The man told us to get inside the shelter, which we did. Inside it was
rather dark, but the man lit a lantern which hung from the roof, and
kindled a fire in a little fireplace. This fireplace was covered with
turf, so that the smoke should not rise up in a column. We saw that
the floor of the hut was heaped with bracken, and there were tarpaulin
boat-rugs piled in one corner, as though for bedding.

The man picked up a couple of rugs and told us to wrap ourselves in
them. "You'll be cold if you don't wrap up," he said.

As he tucked the rugs about us I noticed that the ring-finger of his
left hand was tattooed with three blue rings. I remembered what Mrs
Cottier had said about the man who had lighted her fire in the barn,
so I stared at him hard, trying to fix his features on my memory. He
was a well-made, active-looking man, with great arms and shoulders.
He was evidently a sailor: one could tell that by the way of his walk,
by the way in which his arms swung, by the way in which his head was
set upon his body. What made him remarkable was the peculiar dancing
brightness of his eyes; they gave his face, at odd moments, the look
of a fiend; then that look would go, and he would look like a
mischievous, merry boy; but more generally he would look fierce and
resolute. Then his straight mouth would set, his eyes puckered in as
though he were looking out to windward, the scar upon his cheek
twitched and turned red, and he looked most wrathful and terrible.

"Well, mister," the man said to me, "would you know me again, in case
you saw me?"

"Yes," I said, "I should know you anywhere."