And he pulled out a wallet and threw some pieces at the bailiff, bidding him get change with all haste.  “And now, Richard,” he added, with a glance of disgust about him, “pack up, and we’ll out of this cursed hole!”

“I have nothing to pack, my Lord,” I said.

“My Lord!  Jack, I have told you, or I leave you here.”

“Well, then, Jack, and you will,” said I, overflowing with thankfulness to God for the friends He had bestowed upon me.  “But before we go a step, Jack, you must know the man but for whose bravery I should long ago have been dead of fever and ill-treatment in the Indies, and whose generosity has brought him hither.  My Lord Comyn, this is Captain John Paul.”

The captain, who had been quite overwhelmed by this sudden arrival of a real lord to our rescue at the very moment when we had sunk to despair, and no less astonished by the intimacy that seemed to exist between the newcomer and myself, had the presence of mind to bend his head, and that was all.  Comyn shook his hand heartily.

“You shall not lack reward for this, captain, I promise you,” cried he.  “What you have done for Mr. Carvel, you have done for me.  Captain, I thank you.  You shall have my interest.”

I flushed, seeing John Paul draw his lips together.  But how was his Lordship to know that he was dealing with no common sea-captain?

“I have sought no reward, my Lord,” said he.  “What I have done was out of friendship for Mr. Carvel, solely.”

Comyn was completely taken by surprise by these words, and by the haughty tone in which they were spoken.  He had not looked for a gentleman, and no wonder.  He took a quizzical sizing of the sky-blue coat.  Such a man in such a station was out of his experience.

“Egad, I believe you, captain,” he answered, in a voice which said plainly that he did not.  “But he shall be rewarded nevertheless, eh, Richard?  I’ll see Charles Fox in this matter to-morrow.  Come, come,” he added impatiently, “the bailiff must have his change by now.  Come, Richard!” and he led the way down the winding stairs.

“You must not take offence at his ways,” I whispered to the captain.  For I well knew that a year before I should have taken the same tone with one not of my class.  “His Lordship is all kindness.”

“I have learned a bit since I came into England, Richard,” was his sober reply.

“’Twas a pitiful sight to see gathered on the landings the poor fellows we had come to know in Castle Yard, whose horizons were then as gray as ours was bright.  But they each had a cheery word of congratulation for us as we passed, and the unhappy gentleman from Devonshire pressed my hand and begged that I would sometime think of him when I was out under the sky.  I promised even more, and am happy to be able to say, my dears, that I saw both him and his wife off for America before I left London.  Our eyes were wet when we reached the lower hall, and I was making for the door in an agony to leave the place, when the bailiff came out of his little office.