And, more than all, he respected his companion's desire to remain a mystery.

Brown decided that Atkins was, as he had jokingly called him, a man with a past.

What that past might be, he did not know or try to learn.

"Mind your own business," Seth had declared to be the motto of Eastboro Twin-Lights, and that motto suited both parties to the agreement.
The lightkeeper stood watch in the tower at night.

During most of the day he slept; but, after the first week was over, and his trust in his helper became more firm, he developed the habit of rising at two in the afternoon, eating a breakfast--or dinner, or whatever the meal might be called--and wandering off along the crooked road leading south and in the direction of Pounddug Slough.