ing of vague resentment: "Oh yes. He's not
a mining man!"

Hemmings replied: "We think that he will do." 'Do you?' thought
Scorrier; 'that's good of you!'

He had not altogether shaken off a worship he had felt for
Pippin--"King" Pippin he was always called, when they had been boys
at the Camborne Grammar-school. "King" Pippin! the boy with the bright
colour, very bright hair, bright, subtle, elusive eyes, broad shoulders,
little stoop in the neck, and a way of moving it quickly like a bird;
the boy who was always at the top of everything, and held his head as
if looking for something further to be the top of. He remembered how one
day "King" Pippin had said to him in his soft way, "Young Scorrie,
I'll do your sums for you"; and in answer to his dubious, "Is that all
right?" had replied, "Of course--I don't want you to get behind that
beast Blake, he's not a Cornishman" (the beast Blake was an Irishman not
yet twelve). He remembered, too, an occasion when "King" Pippin with two
other boys fought six louts and got a licking, and how Pippin sat for
half an hour afterwards, all bloody, his head in his hands, rocking to
and fro, and weeping tears of mortification; and how the next day he had
sneaked off by himself, and, attacking the same gang, got frightfully
mauled a second time.

Thinking of these things he answered curtly: "When shall I start?"

"Down-by-the-starn" Hemmings replied with a sort of fearful
sprightliness: "There's a good fellow! I will send instructions; so glad
to see you well." Conferring on Scorrier a look--fine to the verge
of vulgarity--he withdrew. Scorrier remained, seated; heavy with
insignificance and vague oppression, as if he had drunk a tumbler of
sweet port.

A week later, in company with Pippin, he was on board a liner.

The "King" Pippin of his school-days was now a man of forty-four. He
awakened in Scorrier the uncertain wonder with which men look backward
at their uncomplicated teens; and staggering up and down the decks in
the long Atlantic roll, he would steal glances at his companion, as if
he expected to find out from them something about himself. Pippin had
still "King" Pippin's bright, fine hair, and dazzling streaks in his
short beard; he had still a bright colour and suave voice, and what
there were of wrinkles suggested only subtleties of humour and ironic
sympathy. From the first, and apparently without negotiation, he had
his seat at the captain's table, to which on the s