At last they came to a level plain of moor, sallow, discoloured, desolate as the edge of coast and rim of sea that was now sweeping round to their progress so as to meet them. Then the captain could make Bruton hear this-- 'Do you ever use your house for the running of goods?' 'Who are you that I should report myself?' And the squint turned fiercely upon Jackman. 'Oh, I can be candid with such as you,' exclaimed the captain, with a loud laugh. '_You_ don't peach. You have secrets which keep you men of honour. See here, now.' He laid his hand upon Bruton's shoulder, and said, 'I am pirate and smuggler!' 'Where have you been running?' 'Folkestone.' 'Ye h'ant got the looks of one of us.' 'I am a gentleman,' exclaimed Jackman warmly, 'with as determined a resolution to make a fortune as others have. The sea promises a good yield. You must have done well out of her to live without work at your time of life.' 'The ocean's paid me well. I'm bound to say that,' said Mr. Bruton, relaxing. 'And since you're so free, so'll I be. The cottage and the cave I'm a-driving you to, and which'll soon heave in sight, was used by me and my missis and the children as a dwelling-house and a storeroom for the choicest of the run goods, the rest being stowed in secret places, or in the steps.' 'The steps,' echoed the captain. 'Ay, you can step down to the foam of the water. It's a low front of cliff hereabouts.' 'Were you successful in your hidings?' 'To tell you the truth,' the man answered in a grumbling note of laughter, 'we were so rarely troubled that I believe we came off with nigh everything we got ashore.' 'Piracy is a dangerous trade,' said Captain Jackman, talking to this man as if he was a brother pirate. 'My ship is not to be seen once too often in that market, and newly rigged and freshly painted, she may complete the sum of money I want, and which as a gentleman I cannot possibly live without, if we rig her afresh and paint her a new colour.' Bruton turned his squint eye upon his companion. He scarcely knew what to think of him. 'Where's your gang?' said he. 'I have men fit to board and capture a line-of-battle ship,' was the answer. Bruton pointed dumbly ahead with his whip; and Jackman saw a little cottage upon the horizon, the most melancholy picture in the world under the grey sky, and set to the music of the wind that was now coming a little wildly off that opening eye of sea on their left. They drove rapidly, and drew up at the cottage door. It was a strong house, fit for a powder-magazine, built of Cornish flag, put together with a heedlessness of aspect that lent it beauty of the roughest sort. It had several little windows on either side, a fair piece of ground plotted out at the back, a small front garden, and was certainly a dead broke bargain with its stairs, even for moral living, at the money asked.