concern--

"Wat's dat, Massa Drake--wat's dat you say?" Drake drew nearer to her
and repeated what he had said. "My hebbens, Massa Drake, wat did scar
you?"

"Well, you see, Aunt Juno," replied Drake, looking cautiously about him
again in the darkness of the room--"Bob and I were coming round at the
back of the house, when we heard, or thought we heard, whispering, and
on drawing nearer, we heard some fearful threats uttered; I cannot say
what they were, they were so dreadful."

"Oh! don't talk so, Massa Drake, if dere was anybody, dey must be de
smugglers, and dey will come to cut all our troats," exclaimed Juno,
looking cautiously round over her shoulder.

I cannot say that even then, thoughtless as I was, I liked what Drake
had said, because he had told a positive falsehood, and it was no excuse
to declare that it was said in joke. Drake continued, his voice growing
more and more tremulous every instant, as if with terror--"That's not
all. As we crept away undiscovered, we heard the tramp of many feet
coming up from the shore, and we shouldn't be surprised if at this very
moment the house was surrounded by smugglers, come to carry us all off
to foreign lands, to make slaves of us."

"Or to make soup of us," I cried out, wringing my hands. "Oh dear, oh
dear, oh dear!"

"What has become of Walter and the rest, it is impossible to say," added
Drake. "Too probably they have been already spirited away by the
smugglers. Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear!" he exclaimed, and, jumping up,
ran out as if to loo