TORS

Miss Garland and Loveday walked leisurely to the inn and called for horse-
and-gig. While the hostler was bringing it round, the landlord, who knew
Bob and his family well, spoke to him quietly in the passage.

'Is this then because you want to throw dust in the eyes of the Black
Diamond chaps?' (with an admiring glance at Bob's costume).

'The Black Diamond?' said Bob; and Anne turned pale.

'She hove in sight just after dark, and at nine o'clock a boat having
more than a dozen marines on board, with cloaks on, rowed into harbour.'

Bob reflected. 'Then there'll be a press to-night; depend upon it,' he
said.

'They won't know you, will they, Bob?' said Anne anxiously.

'They certainly won't know him for a seaman now,' remarked the landlord,
laughing, and again surveying Bob up and down. 'But if I was you two, I
should drive home-along straight and quiet; and be very busy in the mill
all to-morrow, Mr. Loveday.'

They drove away; and when they had got onward out of the town, Anne
strained her eyes wistfully towards Portland. Its dark contour, lying
like a whale on the sea, was just perceptible in the gloom as the
background to half-a-dozen ships' lights nearer at hand.

'They can't make you go, now you are a gentleman tradesman, can they?'
she asked.

'If they want me they can have me, dearest. I have often said I ought to
volunteer.'

'And not care about me at all?'

'It is just that that keeps me at home. I won't leave you if I can help
it.'

'It cannot make such a vast difference to the country whether one man
goes or stays! But if you want to go you had better, and not mind us at
all!'

Bob put a period to her speech by a mark of affection to which history
affords many parallels in every age. She said no more about the Black
Diamond; but whenever they ascended a hill she turned her head to look at
the lights in Portland Roads, and the grey expanse of intervening sea.

Though Captain Bob had stated that he did not wish to volunteer, and
would not leave her if he could help it, the remark required some
qualification. That Anne was charming and loving enough to chain him
anywhere was true; but he had begun to find the mill-work terribly
irksome at times. Often during the last month, when standing among the
rumbling cogs in his new miller's suit, which ill became him, he had
yawned, thought wistfully of the old pea-jacket, and the waters of the
deep blue sea. His dread of displeasin