se face expanded with
pleasure. A moment before he had not liked the way in which Harry had
taken his hints; but now this declaration of an intention to give him
something was pleasant, and he smiled quite broadly as the young man
went to a cupboard.

"Will it be five or ten pound?" said Zekle to himself. "I'm making a
good night of it this time, and if I don't--Don't you hit me with that
there, Mas'r Harry! don't you hit me with that there!" he roared
suddenly. "Don't you hit me with that there, or I'll have the law of
you."

"Get out of the place, you contemptible, tale-bearing sneak!" said
Harry; and he accompanied his words with lash after lash of a big
old-fashioned dog-whip. "How dare you come here with your miserable
stories! Out with you, you dog, or I'll lash you till you are blue!"

There could be no doubt but that some of the strokes administered would
leave blue weals, though Zekle did not get many. Four or five fell upon
his back and sides, however, before he got out of the door; and he was
just turning to shake his fist and vow vengeance when a tremendous lash
curled round him, inflicting so much pain that he uttered a loud yell
and ran as hard as he could to a safe distance, where he turned once to
shout, "Yah, coward!" and then disappeared.

"Coward!" said Harry bitterly. "Well, people say I am. Don't be
frightened, dear," he continued as his mother entered the room in haste.

"But I am, my dear," she cried excitedly. "What does all this mean?"

"I only used the dog-whip to a scoundrel--that's all," he said, with a
reassuring smile; and as soon as he had pacified her he went outside to
walk up and down and think about his late escape.

"No," he said at last after a long thought, during which he had gone
well over his adventures that evening; "I will not believe that a man
could be such a wretch."

He felt better after this and went in; but that night the excitement of
the adventure and the effects of his immersion were sufficient to keep
him awake hour after hour, while when he dropped off into an uneasy
slumber it was for his mind to be haunted by dreams in which he was
being dragged down into the depths of the sea by a strange monster that
clung to his limbs and writhed about him, making him shudder as he felt
the chilling embrace.

Again and again he awoke and tried to shake off the unpleasant
sensation, but no sooner did he drop off to sleep again than the
horrible dream came back