e o'clock the
last party returned, and as I thought you might have some difficulty in
getting on board after that, I got into the boat and rowed ashore, and
engaged the men to wait as long as I wanted them. I thought perhaps you
had missed your way, and did not feel uneasy about you, for there being
three of you together it was scarcely likely you had got into any bad
scrape. I was beginning at last to think you had perhaps gone to an
hotel for the night, and that it was no use waiting any longer, when I
heard your voices coming along the quays. The night is so quiet that I
heard your laugh some distance away, and recognized it. I then strolled
along to meet you, when I saw those four fellows come out into the
moonlight from a shadow in the wood. I guessed that they were up to
mischief, and started to run at once, and was within fifty yards of you
when I saw the scuffle and caught the glint of the moon on the blade of
a knife. Another five or six seconds I was up, and then there was an end
of it. Now we are close to the ship. Go up as quietly as you can, and do
not make a noise as you go into your cabins. It is no use alarming
people. I will carry Jim down."

"I can walk now, I think, Mr. Atherton."

"You might do, but you won't, my lad; for if you did you would probably
start your wound bleeding afresh. You two had best take your shoes off
directly you get on deck."

James Allen was carried down and laid on his berth. Mr. Atherton went
and roused the ship's doctor, and then lighted the lamp in the cabin.

"What is all this about?" the surgeon asked as he came in.

"There has been a bit of a scrimmage on shore," Mr. Atherton replied;
"and, as you see, Allen has got a deepish slash from the shoulder down
to the elbow. It has been bleeding very freely, and he is faint from
loss of blood; but I do not think it is serious at all."

"No, it is a deep flesh wound," the doctor said, examining him; "but
there is nothing to be in the slightest degree uneasy about. I will get
a bandage from my cabin, and some lint, and set it all right in five
minutes."

When the arm was bandaged, Mr. Atherton said: "Now I must get you to do
a little plastering for me doctor."

"What! are you wounded, Mr. Atherton?" the others exclaimed in surprise.

"Nothing to speak of, lads; but both those fellows made a slash at me as
I closed with them. I had but just finished their leader and could do no
more than strike wildly as I turned upon th