It was one January morning, very early—­a pinching, frosty morning—­the cove all grey with hoar-frost, the ripple lapping softly on the stones, the sun still low and only touching the hilltops and shining far to seaward.  The captain had risen earlier than usual and set out down the beach, his cutlass swinging under the broad skirts of the old blue coat, his brass telescope under his arm, his hat tilted back upon his head.  I remember his breath hanging like smoke in his wake as he strode off, and the last sound I heard of him as he turned the big rock was a loud snort of indignation, as though his mind was still running upon Dr. Livesey.

Well, mother was upstairs with father and I was laying the breakfast-table against the captain’s return when the parlour door opened and a man stepped in on whom I had never set my eyes before.  He was a pale, tallowy creature, wanting two fingers of the left hand, and though he wore a cutlass, he did not look much like a fighter.  I had always my eye open for seafaring men, with one leg or two, and I remember this one puzzled me.  He was not sailorly, and yet he had a smack of the sea about him too.

I asked him what was for his service, and he said he would take rum; but as I was going out of the room to fetch it, he sat down upon a table and motioned me to draw near.  I paused where I was, with my napkin in my hand.

“Come here, sonny,” says he.  “Come nearer here.”

I took a step nearer.

“Is this here table for my mate Bill?” he asked with a kind of leer.

I told him I did not know his mate Bill, and this was for a person who stayed in our house whom we called the captain.

“Well,” said he, “my mate Bill would be called the captain, as like as not.  He has a cut on one cheek and a mighty pleasant way with him, particularly in drink, has my mate Bill.  We’ll put it, for argument like, that your captain has a cut on one cheek—­and we’ll put it, if you like, that that cheek’s the right one.  Ah, well!  I told you.  Now, is my mate Bill in this here house?”

I told him he was out walking.

“Which way, sonny?  Which way is he gone?”

And when I had pointed out the rock and told him how the captain was likely to return, and how soon, and answered a few other questions, “Ah,” said he, “this’ll be as good as drink to my mate Bill.”

The expression of his face as he said these words was not at all pleasant, and I had my own reasons for thinking that the stranger was mistaken, even supposing he meant what he said.  But it was no affair of mine, I thought; and besides, it was difficult to know what to do.  The stranger kept hanging about just inside the inn door, peering round the corner like a cat waiting for a mouse.  Once I stepped out myself into the road, but he immediately called me back, and as I did not obey quick enough for his fancy, a most horrible change came over his tallowy face, and he ordered me in with an oath that