“Landais means to ruin me yet, by hook or crook,” said he.

“But he can’t intend to close with them,” I replied.  “He has not the courage.”

“God knows what he intends,” said the commodore, bitterly.  “It is no good, at all events.”

My heart bled for him.  Some minutes passed that he did not speak, making shift to raise his glass now and again, and I knew that he was gripped by a strong emotion. “’Twas so he ever behaved when the stress was greatest.  Presently he lays down the glass on the signal-chest, fumbles in his coat, and brings out the little gold brooch I had not set eyes on since Dolly and he and I had stood together on the Betsy’s deck.

“When you see her, Richard, tell her that I have kept it as sacred as her memory,” he said thickly.  “She will recall what I spoke of you when she gave it me.  You have been leal and true to me indeed, and many a black hour have you tided me over since this war’ began.  Do you know how she may be directed to?” he concluded, with abruptness.

I glanced at him, surprised at the question.  He was staring at the English shore.

“Mr. Ripley, of Lincoln’s Inn, used to be Mr. Manners’s lawyer,” I answered.

He took out a little note-book and wrote that down carefully.  “And now,” he continued, “God keep you, my friend.  We must win, for we fight with a rope around our necks.”

“But you, Captain Paul,” I said, “is—­is there no one?”

His face took on the look of melancholy it had worn so often of late, despite his triumphs.  That look was the stamp of fate.

“Richard,” replied he, with an ineffable sadness, “I am naught but a wanderer upon the face of the earth.  I have no ties, no kindred,—­no real friends, save you and Dale, and some of these honest fellows whom I lead to slaughter.  My ambition is seamed with a flaw.  And all my life I must be striving, striving, until I am laid in the grave.  I know that now, and it is you yourself who have taught me.  For I have violently broken forth from those bounds which God in His wisdom did set.”

I pressed his hand, and with bowed head went back to my station, profoundly struck by the truth of what he had spoken.  Though he fought under the flag of freedom, the curse of the expatriated was upon his head.

Shortly afterward he appeared at the poop rail, straight and alert, his eye piercing each man as it fell on him.  He was the commodore once more.

The twilight deepened, until you scarce could see your hands.  There was no sound save the cracking of the cabins and the tumbling of the blocks, and from time to time a muttered command.  An age went by before the trimmers were sent to the lee braces, and the Richard rounded lazily to.  And a great frigate loomed out of the night beside us, half a pistolshot away.

“What ship is that?” came the hail, intense out of the silence.

“I don’t hear you,” replied our commodore, for he had not yet got his distance.