Now, hard by the docks in Leith there was a little parlor groggery kept by a widow named Seaton, who with her nineteen-year-old daughter, Anne, thus labored to make an honest livelihood. A widow, a lovely girl and lots of good Scotch whiskey all under one roof,--why the situation seemed just specially made for the advantage of George Haines, the steward of the _Worcester_. What had looked at first like a long, monotonous detention on a seized ship now suddenly brightened with the most attractive promise. George accepted the opportunity so readily that shortly he became almost a part of the Seaton home, and in an admirably brief space of time nothing less than the accepted suitor of the fair Anne herself. That meant, as any one could see with half an eye, that eventually George Haines would be the proprietor of this neat little business. No more stewing around the East Indies for him; that was all in the past, or very soon would be. Well, truly, it is an ill wind that blows nobody good. Of course, Mrs. Seaton had neighbors, and just as much of course she talked to them about her business, her customers and her customers’ business. One of these neighbors was a dear old lady by name Mrs. Wilkie, also a widow. She was one of those sad folk who flit down to the docks to see every ship come in and who speak to every sailor that steps ashore, in the quest of loved ones long silent upon the far-off seas. Every one knew Mrs. Wilkie’s story. She was the mother of a bonnie lad by the name of Andrew, who some three years before this, had gone as surgeon on the ship of Captain Drummond, the _Speedy Return_, for a voyage to the Indies, and who, after one letter from Madagascar by way of Mauritius, had not been heard from this long time; neither he or his ship nor his captain. And now the old lady lived with her other son, Jamie, a tailor, and whenever a ship came into port from the East Indies, no matter what the hour of the day or night, the sailors would see a little old gray lady waiting to ask them for news of the _Speedy Return_. To Mrs. Wilkie, then, Mrs. Seaton made mention of the _Worcester_ and of George Haines, its steward. Mrs. Wilkie and Jamie hastened together to the widow Seaton’s to interview George. They found him in the parlor, comforting himself with a big tumbler of grog. Jamie bought a drink and talked easily of the voyage and hoped that George and all the others had fared well. This seizure business,--that was bad, of course; but it would all come out all right. George felt it was coming out all right for him as it was. Jamie coughed, shifted a bit in his chair and at length came out with the vital question: “Would you be meeting a ship in your travels, the _Speedy Return_, captain Rab Drummond, out o’ Glasgie?”