the ghastly sight, they holloaed and bellowed like
bulls, coming to reason only at the skipper's cry.

"Take 'em up to the cavern, some of you there, and lay 'em side by side
to cool," he said brutally, and his orders were instantly obeyed.
Others of the crew brought buckets and swabs unbidden, and cleansed the
place, after which Black addressed the men again as though the terrible
scene was a thing of common happening.

"Before I give you good-night," he said, "I want to tell you that we've
got a stranger with us; but he's here to stay, and he's my charge."

"Has he jined?" asked the blear-eyed Yankee, who had eyed me with much
curiosity; but the captain answered--

"That's my affair, and you keep your tongue still if you don't want me
to cut it out; he'll join us by-and-by."

"That's agen rules," said the man Roaring John, loafing up with others,
who seemed to resent the departure.

"Agen what?" asked Black in a tone of thunder, turning on the fellow a
ferocious gaze; "agen what, did you remark?"

"Agen rules," replied Roaring John; "his man broke my jaw, and I'll pay
him, oh, you guess; it's not for you to go agen what's written no more
than us."

Black's anger was evident, but he held it under.

"Maybe you're right," he said carelessly; "we've made it that no
stranger stays here unless he joins, except them in the mines--but I've
my own ideas on that, and when the time comes I'll abide by what's
done. That time isn't yet, and if any man would like to dictate to me,
let him step out--maybe it's you, John?"

The fellow slunk away under the threat, but there were mutterings in
the room when we left; and I doubt not that my presence was freely
discussed. This did not much concern me, for Black was master beyond
all question, and he protected me.

We went back with him to the long passage where I had seen the doors of
bed-chambers, and there he bade me good-night. The doctor showed me
into a room in the passage, furnished both as a sitting-room and a
bedroom, a chamber cut in the solid rock, but with windows towards the
sea; and when he had seen to the provisions for my comfort, he, too,
went his way. But first he said--

"You must have been born under a lucky star: you're the first man to
whom Black ever gave an hour's grace."

CHAPTER XVIII.

THE DEN OF DEATH.

The bed in which I lay was wondrous soft and downy; and the cold gave
me deep sleep, so that I awoke at a late hour to find the sun