nder promised to stand by him as long as the _Sea
Hawk_ floated on the waves. Every arrangement which circumstances would
admit of being made for the future, he dismissed all but the necessary
watch on deck, to take the rest they so much needed.

Among those who appeared was Paolo. He hitherto had had no time to
speak to him--he now summoned him to his side.

"What," he exclaimed, "are you not yet weary of a rover's life, that you
return again to the _Sea Hawk_--or did you fear a pirate's fate, if you
had remained on shore?"

The Italian looked conscience-stricken and miserable. He could not meet
the glance of the pirate's eye; he dared not confess what he had done;
and yet he knew it must be instantly discovered.

"Could I leave my sister?" he asked. "Could I leave one whom I love
dearer than life itself to perish amid the raging fight, when my arm
might save her? Do you suppose that my eye is so dull, my heart so
callous, that I could behold the rare beauty which almost won your
affections from her who had sacrificed all to you, and yet feel no
impression? Know, that he whom you have treated as a tyrant does his
slave, whom you have scorned and deceived, has a heart capable of
burning with a passion far more intense, far brighter, far purer, and
more enduring than the flickering flame which yours can alone nourish."

"What is this rhapsody about?" exclaimed Zappa, thinking that Paolo had
gone mad.

"When you go below, you will discover," answered the Italian, and walked
to the other side of the deck.

When Ada Garden came to her senses, she found herself in the cabin of
the _Sea Hawk_, and Nina bending over her, and applying such
restoratives as she had at command. She was soon sufficiently recovered
to explain to her astonished friend the means by which she had come
there.

"And Paolo could have done this. He who professed to be ready to die
for you, to tear you from the very arms of your friends, when they were
on the point of recovering you. Alas! my unhappy brother--his mind must
have forsaken him."

"Whatever the cause, I have sorely suffered, and I have no one to trust
to now but you, Nina. Through you alone can I now hope to be restored
to my friends."

As Ada was speaking, the pirate chief entered the cabin. He started
back, on seeing her, and an angry frown came over his brow. "What! and
my suspicions are true," he exclaimed, in a voice of passion. "And that
mad youth has ventured to