He found the captain that night smoking a pipe on the low front porch
of the Widow Sprague's cottage, evidently very much at home. Bijonah
motioned him to a chair and proffered a cigar with a slightly
self-conscious air. Inside the house, Code could hear the sound of
people moving about and the voice of a woman singing low, as though to
a child. He told himself without question that this was Nellie getting
the kiddies to sleep.

"A feller hears queer things over in St. John's sometimes," announced
Bijonah suddenly, sucking at his pipe.

"Yes."

"An' this time I heard somethin' about you."

"Me? I don't know three people in St. John's."

"Guess I met one of the three, then."

"Where? How? Who was it?"

Bijonah Tanner coughed and shifted uneasily in his chair.

"Wal," he said, "I was takin' a little turn along the water-front,
just a _leetle_ turn, as the wife will tell you, when I dropped into
a--er--that is--a rum-shop and heard three men at the table next to
mine talking about you."

Schofield smiled broadly in the darkness. Bijonah's little turns along
the water-front of St. John's or any other port had been the subject
for much prayer and supplication in the hearts of many devout persons
thoroughly interested in their neighbor's welfare. And of late years
Ma Tanner had been making trips with him to supply stimulus to his
conscience.

"What were they talking about?" So far from being suspicious, Code was
merely idly curious of the gossip about him.

"My boy," said Tanner, suddenly grave, "I was the best friend your
father had for forty years, and I'm goin' to try and be as good a
friend to his son. But you mustn't mind what I tell ye."

"I won't, captain. Go ahead," said Code, his interest awakening.

"Wal, them men was talkin' about the loss of the old _May Schofield_,
and one of 'em in particular allowed as how he didn't think it should
have foundered when it did. What d'ye think of that?"

Schofield had stiffened in his chair as though undergoing a spasm of
pain. The sentences smote him between the eyes of his sensibilities.
Had it come to this, that his name was being bandied dishonorably
about the barrooms of St. John's? If so, how and why?

"Then I suppose you've heard the talk in Grande Mignon before this?"

"Yes, Code, I have; and I've called every man a liar that said
anything definite against you. I'm gettin' old, but there ain't very
many men here able enough to shove that name back