or
the background of his picture. Uniacke was with his friend at the time,
and heard the Skipper's heavy and stumbling footsteps ascending the
narrow stone stairs.

"Who's that coming?" the painter asked.

"The Skipper," Uniacke answered, almost under his breath.

In another minute the huge seaman appeared, clad as usual in jersey and
peaked cap, his large blue eyes full of an animal expression of vacant
plaintiveness and staring lack of thought. He showed no astonishment at
finding intruders established in his domain, and for a moment Uniacke
thought he would quietly turn about and make his way down again. For,
after a short pause, he half swung round, still keeping his eyes vaguely
fixed on the artist, who continued to paint as if quite alone. But
apparently some chord of curiosity had been struck in this poor and
benumbed mind. For the big man wavered, then stole rather furtively
forward, and fixed his sea-blue eyes on the canvas, upon which appeared
the rough wall of the belfry, the narrow window, with a section of wild
sky in which a weary moon gleamed faintly, and the dark arch of the
stairway up which the drowned mariners would come to their faithful
captain. The Skipper stared at all this inexpressively, turned to move
away, paused, waited. Sir Graham went on painting; and the Skipper
stayed. He made no sound. Uniacke could scarcely hear him breathing. He
seemed wrapped in dull and wide-eyed contemplation. Only when at last
Sir Graham paused, did he move away slowly down the stairs with his
loose-limbed, shuffling gait, which expressed so plainly the illness of
his mind.

In the rectory parlour, a few minutes later, Uniacke and Sir Graham
discussed this apparently trifling incident. A feeling of unreasonable
alarm besieged Uniacke's soul, but he strove to fight against and to
expel it.

"How quietly he stood," said the painter. "He seemed strangely
interested."

"Yes, strangely. And yet his eyes were quite vague and dull. I noticed
that."

"For all that, Uniacke, his mind may be waking from its sleep."

"Waking from its sleep!" said Uniacke, with a sudden sharpness.
"No--impossible!"

"One would almost think you desired that it should not," rejoined Sir
Graham, with obvious surprise.

Uniacke saw that he had been foolishly unguarded.

"Oh, no," he said, more quietly, "I only fear that the poor fellow can
never recover."

"Why not? From what feeling, from what root of intelligence does his
inter