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"Wait," gulped Billy, but it was plain to be seen he was wavering. His feet were getting uneasy, his toes fairly biting holes through his socks in their eagerness to tear up the sward. But as leader it would never do for him to show the white feather.,

"All right; that's settled. But listen, now, every one of you. He's gotta go of his own accord. We're not goin' to be disobedient in any way. Fer a time we'll eat out'a his hand. Now wait—" as a groan of protest went up—"let me finish afore you get the high-jumps, you fellers. At the end of two er three weeks somethin' is goin' to happen to Mr. Johnston. I'm not goin' to say what that somethin' is right now, but you'll all know soon enough. And if after it happens he's got nerve enough to come back here I miss my guess, that's all.",

He was Mr Walter Lawrence, a son of Admiral Lawrence, and down to a recent period a lieutenant in the Royal Navy. He was something over thirty years of age, but drink, dissipation, the hard life of the sea and some fever which had got into his blood and proved intermittent, had worked in his face like time, and he might have passed for any age between thirty-five and forty-five. Nevertheless he was an extremely handsome man, of the classic Greek type in lineament, but improved, at least to the British eye, by the Saxon colouring of hair, skin, and eyes. His teeth were extraordinarily white and good for a sailor who had lived on gun-room fare in times when the ship's biscuit was flint, and the peas which rolled about in the discoloured hot water called soup, fit only for loading a blunderbuss with to shoot men dead. His eyes told their tale of drink, but they were large and fine and spirited; his light brown hair, according to the fashion of[Pg 39] the age, was combed down his back and lay in a rope-shaped tail there. He wore a wide-brimmed round hat, and his attire, a little the worse for wear, consisted of a blue coat, white waistcoat, sage-green kerseymere breeches, and, needless to say, the cravat was high and full. He stood about six feet, his figure was extremely well proportioned, and in addition to these merits his carriage had the easy elegance which the flow of the billow and the heave of the deck infuse into all human figures not radically vile and deformed. His voice was soft, winning, and somewhat plaintive, and no man, whether on or off the stage, not even Incledon, sang a song with more exquisite feeling and sweeter sincerity of passion.,

"And I s'pose a rough fall means good duckin'?" laughed Landon. "Oh, by the way, Billy, before I forget. Would you mind runnin' in to old Swanson's landin' on your way home and tellin' him that a couple of fellers from Cleveland are comin' to his place early next month to shoot. They were here last night. One of em's a lawyer named Maddoc an' he give me this money to pass on to Swanson, so's the old codger would be sure and hold a room for 'em."

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"She's out on the bay," answered the father and lapsed again into brooding silence.,

"Yes, everybody who knows 'em both an' loves 'em both has heard that. But what else could they do? He's not able to support a wife—the little farm is only enough fer himself, after that Burke an' his wife are paid fer workin' it and lookin' after the house, an' he's too high-spirited to ask Erie to share his burden and poverty.",

"Yes, I remember. The master died in the homeward passage, and the ship was[Pg 17] brought to port by the mate, to whom I suppose you intend to give the command.",

Nevertheless he determined to await Captain Acton's arrival from the business which was holding him in his library; so he lighted his pipe afresh with his singular little pistol-shaped pipe-lighter and struck about the grounds with his staff, blowing great clouds out of the depth of his meditation, and often heaving a sailor's blessing at the two points of cliff which interrupted the view of the sea to east and west of the coast.