No, no; that could not be, for he had been talking as they entered. "Father," cried the lad, and pushed him.
Then the Governor opened his eyes, and yawned heavily. The blue-jacket, cap in hand, told his story again, and the good Adam seemed to struggle hard in the effort to grasp it through the mists of sleep. At length he said, "What has the man done?"
"Deserted his ship, your Excellency."
"Nothing else—no crime?"
"Nothing else, your Excellency. Has he been here?"
"No;" said the Governor.
And at that the weary man shut his eyes again and began to breathe most audibly. But when the blue-jackets, taking counsel together, concluded that somewhere thereabouts the man must surely be, and decided to sleep the night in the stable loft, that they might scour the country in the morning, the Governor awoke suddenly, saying he had no beds to offer them, but they might sleep on the benches of the kitchen.
An hour later, when all Lague was asleep, Adam rose from his bed, took a dark lantern and went back to the stable loft, aroused the Icelander and motioned him to follow. They crossed the paved courtyard and came in front of the window. Adam pointed, and the man looked in. The four blue-jackets were lying on the benches drawn round the fire, and the dull glow of the slumbering peat was on their faces. They were asleep. At that sight the man's eyes flashed, his mouth set hard, the muscles of his cheeks contracted, and with a hoarse cry in his throat, he fumbled the haft of the seaman's knife that hung in his belt and made one step forward.
But Adam, laying hold of his arm, looked into his eyes steadfastly, and in the light of the lantern their wild glance fell before him. At the next instant the man was gone.
The night was now far spent. In the town the forts were silent, the streets quiet, the market place vacant, and on the hilltops the fires had smouldered down. By daybreak next morning the blue-jackets had gone back empty to Ramsey, and by sunrise the English brig had sailed out of the bay.