"That is luck, indeed," said Captain Suckling approvingly; "and a comfort to hear at the end of a day when everything has gone wrong. Fetch them up--that is, if they are sufficiently recovered; fetch them up, and when I've shifted these clothes I'll have a look at them while daylight serves." The Captain went below: and five minutes later I saw the first of the prisoners haled up through the hatchway. It was the man in the double overcoat; but he had lost his colour, and he no sooner reached the deck than he lurched and sat down with a thud. Since no one helped him to rise, he remained seated, and gazed about him with a drugged and vacuous stare, while the light of the approaching sunset shimmered over his mother-of-pearl buttons. The next to emerge was my friend of the splendid torso, handcuffed and fettered. When he, too, lurched and fell, I became aware for the first time that the frigate was rocking on a gentle south-westerly swell, and I turned to the bulwarks for a glance overside at the water which, up to an hour ago, had been smooth as a pond. I had scarcely reached the bulwarks when a voice forward sang out that a boat was approaching and hailing us. Sure enough, a boat there was: and in the stern-sheets, with a couple of watermen pulling, sat two men of whom the portliss was promptly and confidently proclaimed by the midshipmen gathered around me to be no other than His Excellency. The boat approached and fell alongside the ladder suspended a few yards aft of the ship's waist. The first lieutenant, having sent word to the Captain, hurried forward to receive our distinguished guest, who climbed heavily on his Secretary's arm. Arriving thus at the sally-way, he nodded graciously in answer to the first lieutenant's salute, pulled out a handkerchief to mop his brow, and in the act of mopping it cast a glance across the deck. "Captain Suckling has asked me to present his excuses to your Excellency--" began the first lieutenant in his best tone of ceremony; and, with that, took a step backward as His Excellency flung out a rigid arm. "The Dustman! for a fiver!" "I--I beg your Excellency's pardon--your Excellency was pleased to observe--" "The Dustman, for a hundred pounds! Jem Clark, too! Oh, catch me, Winyates!" and His Excellency staggered back, clutching at a man-rope with one hand, pointing with the other. His gaze wavered from the prisoners amidships to the first lieutenant, and from the first lieutenant to the poop-ladder, at the head of which Captain Suckling at this instant appeared, hastily buttoning his uniform coat as he came. "A thousand pardons, your Excellency!" "A thousand pounds, sir!" "Hey?" "If that's not the very pair of scoundrels I've been hunting the length and breadth of Hampshire. Fareham was the venue, Captain Suckling--if I am addressing Captain Suckling--" "You are, sir. I--I think you said Fareham--"