art of his face. Dick dared not gaze
on the man too earnestly, and could see no likeness to the picture on
the wall at Shadwell; but, allowing for the effects of hardship and
suffering, he judged him to be about the age of his father.

The man was evidently on good terms with the soldiers, one or two of
whom were chaffing him on his purchase.

"Will nothing but the best tobacco satisfy you?" one laughed.

"Nothing; and even that won't really satisfy me. This stuff is good
enough, when rolled up, for cigars, and it does well enough in
hookahs; but I would give all this pound for a couple of pipes of
pigtail, which is the tobacco we smoked at sea."

Again Dick's heart beat rapidly. This man must have been a sailor. He
could not restrain himself from speaking.

"Have you been a sailor, then?" he asked.

"Ay, I was a sailor, though it is many years ago, now, since I saw the
sea."

"We got some English tobacco at Madras," Dick said, not hesitating for
once at telling an untruth. "We sold most of it to the Feringhee
soldiers, on our way up, but I think I have got a little of it still
left somewhere in the pack. I am too busy to look for it now, and we
shall soon be going to show our goods to the officers' wives; but if
you can come here at nine o'clock, I may have looked it out for you."

"I can't come at nine," the man said, "for at half-past eight I am
shut up for the night."

"Come at eight, then," Dick said. "If I am not back, come the first
thing in the morning, before we get busy."

"I will come, sure enough," the man said. "I would walk a hundred
miles, if they would let me, for half a pound of pigtail."

"Get rid of them, Surajah," Dick whispered, as the man shouldered his
way through the crowd. "Make some excuse to send them off."

"Now, my friends," Surajah said, "you see it is getting dusk. It will
soon be too dark to see what you are buying, and we have been selling
for eight hours, and need rest. At eight o'clock tomorrow we will open
our packs again, and everyone shall be served; but I pray you excuse
us going on any longer now. As you see, we are not as young as we once
were, and are both sorely weary."

As time was no object, and the work of purchasing would relieve the
tedium of the following day, the crowd good humouredly dispersed.
Surajah rose and closed the door after the last of them, and then
turned to Dick. He had, himself, been too busily engaged in satisfying
the demands of the custom