lden guineas in
it, and charged me, if I escaped, to take it to you. I unlashed it and
managed to get it into my pocket just before I was hoisted on board.
There would have been small chance of my keeping it, however, if I had
not fallen among honest people; but when I came to know the captain, I
was sure that it would be safe in his hands, so I gave it into his
charge, and he stowed it away for me, and showed me where it was kept.
If he hadn't done this I should have lost it, for a few months ago, when
we were down in the Bay of Honduras, we were chased and overtaken by a
schooner under Spanish colours. Her crew, a set of fellows of all
nations, calling themselves privateer's-men, though they were more like
pirates, robbed us of everything they could lay hands on, and all the
specie they could find belonging to the captain and owners, and had
begun to scuttle the ship, and would, no doubt, have set fire to her
besides and carried off our boats, when an English man-of-war hove in
sight, bringing up a strong breeze. The pirates, some of whom I was
sure were Englishmen, in spite of their dress, for I heard them
speaking, and should know two or three of them again, made off, and
allowed us to stop the auger holes and pump out the water. Their
schooner, being a fast craft, escaped; but the man-of-war, having seen
us safe on our way to Barbadoes, went back to look for her. If she
didn't find her, she would at all events have made those seas too hot
for the pirate. I was better pleased than anything else that your money
was saved, and here it is all right, just as the captain did it up for
you."

As Peter spoke he placed on the table before Jessie a small
weather-stained canvas bag, and, undoing the string, counted out fifty
guineas.

"They are all right," he continued, "and my heart is lightened of the
thought I've always had that I might lose them, though I would have made
it up to you somehow or other--that I would."

Tears choked Jessie's utterance as she thought of the kind captain who
had remembered her in his last moments, and of the sturdy honesty and
faithfulness of Peter.

"I am, indeed, grateful to you as I am to Captain Mudge," she said at
length; "but surely you are entitled to some of this."

"Not a dollar would I touch, not if all the judges in the land were to
order me to take it," answered Peter, replacing the money in the bag,
which he tied up and pressed into her hands. "There, it's all for you