It was a sudden illumination that gave me the last link I needed. I remembered the story I had deciphered in the tunnel under the earth only an hour ago. An hour ago? It seemed an age! I remembered, too, the tale Worthing's uncle had told me that night beneath the stars: the tale of the Captain and his brothers. Captain Field--Commander Meadows! The disguise was so ludicrously thin that I even laughed aloud when the two names met and mingled in my mind. In that cave of accursed gold was buried the Captain's deadly secret, the secret that had tortured him through life, the secret of his murdered comrades, of his murdered brother. He dared not let another meddle with the thing. The thought of prying eyes in that dark place of crime and death was like a madness in his blood; a madness I could well conceive, for I had heard my father tell so often the story of the Mad Captain, and among his papers was that other yarn which told of the ruthless hunting of the treasure-seeker by one who had no cause to hate him except that he feared the exposing of the secret that had poisoned all his life. Had my father guessed the motive of his relentless persecution, I asked myself; or was it but a fancy that had made him write that yarn? That was something I would never know. My thoughts were in a strange tangle when I arrived at the _Dolphin_, and even my emotions were clashing conflictingly in my soul. On the one hand I saw the cruel and useless murder of my father as a thing crying for revenge. But again so steeped with repetition had I been in the agonies of the Mad Captain that I felt he couldn't have done otherwise than he did. The anguish in his soul had goaded him on to a cruelty he hadn't contemplated. Perhaps even some cause I didn't know had made him commit that first dreadful crime of imprisoning his comrades in the cave and leaving them there to perish so miserably. Again I thought how strange it was that history had repeated itself. The first crime the priest had told of was the same as the last I had read that day. The circle was complete, as though the curse had worked itself to a consummation; and I was determined that it should end now once for all. I would burn all traces of the clue to the treasure cave. I wouldn't touch a penny of the evil gold if it should come my way. And come my way I thought it might, as I knew the Captain was fond of me. And puzzling out his fondness I thought at first it was merely that he had been desirous to make amends; but later I felt sure he had come to like me for my own sake. Well, what my course was to be I couldn't say. Was a further expiation required? If so, I vowed some other hand than mine should strike the blow.