r couldn't manage alone."

"What vessel?" asked Captain Cai. Both skippers were regarding the boy
with interest.

"The _Tartar Girl_--one of Mr Rogers's--with coal from South Shields,
but a Troy crew. It happened five years ago; an' last night when you
said you wanted a boy it came into my head that one of the Burts would
be just about the age. [Pam's other name is Burt, but I didn't tell it
just now, not wanting Mrs Bowldler to guess who he was.] So this
morning I got Mr Rogers to let me telephone to Tregarrick Work'ouse--an'
here he is."

"Do they dress 'em like that in there?" asked

Captain Cai.

"Better fit they did!" said the girl angrily. "They sent him over in a
clean corduroy suit with 'Work-'ouse' written all over it: and a nice
job I had to rig him up so's Mrs Bowldler shouldn' guess."

At this moment a piercing scream interrupted Fancy's explanation.
It came from one of the front rooms, and was followed by another shorter
scream--the voice unmistakably Mrs Bowldler's.

Running to the lady's rescue, they found her in the empty parlour--
alone, clutching at the mantelshelf with both hands, and preparing to
emit another cry for succour.

"What in the world's happened?" demanded Fancy the first to arrive.

"There was a man!" Mrs Bowldler ran her eyes over her protectors and
turned them, with a slow shudder, towards the window. "I seen him
distinctly. It sent my blood all of a cream."

"A man? What was he doing?" they asked.

"He was a-looking in boldly through the window . . ." Mrs Bowldler
covered her face with her hands.

"Well?" Fancy prompted her impatiently, while Captain Cai stepped out to
the front door in quest of the apparition.

"He had on a great black hat. I thought 'twas Death itself come after
me!"

While Mrs Bowldler paused to take breath and record her further
emotions, Captain Cai, reaching the front door, threw it open, looked
out into the roadway, and recoiled with a start. Close on his right a
man in black stood peering, as Mrs Bowldler had described, but now into
the drawing-room window; shielding, for a better view, the brim of a
tall hat which Captain Cai recognised with an exclamation--

"Mr Philp!"

Mr Philp withdrew his gaze, turned about and nodded without
embarrassment.

"Good evenin', Cap'n. Friend arrived?"

"Funny way to behave, isn't it?" asked Captain Cai with sternness.
"Pokin' an' pryin' in at somebody else's windows--what makes ye do it?"