matters any better, of course, but I couldn't keep from it.

"I got knocking about with a bad lot of chaps; and the end of it was,
some of us came here. I don't care how soon it's all over with me. I
hate this business, and I hate myself."

Here Ben came to a pause, as though he had said more than he intended;
and Eric, not knowing what to interpose, looked at him in silent
sympathy, until he began again.

"But I haven't told ye why I saved ye from Evil-Eye.

"Well, it was just this way. When I found ye, you were lying on the
sand like as though you were asleep; and you fairly gave me a start,
you looked so like my own boy. He was just about your age when he was
lost, and you'd be much the same size, and he had brown hair just like
yours.

"If my boy had been lying half-dead on the beach, I'd have thought any
man worse than a brute that wouldn't help the lad. So I just made up
my mind to take your part, Evil-Eye or no Evil-Eye; and now I'm going
to stick to it."

Having spoken thus, Ben put his pipe back between his lips, evidently
having no more to say. Eric hardly knew how to give expression to his
feelings. Sympathy for his rescuer's troubles and gratitude for his
assurance of safe-keeping filled his heart. The tears gathered in his
eyes, and his voice trembled as, turning to the big man beside him, he
laid his hand upon his knee, and looking up into his face, said,--

"You've been very good to me, Mr. Ben. You're the only friend I've got
here except Prince, and I'm sure you won't let any harm come to me, if
you can help it. And I'm so sorry about your son. You see, we've both
lost somebody: you've lost your boy, and I--I've lost my mother."

His voice sank to a whisper as he uttered the words, and the tears he
had been bravely keeping back overflowed upon his cheeks.

Ben said not a word. There was a suspicious glistening about his
eyelids, and the quite superfluous vigour of his puffing told plainly
enough that he was deeply moved. After a moment he rose to his feet,
knocked the ashes out of his pipe, and putting it into his pocket,
said,--

"Come, lad, let us go back to the hut."

The two retraced their steps to the wreckers' abode. Eric now felt
more at ease than he had since the shipwreck. With such protectors as
Ben and Prince he surely had not much to fear, even in the evil company
among which he had been cast. As to the future--well, it certainly did
seem dark. But he had been