As soon as your regiment disembarks you shall be
a free man: for not till then shall I have an opportunity of speaking
with his Majesty. The squadron will be returning at once to this
port, and I trust you may return with it. In the meantime you must
give me your word to remain where you are; for though the punishment
is remitted, you are still under arrest. I have seen your captain,
however, and you will find matters made very light for you.
The sentry will bring you food and drink."
He stopped, for Tristram had fallen on one knee and was passionately
kissing his hand.
"How ill you must think of me!" he murmured; "and how can I thank
you?"
"By keeping one tender thought or two for a father who held aloof
from you, while it was for your good, and came to you when, for the
first time, you wanted him. Mine has been a hard life, Tristram, and
not altogether a good one. By asking you to share it, I had done you
Heaven knows what injury."
This was true enough, and it struck the speaker as so pathetic that
he managed even to squeeze up a tear.
"But come," he went on, with a sudden change to vivacity, "tell me
how you happened into this scrape?"
And so, with the lantern between them casting long spokes of light on
the ship's timbers, the rafters and the two drunken sleepers in the
corner, father and son sat and talked for the better part of an hour;
at the end of which time Captain Salt, who dexterously managed to do
nine-tenths of the listening, was pretty well posted in the affairs
of the Blue Pavilions and their inmates, and knew almost as much of
Tristram's past history as if he had spent a day with the
thirty-seven green volumes.
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