“George,” he whispered, suddenly. “Sir,” said the watchman. “I want to speak to you,” said Fraser, mysteriously; “come down here.” George rose carefully from his seat, and lowering himself gingerly on board, crept on tiptoe to the galley after the mate. “Wait in here till I come back,” said the latter, in a thrilling whisper; “I’ve got something to show you. Don’t move, whatever happens.” His tones were so fearful, and he put so much emphasis on the last sentence, that the watchman burst hurriedly out of the galley. “I don’t like these mysteries,” he said, plainly. “There’s no mystery,” said the mate, pushing him back again; “something I don’t want the crew to see, that’s all. You’re the only man I can trust.” He closed the door and coughed, and a figure which had been lurking on the companion-ladder, slipped hastily on deck and clambered noiselessly onto the jetty. The mate clambered up beside it, and hurrying with it to the gate helped it over, and with much satisfaction heard it alight on the other side. “Good-night, Jack,” said Flower. “Don’t forget to look after Poppy.” “Good-night,” said the mate. “Write as soon as you’re fixed.” He walked back leisurely to the schooner and stood in some perplexity, eyeing the galley which contained the devoted George. He stood for so long that his victim lost all patience, and, sliding back the door, peered out and discovered him. “Have you got it?” he asked, softly. “No,” replied Fraser; “there isn’t anything. I was only making a fool of you, George. Good-night.” He walked aft, and stood at the companion watching the outraged George as he came slowly out of the galley and stared about him. “Good-night, George,” he repeated. The watchman made no reply to the greeting, but, breathing heavily, resumed his old seat on the post; and, folding his arms across his panting bosom, looked down with majestic scorn upon the schooner and all its contents. Long after the satisfied mate had forgotten the incident in sleep, he sat there striving to digest the insult of which he had been the victim, and to consider a painful and fitting retribution. CHAPTER IX. The mate awoke next morning to a full sense of the unpleasant task before him, and, after irritably giving orders for the removal of the tarpaulin from the skylight, a substitution of the ingenious cook’s for the drawn blinds ashore, sat down to a solitary breakfast and the composition of a telegram to Captain Barber. The first, a beautiful piece of prose, of which the key-note was resignation, contained two shillings’ worth of sympathy and fourpence-halfpenny worth of religion. It was too expensive as it stood, and boiled down, he was surprised to find that it became unfeeling to the verge of flippancy. Ultimately he embodied it in a letter, which he preceded by a telegram, breaking the sad news in as gentle a form as could be managed for one-and-three.