emn twilight and irregular crag, arch and hollow, it looked quite an
ideal entrance to some mermaid city such as is described by the poets
who deal in fable.

But there were the two little men-o'-war to watch, and Aleck drew back a
step or two from the edge to select a comfortable seat, where the colour
of the rock which rose up behind was likely to assimilate with his
garments and not throw him up as a plainly-seen watcher if a telescope
were directed shoreward from one of the vessels.

"I wonder whether the smugglers ever come here," thought Aleck, as he
looked at the face of the rock in a spot that just suited his purpose;
and then he laughed to himself and felt no doubt at all, for there, just
level with his face, and about eighteen inches within a crack in the
rock, a shabby old horn lanthorn was wedged, and just below it was a
tinder-box and a square wide-mouthed bottle, well corked, evidently to
protect its contents from the spray which would come rushing up from
below in a storm, the contents being so many thin slips of wood, whose
sharply-pointed ends had been dipped in molten brimstone.

"One of their look-outs," he said to himself, as he turned again to sit
down, but only to start and crouch upon his knees in surprise; for close
up to the rock wall, half hidden by a tuft of sea-pink and grey sea
holly, was a very old ragged black silk neckerchief, folded and creased
as if lately torn off, and bearing strange rusty dark stains, dry and
unpleasant-looking, and with very little consideration Aleck settled in
his own mind that, if it were not the kerchief Tom had torn from his
neck to wind round the smuggler's wound, it was as like it as could be.

It did not look a nice thing to take up and handle, but the lad bent
lower, before rising up to say, decisively:

"It must be, I'm sure, for I almost seem to know the holes. Then Eben
must have been here this morning watching for the press-gang people."

Another thought flashed across the lad's brain directly:

"Perhaps he's close by somewhere, watching me."

This thought produced a very uncomfortable feeling, and Aleck was
divided between two forces which pulled different ways. One was to--as
Tom Bodger called it--look out for squalls, the other to sit down quite
calm and unconcerned to watch the vessels.

"I can't help it if Eben does fancy I'm watching his proceedings; he
must feel that I should be longing to know what is going on. No, after
last night I