Page:O'Higgins--From the life.djvu/257

 this thing ends. You're going to be all right after this."

"G'night," Sam said, and staggered off through the sands toward his shack.

The captain watched him go—through the serene moonlight toward the shade of the willows that draped black along the edge of the swamp. There, suddenly, he threw his hands up over his head—and at the same instant disappeared in the shadows. The captain, having stood a moment gazing after him, turned and went home to his bed.

In the morning, after a scene of anger with his daughter, he posted down to the boat and found that Sam had not appeared for work. He waited an hour, and then hurried off to the shack. The door was open. The place was in disorder—the lantern thrown upon the floor, the bedding dragged aside, the bench overturned under the table—and Sam had gone.

Sam had gone. And all the efforts of the captain to learn in what direction he had gone, to find any one who had seen him on his way, or to hear anything of him in any of the neighboring villages—all were unavailing. He had gone. He had told his story again—and he had not waited.

"It was my fault," the captain says. "I oughtn't to made him tell it. But there it is. That can't be helped. He says himself he tells it ev'rywhere