with gravity to prepare for my next assault.

'Was Edbury the one to throw up the marriage? Did he decline it?'

'No,' was the answer once more.

Temple stopped my wrath by catching at me and begging me to listen.

'Edbury was drowned, Richie.'

'Overnight?'

'No, not overnight. I can tell it all in half-a-dozen words, if you'll
be quiet; and I know you're going to be as happy as I am, or I shouldn't
trifle an instant. He went overnight on board the barque Priscilla to
see Mabel Sweetwinter, the only woman he ever could have cared for, and
he went the voyage, just as we did. He was trapped, caged, and
transported; it's a repetition, except that the poor old Priscilla never
came to land. She foundered in a storm in the North Sea. That 's all we
know. Every soul perished, the captain and all. I knew how it would be
with that crew of his some day or other. Don't you remember my saying
the Priscilla was the kind of name of a vessel that would go down with
all hands, and leave a bottle to float to shore? A gin-bottle was found
on our East coast-the old captain must have discovered in the last few
moments that such things were on board--and in it there was a paper, and
the passengers' and crew's names in his handwriting, written as if he had
been sitting in his parlour at home; over them a line--"The Lord's will
is about to be done"; and underneath--"We go to His judgement resigned
and cheerful." You know the old captain, Richie?