"It is probable that one of them sailed with Jack when he was on the West Wind; but who the others were I don't know, and it isn't at all likely that I shall ever find out," replied Marcy. "Not in the dining-room, please, because there's a stove-pipe hole in the ceiling that leads into a room upstairs. Oh, it's a fact," he added with a laugh, when his mother stopped and looked at him. "A certain person, whose name I shall presently give you, listened at that pipe-hole time and again, and took messages straight to Hanson. But you'll not blame him when you hear my story. Let's go into the back parlor. By the way, did you find your breastpin?"
His mother said in reply, that she had neither seen nor heard of it since the day it was stolen.
"Well I've got it safe and sound," continued Marcy; and then he settled back in his chair and repeated, almost word for word, the story sailor Jack had told him the night before he left for the blockading fleet. He told how Julius had taken the pin in the first place, how the overseer had worked upon his fears to compel him to give it up, and how he had used the power which the possession of the stolen pin enabled him to exercise over the timid black boy. Then he described how sailor Jack and his "Enchanted Goblet" appeared upon the scene; and from that he glided into the history of Jack's acquaintance with Aleck Webster, and the interviews he had held with him at the post-office. But there were two things he did not touch upon—the meeting with Captain Beardsley at Crooked Inlet, and sailor Jack's fears that the Confederate authorities might interest themselves in the matter if they learned, through any of her "secret enemies," that Mrs. Gray kept money concealed in the house. His mother was profoundly astonished, and when Marcy finished his story she did not know whether to be glad or frightened. The boy thought, from the expression of her countenance, that he had added to her fears.
"You don't act as if you were pleased a bit," said he dolefully. "Are you not glad to know that I can stay at home now? Beardsley has got to quit business, and of course he can't make any more excuses to take me away from you. He never did need a pilot, the old rascal. When he reads the warning letter that is waiting for him in Newbern, he'll fill away for home without the loss of a moment."
"Of course I am glad that you will not be obliged to go to sea any more," said Mrs. Gray. "But I don't want those Union men to destroy Captain Beardsley's property. When you see this man Webster I hope you will say as much to him."
"If it's all the same to you, mother, I'll wait and see how Beardsley conducts himself," answered Marcy, who did not like the idea of trying to protect a man who had done all he could to annoy his mother. "If he lets us alone, we'll let him alone; but if he bothers us, he had better look out. When he finds out what those Union men did to Hanson, I think he will haul in his horns. I wonder if Shelby and Dillon know it?"
"That's another strange thing that happened while you were absent, and I did not know what to make of it," replied Mrs. Gray. "Of course the story of the overseer's abduction spread like wild-fire, and I know it must have reached the village, for the very next afternoon Mr. and Mrs. Shelby rode out to visit me; and that is something they have not done before since these troubles began."
"Aha!" said Marcy, in a significant tone. "They began to see that you were not so helpless as they thought you were, and that it might be to their interest to make friends with you."
"That is what I think now that I have heard your story," replied his mother, "but I did not know what to think at the time they made their visit. I am sorry that I was not more courteous to them, but they were so very cordial and friendly themselves that it made me suspicious of them."
"That was perfectly right," said Marcy approvingly. "You did well to stand on the defensive. Don't let them fool you with any of their specious talk. They're treacherous as Indians, and would burn your house over your head to-morrow, if they were not afraid."