ootsteps were coming up behind her. In dire
terror now, she left the road, and crept into some bushes in an adjacent
hollow. There, with thumping heart, she cowered whilst two men ran
past, and presently, whilst she still lay hid, they returned, vowing
loud vengeance on some person who had "done" them. It was long ere the
poor girl dared leave her shelter, late ere she got home to tell her
tale to an anxious mother. But when the three rescued shillings were
produced, the cause of the robbers' anger was not far to seek; they were
not shillings that came this time from the depths of a capacious pocket,
but three golden guineas.

CIRCUMSTANTIAL EVIDENCE

When the skipper of some small coastal trading craft is able to retire
from leading a sea-faring life, it is usually within close range of the
briny, tarry whiffs that with every breeze come puffing from the harbour
of some little port out of which he has formerly traded that he sets up
his shore-going abode. There, when he has paid off for the last time,
and everything, so to speak, is coiled down and made ship-shape, he
settles within easy hail of old cronies like himself; and if he should
chance to be one of those who have lived all their days with only their
ship for wife, then he not unnaturally falls easily into the habit of
dropping, of an evening, into the snug, well-lit bar-parlour of the
"Goat and Compasses" or the "Mariner's Friend," or some such house of
entertainment, with its glowing fire and warm, seductive, tobacco-and
grog-scented atmosphere, there to wile away the time swopping yarns with
old friends. Sometimes, if opportunity offer, he is not averse from a
mild game of cards for moderate points; and usually he takes, or at
least in old days he used to take, his liquor hot--and strong.

Captain Alexander Craes was one of those retired merchant skippers; but
he had not, like the majority of his fellows, settled near the
sea-coast. It was Kelso that had drawn him like a loadstone. An
inland-bred man, in his boyhood he had run away to sea, and the sea,
that had irresistibly woed his youthful fancy, had no whit fulfilled his
boyish dreams. It was not always blue, he found; the ship was not always
running before a spanking breeze; more kicks than ha'pence, more
rope's-endings than blessings, came his way during the first few years
of his sailor life. Perhaps it was because he had been ashamed to go
back and own himself beaten, or perhaps it was his n