“If I’d known I was so late!”

“Five minutes.”  Captain Tobias gazed across at the station clock, then at his friend’s face, as if comparing the two.  “You’ve altered your appearance recently.  Which some might say ’twas for the better.”

“Glad you think so,” said Captain Cai, modestly pleased.

“Others, again, mightn’t.  But, there!” added Captain Tobias with sudden intensity.  “Who cares what folks say?  If you chose to go about like a Red Indian, ‘twouldn’ be no affair o’ theirs, I should hope?”

“Why, o’ course not,” Captain Cai agreed, albeit a trifle dashed.  “As you say, we’ve retired, an’ can do as we like.”

“Ah!” Captain Tobias eyed him and drew a long breath.  “Got such a thing as a match about ye?” he asked, pulling forth a short clay pipe.

“No—­yes!” Captain Cai, clapping a hand to either hip, was about to admit that he had come without pipe, tobacco, or matches, when he felt something hard and angular within the left pocket, and (to his confusion) produced—­a silver matchbox.  “Good Lord!” he exclaimed stupidly.

“That’s a pretty trifle,” said Captain Tobias, possessing himself of the box and extracting a match from it.  “Where did ye pick it up, now!”

“From a—­a lady—­a Mrs Bosenna.”  Captain Cai recovered the box, pocketed it, and desperately changed the subject.  “What’s become of all the porters hereabouts?” he demanded.  “Leavin’ us alone an’ all this luggage, like a wreck ashore!”

“I sent ’em away,” Captain Tobias explained with composure, “knowin’ as you’d turn up sooner or later.  Who’s Mrs Bosenna?”

“She’s our landlady; a widow-woman.  She lives up the valley yonder.”  Captain Cai jerked a thumb in that direction, and with renewed anxiety looked about for a porter.  “Hadn’t we better whistle one across?”

“Sells matches, does she?”

“No,”—­he knew his friend’s persistence, and faced about to make a clean breast.  “I was callin’ there to-day.  There’s the leases to be fixed up, you see—­” He paused.

Captain Tobias assented with a slow nod.  “Premises all satisfactory?”

“And shipshape.  That’s one load off my mind, anyway,” sighed Captain Cai.  “You’re bound to like ’em—­that is, if you like Troy at all.  There’s hot and cold water laid on, so’s you can have a bath at a moment’s notice.”

“I don’t see myself, exactly,” said Captain Tobias.  “But never mind.”

“Well, as I was sayin’, I called there to-day—­to break the ice, so to speak—­”

“You didn’t mention ice; or, if you did, I missed hearin’ it.”

“‘Tis a way of speakin’.  Well, the widow pressed me to stay to dinner, and there was a suckin’ pig; and afterwards—­”

“Hold hard.”  Captain Tobias removed the pipe from his mouth and stared earnestly at his friend.  “Say that agen,” he commanded.

“There was roast suckin’ pig, I tell you.  It melted in y’r mouth.  Well, after dinner she left me alone with pipes an’ tobacco; an’ ’twas then, I suppose, that in my forgetful way I must have slipped the box into my pocket.”