. "I only need a good, quiet rest in the
old place, where I can lie and watch the sea, or go down the shady old
combe, to listen to the falls and watch the salmon leap."

"Ugh! don't talk about the fish," cried the Captain, with a shudder;
"they were the cause of all this suffering."

"Oh no," said Nic, smiling. "It was all that terrible mistake."

"Well, don't let's talk about the past," said the Captain hurriedly; "or
only about one thing, my boy. I did want to consult you about that
fellow who's up aloft with William Solly."

"About Pete, father?"

"Yes, the scoundrel! He was as bad as the salmon."

"Poor old Pete!" said Nic, smiling. "He saved my life over and over
again, father. I want you to take him into your service."

"What! that poacher who used to defy us all?"

"Poachers make the best keepers, father, when they reform; and Pete has
proved himself a good man and true. Will you tell him he is to stay?"

"I'll keep a dozen of such fellows if you'll only get strong and well
again, my boy," said the old sailor eagerly. "I'll tell him next time
we change horses. But I shall never forgive Lawrence."

"What, father!" cried Nic, smiling. "Why?"

"An old comrade like he has always been, to have such a stupid blunder
made by those under his command."

"A terrible mistake, father; but, to be quite fair, it was all my doing,
and I was hoist with my own petard."

"No, no, Nic; you're wrong," said the old man, "and William Solly--an
impudent rascal!--was right."

"How, father?"

"Well, my boy, it was all my fault for making such a fuss about a few
salmon. William Solly had the insolence to tell me I made a trouble
about nothing, and wanted a real one to do me good. This has been a
real one, Nic, and I've suffered bitterly."

"But there's fair weather ahead, father."

"Please God, my boy," said the old man piously, and with his voice
trembling, "and--and there, Nic, I've got you back again, and you will
get well, my boy--you will get well, won't you?"

"Fast, father," replied Nic, pressing the old man's hand.

Nic did mend rapidly in the rest and quiet of his old home, where one
day Captain Lawrence, newly returned from a long voyage, came to see his
old friend, and heard Nic's adventures to the end.

"A bitter experience, my dear boy," he said; "but let's look to the
future now: never mind the past."

But one day, when the convalescents had been for two months drinking in
the grand old