nnocently. In the slow pause Mr. Rogers was
growing purple in the face, when again the Vicar's voice broke across
the silence. "The Lord Proprietor's power in former days--I speak only
of former days--may well have warranted the Government in stationing a
military officer here to keep some check on him. For instance, he
shared all ordinary wrecks with the Lord High Admiral, but a wreck
became his sole property by law, if none of the crew remained alive; a
dangerous reservation, ma'am, in times when justice travelled slowly,
and much might happen in the Islands and never a word of it reach
London."

Miss Gabriel put up both hands--they were encased in mittens, and the
mittens decorated with steel beads--as if to close her ears.

"We must be thankful, indeed," she began, and paused in dismay as the
floor of Mrs. Fossell's drawing-room trembled under her, and at the
same moment the window sashes rattled violently throughout the house.

"Good Heavens!"

"What was that?"

The players dropped their cards. All listened.

"Upon my word," suggested the Vicar, who had heard nothing, but felt
the concussion, "if it weren't positively known to be empty one would
say the powder magazine at the Garrison----"

"Oh, Richard! Richard!"--here Mrs. Fossell came running in from the
dining-room with a dish of trifle in her hands--"Is it an earthquake?"

"I--I rather think not, my dear!"

"At any rate it can't be the end of the world?" She turned and appealed
to the Vicar, and from the Vicar again to her husband. "And if it is
not, I wish you would come to Selina, for she has dropped the cold
shape all over the floor and is having hysterics in the better of the
two armchairs!"

Indeed, Selina's hysterics could be heard.

"Earthquake? Fiddlesticks, ma'am!" said Mr. Rogers, buttoning his
pea-jacket and turning up its collar. "What you heard was a gun. There
is a vessel in distress somewhere, and we shall have my men here in a
moment with news of her."

"But there was no sound," objected Mrs. Pope.

"Fog, ma'am--fog; sound don't travel in a fog, and ships oughtn't to.
There has been a nasty bank of it to the south'ard ever since morning,
and you may bet that's the mischief."

He went into the hall for his lantern, brought it back, lit it, and
carried it out to the front door.

"Whe--ew!" he whistled, as he opened the door and stood, with lantern
lifted high, staring into the night.

The guests behind him wondered; for all w