o move or direct Dalton's attention
to it. The Skipper, still like a monument of stone, but called to
animation by astonishment and dismay, while the light played with the
grace and brilliancy of lightning on the bright mountings of his
pistols. Still the flames towered brightly to the heavens, while each
fresh explosion separated their condensed effect, and sent a portion of
them higher in the clouds, or hissing over the variegated and sparkling
sea, which rolled to the shore in masses of glowing fire.

"Read! read!" at length exclaimed Roupall, thrusting the parchment into
the hand of the Buccaneer. "Read! read!" he repeated, for Dalton heeded
him not.

"Read what?" said the Skipper, in a voice which entered the heart of all
who heard it; "do I not read--do I not read--black, bitter, burning
treachery?--It is my own ship--I know every spar that flits like a
meteor through the air. My heart was never crushed till now."

"Read--I will read it, if I can," said Springall, who had joined the
party. With some difficulty he succeeded in making audible its contents.

"Dalton, you are safe! it may be that I perish: I knew you would never
sacrifice your ship for your own life, so I have done it for you. Go
with the Jewess, your daughter, and the Preacher, immediately to Cecil
Place, to the small passage leading to the purple chamber, and demand
admittance. You are pardoned--and all the rest may leave the island,
provided they depart before the hour of one."

The Buccaneer apparently heard it not: the communication made no visible
impression upon him; he stood in the same position as before. Even
Springall spoke no word, although his feeling of attachment to Dalton
was rendered sufficiently obvious by his creeping close to his side, and
grasping his arm with a gesture which said, "I will not be separated
from you."

At this moment a cry arose from the beach, and, though the flames were
fading, it could be seen that several of the men had rushed to the
water's edge, and assisted a creature to the shore who was unable to
struggle longer for himself; soon, however, he contrived to mount the
cliff on which Dalton still remained a living statue of despair, and
faint, dripping, unable to utter a single word, Robin stood, or rather
drooped, by the side of the Buccaneer. He came too soon; Dalton,
irritated, maddened by the loss of his ship, was unable to appreciate
the risk which the Ranger had run, or the sacrifice he had made. H