The master turned when the young captain accosted him, and replied, with reasonable civility, "Yea, the Rose of Devon, Captain Hosmer, at your service, sir. Passage? Yea, we can take you, but you're a queer sort to ask passage ere you know whither she sails. Is it murder or theft?"
"Neither. The old order is changing and I would go abroad."
"To the colonies?"
"They tell me all the colonies are of a piece with these Roundheads here, and that as many psalms are whined in Boston in New England as in all the conventicles in London."
He laughed in good humour. "You are rash," said he. "Were I of the other side, your words might cost you your head. But we're going south to Barbados, and there you'll find men to your own taste."
Captain Philip Marsham wished no more than that. So he struck a bargain for passage, and paid with gold, and sailed from England for the second time in the old Rose of Devon, the dark frigate that by God's grace had come back to Bideford in the hour when he most needed her.
THE END
THE DARK FRIGATE
By CHARLES BOARDMAN HAWES