"That's reasonable," said Tortue, and the rest echoed his words. In a little there was silence. Tortue set to work again with his knife. It flashed backwards and forwards, red with the candle light as though it ran blood. It shone in my eyes and dazzled me, and somehow, there came back to me a recollection of that hot night in Clutterbuck's rooms when everything had glittered with an intolerable brightness, and Dick Parmiter had been set upon the table to tell his story. I was vaguely wondering what they were all doing at this moment in London, Clutterbuck, Macfarlane, and the rest, when the questions began again. "You came back from St. Mary's to New Grimsby?" "Yes." "Did you tell Parmiter?" "No." "From St. Mary's you crossed the island to Merchant's Point?" "Yes." "Did you tell the girl?" Here a lie was obviously needful, and I did not scruple to tell it. "No." Peter Tortue leaned forward to me with a shrewd glance in his keen eyes. "You are her lover," he said. "You told her." I lifted my eyes from his knife, looked him in the eyes, and sustained his glance. "I am not her lover," I said; "that is a damned lie." He did not lose his temper, but repeated: "You told her," and George Glen looked in again with his whole face screwed into a wink. "You said to her, 'My dear,' says you, 'there's old George,'" and at that I lost my temper. "I said nothing of the kind," I cried. "Am I a parrot that I cannot open my lips without old George popping out of them? But what's the use of talking. Do what you will, I have done. If I had betrayed your secret, do you think I should be walking home alone, and you upon the island? But I have done. I had a bargain to strike with you, I thought to find you all at the inn--but I have done." To tell the truth, I had no longer any hope of life. Glen, for all his winks and smiles, would stop short of no cruelty. Peter Tortue quietly polished his knife upon his thigh. He was a big Brittany man, with shrewd eyes and an unchanging face. The rest squatted and stared curiously at me. The light of the lantern fell upon their callous faces, they were lookers-on at a show, of which perhaps, they had seen the like before, they were not concerned in this affair of the _Royal Fortune_ nor how it ended. "So you told no one." "No one." I closed my eyes and leaned back against the partition. I was utterly helpless in their hands, and I hoped they would be quick. I remember that I regretted very much I could send no word to the girl at Merchant's Rock, and that I was very glad she had not delayed her music till tomorrow night, but both regret and gladness were of a numbed and languid kind. Then Glen asked me another question, and it spurred my will to alertness. "How did you know that I was quartermaster on the _Royal Fortune?_"