"And what if I refuse to put myself under your orders?" inquired the man.
"You are but a young captain for such an old hulk as mine."

"The ill consequences of a refusal would all be on your own side," replied
Edward. "I shall, in that case, deliver you up to justice: if I have not
the means of capturing you myself," he continued, observing the seaman's
eye to wander rather scornfully over his youthful and slender figure,
"there are hundreds within call whom it will be in vain to resist.
Besides, it requires little strength to use this," he added, laying his
hand on a pistol.

"If that were all, I could suit you there, my lad," muttered the stranger.
He continued aloud, "Well, what is your will with me? D----d ungenteel
treatment this! But put your questions; and, to oblige you, I may answer
them,--if so be that I know anything of the matter."

"You will do wisely," observed the young man. "And now to business. What
reason have you to suppose that the persons for whom you watch are not
already beyond the village?" The seaman paused long before he answered,
and gazed earnestly at Edward, apparently endeavoring to ascertain from
his countenance the amount of his knowledge. This he probably overrated,
but, nevertheless, hazarded a falsehood.

"I doubt not they passed before midnight," he said. "I warrant you they
are many a league towards the sea-coast, ere this."

"You have kept watch, then, since midnight?" asked Edward.

"Ay, that have I! And a dark and rough one it was," answered the stranger.