esently I went on, too, and
walked across the Head until I came within sight of Port Soderick. Then
I sat down by a great bowlder. So quiet up there, Nelly; not a sound
except the squeal of the sea birds, the boo-oo of the big waves outside,
and the plash-ash of the little ones on the beach below. All at once
I heard a sigh. At that I looked to the other side of the bowlder, and
there was my friend of the monkey jacket. I was going to rise, but
he rose instead, and begged me not to trouble. Then I was vexed with
myself, and said I hoped he wouldn't disturb himself on my account."

"You never said that, Jenny Crow?"

"Why not, my dear? You wouldn't have had me less courteous than he was.
So he stood and talked. You never heard such a voice, Nelly. Deep as
a bell, and his Manx tongue was like music. Talk of the Irish brogue!
There's no brogue in the world like the Manx, is there now, not if the
right man is speaking it."

"So he was a Manxman," said Mrs. Quiggin, with a far-away look through
the open window.

"Didn't I say so before? But he has quite saddened me. I'm sure there's
trouble hanging over him. 'I've been sailing foreign, ma'am,' said he,
'and I don't know nothing--'."

"Oh, then he wasn't a gentleman?" said Mrs. Quiggin.

Jenny fired up sharply. "Depends on what you call a gentleman, my dear.
Now, any man is a gentleman to me who can afford to dispense with the
first two syllables of the name."

Mrs. Quiggin looked down at her feet.

"I only meant," she said meekly, "that your friend hasn't as much
education--."

"Then, perhaps, he has more brains," said Jenny. "That's the way they're
sometimes divided, you know, and education isn't everything."

"Do _you_ think that, Jenny?" said Mrs. Quiggin, with another long look
through the window.

"Of course I do," said Jenny.

"And what did he say?"

"' I've been sailing foreign, ma'am,' he said. 'And I don't know nothing
that cut's a man's heart from its moorings like coming home same as
a homing pigeon, and then wishing yourself back again same as a lost
one.'"

"Poor fellow!" said Mrs. Quiggin. "He must have found things changed
since he went away."

"He must," said Jenny.

"Perhaps he has lost some one who was dear to him," said Mrs. Quiggin.

"Perhaps," said Jenny, with a sigh.

"His mother may be, or his sister--" began Mrs. Quiggin.

"Yes, or his wife." continued Jenny, with a moan.

Mrs. Quiggin drew up suddenly. "What's his name?" sh