promise with defiance to you to do
your worst; but, Ben-Ahmed, I have lived to learn that, after a fashion,
you have been kind to me; that I might have fallen into worse hands;
therefore I am not ungrateful, and I now recall the promise only with
regret. All the same, my resolve is fixed."

The curious smile still lingered on the Moor's lips as he said, almost
in a jesting tone--

"But you will not try to escape to-day if I let you go into the town for
colours?"

"I make no promise, Ben-Ahmed. Yet this I may safely say, that I will
not try to clear off on my own account. Unless to save Hester I will
not at present try to escape; so far you may be sure of my return; but
if I get the chance I will either rescue her or die for her--God helping
me."

The smile vanished from the Moor's lips as he turned, and said gravely--

"It is well, young man, that you confess to the true and only source of
all help. You Christians, as you call yourselves, have ever seemed to
me unwilling to mention the name of God save when cursing your fellows,
and then you misuse it glibly enough. Yet there are some among you who
are more consistent in their professions. Go, fulfil your commission.
I will trust you."

"Thank you, Ben-Ahmed," returned the middy; "but remember, if I never
return, you will understand that I have not broken my word of honour."

The Moor bowed his head in acquiescence, and took a long pull at his
pipe as the midshipman went away.

George Foster was half-way to the town before he recovered from his
astonishment at the strange and unexpected way in which Ben-Ahmed had
received his very plain speaking. He had expected that chains and the
bastinado, if not worse, would certainly follow, but he had made up his
mind to go through with it--if need be to die--for Hester's sake. To
find himself, therefore, free to go where he pleased, and to help Hester
to escape if the opportunity to do so should come in his way, was an
amazing state of things which he could scarcely bring himself to
believe.

Of course, our hero had not the slightest expectation of encountering
Hester that day, when he thus freed himself from his parole, and we need
scarcely add that, even if he had met her, he could not have devised any
sudden scheme for her deliverance. Nevertheless, the mere fact that he
was at liberty to act as he pleased in her behalf had such an effect on
him that he entered the town with a lighter heart than he had poss