Page:Doctor Syn - A Smuggler Tale of the Romney Marsh.djvu/59

 All through supper was this vein of humorous conversation kept up, until when the meal was finished and pipes alight, and Denis had retired to his room with a glum face to steer most sorely against his will upon a course of literature, the conversation gradually drifted into the Southern Seas, and the captain began telling stirring tales of Clegg the pirate, who had been hanged at Rye.

"I should like to have been at that hanging," he cried, finishing a tale of horror, "for the fellow, as you have just heard, was a bloodthirsty scoundrel."

"So we have always heard," said Doctor Syn; "but don't you think that some of his exploits may have been exaggerated?"

"Not a bit of it," exclaimed the captain; "I believe everything I hear about that man, except that last blunder that put his neck into the noose at Rye."

"That is his only exploit about which there is any certainty," said the physician.

"It was a mistake murdering that revenue man," agreed Doctor Syn, "but Clegg was drunk, and threw all caution to the devil."

"Clegg had been drunk enough before," said the captain, "and yet he had never made a mistake. No, he was too clever to be caught in the meshes of a tavern brawl. Besides, from all we know of his former life, he would surely have put up a better defence at his trial; of course he would. You don't tell me that a man who