for the moon was still behind the cliffs. Four bells rang at the
gangway. Mr. Spenlove lit a cigarette and continued.

"Have you ever seen a sea-captain in the throes of adoration? It is an
astonishing sight. Jack was what he himself called 'open as the day.'
Mind you, I had no ulterior motive in taking my old friend down home
with me. I had no plain sisters or cousins to get settled in life. Both
plain and pretty in our family were married and gone when we arrived. We
lived, you know, just outside Threxford, a small town six miles from a
railway, tucked away in the valley of the Threxe, about ten miles from
where that small stream falls into the Channel. It was a lovely spot,
but so dreadfully quiet I could never live there very long. Over the
town hung a high hill crowned by the workhouse. You see, it was the
workhouse master's daughter Jack had fallen in love with."

"Captain Macedoine's daughter?" suggested the Paymaster.

"No, a very different person, I assure you. Madeline Hanson had been
brought up in a very secluded way. It couldn't have been otherwise. Old
Hanson occupied a somewhat dubious position in the social life of
England. A workhouse master is not the sort of man either rich or poor
want to have much to do with. He is like the hangman or jailer or
rag-and-bone man; a necessary evil. But he may be, as Hanson was, a most
respectable person. And Madeline, his only child, was brought up in
almost solitary confinement until she was twenty. I believe she went to
an aunt in Portsmouth occasionally. Anyhow it suited her. She was a
puny, flat-chested little girl, very prim and precise, and would bridle
at once when any one laughed or made a joke. I never discovered exactly
how Jack got acquainted with her. At church most likely, for he was in
full cry after respectability and went to church regularly with my old
people. I know we used to go fishing together at first, and later I
found myself going alone, for Jack was meeting his inamorata, and going
for walks. Oh, quite above board. Jack was 'open as the day.' He lost no
time in marching up the hill to the workhouse (not the first time he'd
been inside one, he assured me grimly) and informing Mr. Hanson that
Captain Evans wished to pay attention to Miss Hanson. Whether old Hanson
was a man of the world or not, I cannot say, but he certainly knew his
daughter might go a long way farther and fare worse. Jack's affair
prospered. I have often been curious to know