iderable distance before Jonathan
observed they were entering into a quarter darker and less frequented
than that which they had quitted. Tall brick houses stood upon either
side, between which stretched a narrow, crooked roadway, with a kennel
running down the center.

In front of one of these houses--a tall and gloomy structure--our
hero's conductor stopped and, opening the door with a key, beckoned
for him to enter. Jonathan having complied, his new-found friend led
the way up a flight of steps, against which Jonathan's feet beat
noisily in the darkness, and at length, having ascended two stairways
and having reached a landing, he opened a door at the end of the
passage and ushered Jonathan into an apartment, unlighted, except for
the moonshine, which, coming in through a partly open shutter, lay in
a brilliant patch of light upon the floor.

His conductor having struck a light with a flint and steel, our hero
by the illumination of a single candle presently discovered himself to
be in a bedchamber furnished with no small degree of comfort, and even
elegance, and having every appearance of a bachelor's chamber.

"You will pardon me," said his new acquaintance, "if I shut these
shutters and the window, for that devilish fever of which I spoke is
of such a sort that I must keep the night air even out from my room,
or else I shall be shaking the bones out of my joints and chattering
the teeth out of my head by to-morrow morning."

So saying he was as good as his word, and not only drew the shutters
to, but shot the heavy iron bolt into its place. Having accomplished
this he bade our hero to be seated, and placing before him some
exceedingly superior rum, together with some equally excellent
tobacco, they presently fell into the friendliest discourse
imaginable. In the course of their talk, which after a while became
exceedingly confidential, Jonathan confided to his new friend the
circumstances of the adventure into which he had been led by the
beautiful stranger, and to all that he said concerning his adventure
his interlocutor listened with the closest and most scrupulously
riveted attention.

[Illustration: How the Buccaneers Kept Christmas

_Originally published in_
HARPER'S WEEKLY, _December 16, 1899_]

"Upon my word," said he, when Jonathan had concluded, "I hope that you
may not have been made the victim of some foolish hoax. Let me see
what it is she has confided to you."

"That I will," replied Jonat