“Well, uncle, but suppose I do go off to the rock, what chance have you of making things appear better than they are at present?”

“I’ll explain that, lad.  In the first place, Major Stewart is a gentleman, out-and-out, and will listen to the truth.  He swears that the robbery took place at one o’clock in the mornin’, for he looked at his watch and at the clock of the house, and heard it ring in the town, just as the thieves cleared off over the wall.  Now, if I can get your old skipper to take a run here on his return from the West Indies, he’ll swear that you was sailin’ out to the North Sea before twelve, and that’ll prove that you couldn’t have had nothin’ to do with it, d’ye see?”

“It sounds well,” said Ruby dubiously, “but do you think the lawyers will see things in the light you do?”

“Hang the lawyers! d’ye think they will shut their eyes to the truth?”

“Perhaps they may, in which case they will hang me, and so prevent my taking your advice to hang them,” said Ruby.

“Well, well, but you agree to my plan?” asked the captain.

“Shall I agree, Minnie? it will separate me from you again for some time.”

“Yet it is necessary,” answered Minnie, sadly; “yes, I think you should agree to go.”

“Very well, then, that’s settled,” said Ruby, “and now let us drop the subject, because I have other things to speak of; and if I must start before daylight my time with you will be short——­”

“Come here a bit, nephy, I want to have a private word with ’ee in my cabin,” said the captain, interrupting him, and going into his own room.  Ruby rose and followed.

“You haven’t any——­”

The captain stopped, stroked his bald head, and looked perplexed.

“Well, uncle?”

“Well, nephy, you haven’t—­in short, have ye got any money about you, lad?”

“Money? yes, a little; but why do you ask?”

“Well, the fact is, that your poor mother is hard up just now,” said the captain earnestly, “an’ I’ve given her the last penny I have o’ my own; but she’s quite——­”

Ruby interrupted his uncle at this point with a boisterous laugh.  At the same time he flung open the door and dragged the old man with gentle violence back to the kitchen.

“Come here, uncle.”

“But, avast! nephy, I haven’t told ye all yet.”

“Oh! don’t bother me with such trifles just now,” cried Ruby, thrusting his uncle into a chair and resuming his own seat at his mother’s side; “we’ll speak of that at some other time; meanwhile let me talk to mother.

“Minnie, dear,” he continued, “who keeps the cash here; you or mother?”

“Well, we keep it between us,” said Minnie, smiling; “your mother keeps it in her drawer and gives me the key when I want any, and I keep an account of it.”

“Ah! well, mother, I have a favour to ask of you before I go.”