e to argue
farther, sulked. Blunt, coming in about some ship matters, the pair
drank rum. Sylvia went to her room and occupied herself with some minor
details of clothes-packing (it is wonderful how women find relief from
thoughts in household care), while North, poor fool, seeing from his
window the light in hers, sat staring at it, alternately cursing and
praying. In the meantime, the unconscious cause of all of this--Rufus
Dawes--sat in his new cell, wondering at the chance which had procured
him comfort, and blessing the fair hands that had brought it to him. He
doubted not but that Sylvia had interceded with his tormentor, and by
gentle pleading brought him ease. "God bless her," he murmured. "I
have wronged her all these years. She did not know that I suffered." He
waited anxiously for North to visit him, that he might have his belief
confirmed. "I will get him to thank her for me," he thought. But North
did not come for two whole days. No one came but his gaolers; and,
gazing from his prison window upon the sea that almost washed its walls,
he saw the schooner at anchor, mocking him with a liberty he could
not achieve. On the third day, however, North came. His manner was
constrained and abrupt. His eyes wandered uneasily, and he seemed
burdened with thoughts which he dared not utter.

"I want you to thank her for me, Mr. North," said Dawes.

"Thank whom?"

"Mrs. Frere."

The unhappy priest shuddered at hearing the name.

"I do not think you owe any thanks to her. Your irons were removed by
the Commandant's order."

"But by her persuasion. I feel sure of it. Ah, I was wrong to think she
had forgotten me. Ask her for her forgiveness."

"Forgiveness!" said North, recalling the scene in the prison. "What have
you done to need her forgiveness?"

"I doubted her," said Rufus Dawes. "I thought her ungrateful and
treacherous. I thought she delivered me again into the bondage from
whence I had escaped. I thought she had betrayed me--betrayed me to the
villain whose base life I saved for her sweet sake."

"What do you mean?" asked North. "You never spoke to me of this."

"No, I had vowed to bury the knowledge of it in my own breast--it was
too bitter to speak."

"Saved his life!"

"Ay, and hers! I made the boat that carried her to freedom. I held her
in my arms, and took the bread from my own lips to feed her!"

"She cannot know this," said North in an undertone.

"She has forgotten it, perhaps, for she