The servants of Sir Arthur Adelon were standing at some distance while their young master spoke with Captain M----; and Dudley, taking the arm of the latter, walked slowly away with him up the beach, and out of the light of the fire; but Edgar turned to speak a few minutes to his fellow-travellers, giving kind and liberal orders for their comfort and accommodation.
"I do not wish," said Dudley, addressing Captain M----, "to be recognised just at present. I will choose my own time and my own manner; and you may, doubtless, divine the reasons, as I know you have been made acquainted with a considerable portion of my history."
"I can easily conceive," replied Captain M----, "that you have a great many painful and unpleasant things to go through, which you would desire to do in your own way; but I congratulate you most sincerely, Mr. Dudley, not alone upon your salvation this night, but upon your restoration to your country and your friends, your property and your reputation. I trust this storm will be the last you will have to encounter."
"God only knows!" replied Dudley; "but for the future, my dear sir, I shall be less apt than in earlier years to give way either to hope or to despair."
"Hope is the best of the two," replied the young officer, in a lighter tone. "It comes from heaven, and is an ingredient, more or less, in everything that is good, and high, and holy. The other comes from below, leading to all that is evil, and dark, and disastrous. Choose hope, then, my good friend. But here comes some one quickly after us. I trust none of the men are much injured?"
"None of the survivors," answered Dudley, gravely; "but twenty or thirty perished when the ship first struck."
"Mr. Adelon sent me, sir," said a rough, but not unpleasant voice, "to show one of you two gentlemen the way to my cottage. It is the gentleman who was on the wreck," he continued, looking at Dudley, who said, in reply, that he was willing to go wherever the other should lead.
"Then I will leave you now," said Captain M----, in a low voice, "and your secret is perfectly safe with me, depend upon it; but I trust that we shall meet again before I depart for London, and if not here, in the great city."
"I will certainly find you out," replied Dudley, "for the scene and the circumstances in which we first met are never to be obliterated from memory, nor the kindness with which you soothed and relieved, at a moment when I thought there was none to help."
They then parted; and after taking a few steps forward with the stout, broad-set countryman who had been sent up to him, Dudley inquired how far they were from Brandon.