At this I was silent, and I was wishing I had not said so much, when I heard a voice that thrilled me asking to give evidence. CHAPTER XII HOW MY LOVE SAVED ME--WHEN FREE I GO TO SEA, AND MONTHS LATER COME BACK TO BETSEY'S COTTAGE AND HEAR BAD NEWS As I turned my heart seemed to stand still, for I saw Naomi Penryn, but when for a moment her eyes met mine it started thumping against my side as though it had been set at liberty from bondage. I saw, too, that Richard Tresidder was as surprised as I, and I was afraid lest my love should be taken to task for what she had done. For a few minutes everything seemed to swim before my eyes, and my head whirled so that I thought I was going to faint; but presently as I heard Naomi in sweet, steady tones answering questions my strength came back to me again. "You say," said Admiral Trefry, "that Jasper Pennington was in Pennington kitchen at midnight last Wednesday?" "He was," replied Naomi, clearly. After that a lawyer asked her concerning many things. So impudent was he that I had a difficulty in keeping myself from jumping from the place where I stood and throttling him on the spot. "Were you alone in the kitchen?" asked this lawyer. "I was not." "Who was with you?" "Tryphena, the cook." "How do you know it was midnight?" "I heard the kitchen clock strike." "What did Jasper Pennington say to you?" "You need not answer that question," remarked Admiral Trefry. "Why did Jasper Pennington come into the house that night?" again queried the lawyer. "Need I answer that?" asked Naomi. "No," answered the Admiral, and I saw that he was anxious to save Naomi from awkward questions, for which I blessed him. "All we want to know is whether you are sure Jasper Pennington was at Pennington on the night in question at the time you state. We have nothing to do as to why he was there or what was said." I saw, too, that Richard Tresidder did not wish the lawyer to ask any more questions, although I was sure the poor girl would suffer when she returned to Pennington, and I wondered then how I could save her from pain. And so very few questions were asked after that, and a little later I was a free man; for it was clear that if I was at Pennington I could not be rushing along the headland by the Lizard, and so it must have been some other man that the Preventive men had chased, and I had been captured by mistake. It all seemed so wonderful to me that I could hardly believe that my danger was past; at the same time I longed greatly to speak to Naomi and thank her for what she had done. But nowhere could I see her.