.

A MISTAKE.
The tide was ebbing still when Barebone loosed his boat, one night, from the grimy steps leading from the garden of Maiden's Grave farm down to the creek.

It was at the farm-house that Captain Clubbe now lived when on shore.

He had lived there since the death of his brother, two years earlier--that grim Clubbe of Maiden's Grave, whose methods of life and agriculture are still quoted on market days from Colchester to Beccles.
The evenings were shorter now, for July was drawing to a close, and the summer is brief on these coasts.

The moon was not up yet, but would soon rise.