"By the crew of the Albatross. Ah, I thought you wouldn't be quite so much amused and so full of your grins when I mentioned them."
"Oh," said she, recovering herself, "I can still grin when there's anything to amuse me. But we seem to have changed places; now you're talking riddles which I cannot understand."
"Can't you? then I must explain them for you. If what I'm told is right--but it's very little I know--you belonged to that crew yourself once. My brother Tony was one of them, I understand; and though he's dead now, there's several of 'em left. Old Lyons, for instance,--you recollect him? Crockett, Griffiths--"
"Suppose, to avoid giving you further trouble, I say I do recollect them, what then?"
"You're angry, although you smile; I can see that fast enough. But what's the good of being angry with me? You know when a feller gets into their hands what chance he has. You know that fast enough, or ought to. Well, I'm in their hands, and have to do what they order me."
"And they've ordered you to come down to me?"
"They found out where you were, and sent me after you."
"Ha! And what on earth can have induced them, after a certain lapse of time, to be so suddenly solicitous of my welfare?" said Miss Gillespie, laughingly. "There was never any great love between any of those you have named and myself. I have no money for them to rob me of, nor do I see that I can be of any great use to them."
"I don't know that," said Mr. Effingham, laying his forefinger knowingly alongside his nose. "You see, you're a pretty gal, and you've rather got over me--"
"Flattered, I am sure," said Miss Gillespie, showing all her teeth.