, but which was yet a prize worth any man's
having. She bade me tell her about myself, and heard me so gently, and
concerned herself so honestly in all that touched me, and praised and
chid me so prettily for what I had done well and ill, that I would my
story had been twice as long and twice as pitiful. The only secret I
did not tell her, you may guess. She did not. But she heard me
greedily when I came to tell of my meeting with Ludar and of our
adventures near Oxford; and for his sake, as much as for my own, she
thought kindly of me and promised me her friendship.

Our watch was ended, and we were in the act of quitting our post, when
the maiden, taking one last look seaward, cried: "Is not that a sail
away there?"

Sure enough it was, sparkling on the westward horizon, some two leagues
to the larboard.

"Who cometh?" said I to myself, echoing the maiden's song.

CHAPTER TWELVE.

HOW WE SAILED INTO LEITH.

A strange joy seized me as I sighted the unknown ship. For my heart
told me she was no friend, and I was just in the humour for a fight. I
was one too many on board the _Misericorde_; and a brush with the
Queen's foes just now would comfort me amazingly. And yet, when I came
to think of it, she lay in nearer the English coast than we, and was
like enough to be no Queen's enemy after all, but a Queen's cruiser on
the look-out for suspicious craft like ours. For we floated no colours
aloft. After the late fight Ludar had hauled down the Frenchman's flag;
but it was in vain I begged him to hoist that of her royal Majesty in
its place. He would not hear of it.

"No," said he, "I sail under no false colours. This is a voyage for
safety, not for glory, else I know the flag would fly there. As it is,
Humphrey, 'tis best for us all to fly nothing. The masts shall go bare.
The blue of a maiden's eyes is colour enough for you and me to fight
under."

I could not gainsay him. We were in no trim for receiving broadsides,
or grappling with sea-dogs, however merry the ports might be for a man
in my plight. Our business was to bring the _Misericorde_ safe into
Leith Roads, and to that venture we stood pledged.

Ludar ordered the maiden to her quarters and me to my cabin.

"In this calm," said he, "'twill be hours before we foregather if
foregather we may. So below, while the poet and I whistle for a
breeze."

Towards afternoon we lay much as we were, drifting a little westward.
But then came som