“No message for Mrs. Quiggin? Dare say I could find her at Castle Mona.” “No! Wait--yes--tell her--say I’m--if ever I--Chut! what’s the odds? No, no message.” “Not even good-by, Capt’n?” “She sent none to me--no.” “Not a word?” “Not a word.” Davy was pawing up the carpet with the toe of his boot, and filling his pipe from his pouch. “Going back to Callao, Capt’n?” said Lovibond. “God knows, mate,” said Davy. “I’m like the seeding grass, blown here and there, and the Lord knows where; but maybe I’ll find land at last.” “Capt’n, about the money?--dy’e owe me any grudge about that?” said Lovibond. “Lord-a-massy! Grudge, is it?” said Davy. “Aw, no, man, no. The money was my mischief. It’s gone, and good luck to it.” “But if I could show you a way to get it all back again, Capt’n----” “Chut! I wouldn’t have it, and I wouldn’t stay. But, matey, if you could show me how to get back... the money isn’t the loss I’m... if I was as poor as ould Chalse-a-killey, and had to work my flesh.... I’d stay if I could get back....” The whistle sounded from the funnel of the “Snaefell,” and the loud throbs of escaping steam echoed from the Head. Willie Quarrie ran in to say that the luggage was down at the ferry steps, and the ferryboat was coming over the harbor. “Capt’n,” said Lovibond, “she must have injured you badly----” “Injured _me?_” said Davy. “Wish she had! I wouldn’t go off to the world’s end if that was all betwixt us.” “If she hasn’t, Capt’n,” said Lovi-bond, “you’re putting her in the way of it.” “What?” Davy was about to light his pipe, but he flung away the match. “Have you never thought of it?” said Lovibond, “That when a husband deserts his wife like this he throws her in the way of--” “Not Nelly, no,” said Davy, promptly. “I’ll lave _that_ with her, anyway. Any other woman perhaps, but Nelly--never! She’s as pure as new milk, and no beast milk neither. Nelly going wrong, eh? Well, well! I’d like to see the man that would... I may have treated her bad... but I’d like to see the man, I say...” Then there was another shrieking whistle from the steamer. Willie Quarrie called up at the window and gesticulated wildly from the lawn outside. “Coming, boy, coming,” Davy shouted back, and looking at his watch, he said, “Four minutes and a half--time enough yet.” Then they left the hotel and moved toward the ferry steps. As they walked Davy begun to laugh. “Well, well!” he said, and he laughed again. “Aw, to think, to think!” he said, and he laughed once more. But with every fresh outbreak of his laughter the note of his voice lost freshness.