‘I’ll chance it,’ he cried.  ’I believe you are a man of your word, and a white man, and I’ll tell you the whole story.  But one thing I will say first.  So far as I am concerned, I regret nothing and I fear nothing, and I would do it all again and be proud of the job.  Damn the beast, if he had as many lives as a cat, he would owe them all to me!  But it’s the lady, Mary—­Mary Fraser—­for never will I call her by that accursed name.  When I think of getting her into trouble, I who would give my life just to bring one smile to her dear face, it’s that that turns my soul into water.  And yet—­and yet—­what less could I do?  I’ll tell you my story gentlemen, and then I’ll ask you, as man to man, what less could I do?

’I must go back a bit.  You seem to know everything, so I expect that you know that I met her when she was a passenger and I was first officer of the Rock of Gibraltar.  From the first day I met her, she was the only woman to me.  Every day of that voyage I loved her more, and many a time since have I kneeled down in the darkness of the night watch and kissed the deck of that ship because I knew her dear feet had trod it.  She was never engaged to me.  She treated me as fairly as ever a woman treated a man.  I have no complaint to make.  It was all love on my side, and all good comradeship and friendship on hers.  When we parted she was a free woman, but I could never again be a free man.

’Next time I came back from sea, I heard of her marriage.  Well, why shouldn’t she marry whom she liked?  Title and money—­who could carry them better than she?  She was born for all that is beautiful and dainty.  I didn’t grieve over her marriage.  I was not such a selfish hound as that.  I just rejoiced that good luck had come her way, and that she had not thrown herself away on a penniless sailor.  That’s how I loved Mary Fraser.

’Well, I never thought to see her again, but last voyage I was promoted, and the new boat was not yet launched, so I had to wait for a couple of months with my people at Sydenham.  One day out in a country lane I met Theresa Wright, her old maid.  She told me all about her, about him, about everything.  I tell you, gentlemen, it nearly drove me mad.  This drunken hound, that he should dare to raise his hand to her, whose boots he was not worthy to lick!  I met Theresa again.  Then I met Mary herself—­and met her again.  Then she would meet me no more.  But the other day I had a notice that I was to start on my voyage within a week, and I determined that I would see her once before I left.  Theresa was always my friend, for she loved Mary and hated this villain almost as much as I did.  From her I learned the ways of the house.  Mary used to sit up reading in her own little room downstairs.  I crept round there last night and scratched at the window.  At first she would not open to me, but in her heart I know that now she loves me, and she could not leave me in the frosty night.  She whispered to me to