I had fallen into a sleep more profound than any that had yet blessed my hard couch, when I was suddenly wakened by a busy clatter on the deck, the shriek of ill-greased davits, the squeak of blocks, and the fall of a small-boat into the water. Another odd sound puzzled me: but for the probability that we were out over Bass I could have sworn it was the murmur of a stream running upon a gravelled shore. A stream--heavens! There could be no doubt about it now; we were somewhere close in shore, and the _Seven Sisters_ was lying to. The brigantine stopped in her voyage where no stoppage should be; a small boat plying to land in the middle of the night; come! here was something out of the ordinary, surely, on a vessel seaward bound. I had dreamt of the gallows and of Dan Risk as an informer. Was it a wonder that there should flash into my mind the conviction of my betrayal? What was more likely than that the skipper, secure of my brace of guineas, was selling me to the garrison of Blackness? I clad myself hurriedly and crept cautiously up the companion ladder, and found myself in overwhelming darkness, only made the more appalling and strange because the vessel's lights were all extinguished. Silence large and brooding lay upon the _Seven Sisters_ as she lay in that obscuring haar that had fallen again; she might be Charon's craft pausing mid-way on the cursed stream, and waiting for the ferry cry upon the shore of Time. We were still in the estuary or firth, to judge by the bickering burn and the odors off-shore, above all the odour of rotting brake; and we rode at anchor, for her bows were up-water to the wind and tide, and above me, in the darkness, I could hear the idle sails faintly flapping in the breeze and the reef-points all tap-tapping. I seemed to have the deck alone, but for one figure at the stern; I went back, and found that it was Horn. “Where are we?” I asked, relieved to find there the only man I could trust on board the ship. “A little below Blackness,” said he shortly with a dissatisfied tone. “I did not know we were to stop here,” said I, wondering if he knew that I was doomed. “Neither did I,” said he, peering into the void of night. “And whit's mair, I wish I could guess the reason o' oor stopping. The skipper's been ashore mair nor ance wi' the lang-boat forward there, and I'm sent back here to keep an e'e on lord kens what except it be yersel'.” “Are ye indeed?” said I, exceedingly vexed. “Then I ken too well, Horn, the reason for the stoppage. You are to keep your eye on a man who's being bargained for with the hangman.” “I would rather ken naithin' about that,” said he, “and onyway I think ye're mistaken. Here they're comin' back again.” Two or three small boats were coming down on us out of the darkness; not that I could see them, but that I heard their oars in muffled rowlocks.