Transcriber's Note:
A Table of Contents has been added.

By William John Hopkins

THE CLAMMER AND THE SUBMARINE.
THOSE GILLESPIES. Illustrated.
BURBURY STOKE.
CONCERNING SALLY.
THE MEDDLINGS OF EVE.
OLD HARBOR.
THE CLAMMER.

JUVENILE

THE DOERS. Illustrated.
THE INDIAN BOOK. Illustrated.

HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
Boston and New York

THE CLAMMER AND THE
SUBMARINE

THE CLAMMER AND
THE SUBMARINE
BY WILLIAM JOHN HOPKINS

BOSTON AND NEW YORK
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
The Riverside Press Cambridge
1917

COPYRIGHT, 1917, BY WILLIAM JOHN HOPKINS
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
Published September 1917

THE CLAMMER AND THE
SUBMARINE

CONTENTS

THE CLAMMER AND THE SUBMARINE

I

Down under my great pine is a pleasant place—even in April, if it is but warm enough, and if the sun is shining, and if there is no great wind, and if what wind there is comes from the southwest. It is not so pleasant—I know many pleasanter—if the wind is from the northwest, howling and shrieking as it does often in the winter, picking up the fine snow and whirling it back, leaving the top of my bluff as clean as though it had been swept. Such a wind roars through the ancient branches of the pine, and twists them, and tears at them as if it would tear them off. My pine stands sentinel-like on the top of the bluff, some distance from the edge, and its branches have withstood the winds of many winters. Its age must be measured in centuries, for it is a noble great tree; and in times long past it must have had fellows standing close. It is a forest tree, and its great trunk rises twenty feet without a branch. But its fellows are gone, leaving no memory, and the ancient pine now stands alone.

From the bench built against the trunk one can see many things: the harbor, and the opposite shore, and rolling country beyond, and distant hills, and one hill in particular with a tree upon it like a cross, which stands out, at certain seasons, right against the disc of the setting sun. One can see, too, the waters of the bay beyond the harbor, and certain clam beds just at the point, and a certain water front; and other things in their season. Old Goodwin's palace on the hill is not visible, except for a glimpse of red roofs above the tops of the trees. There is one other thing which I almost forgot to mention, and that is a hole scooped in the ground just without the shadow of the pine, and lined with great stones. That stone-lined hole has its uses, but the time for them is not yet.

I was sitting on the seat under my old pine, gazing out but seeing nothing of what lay before my eyes. And that was strange, too, for the harbor before me was smiling under a warm spring sun, and the hills beyond were bathed in the blue mist of summer. Indeed, it seemed like summer. There will be cold weather in plenty, with skies gray and wet. There is always more than enough of such weather in the first half of May, but that day seemed like summer. I had had hard work to realize that it was April until I looked about me and saw the grass just greening in the moist and sheltered spots, and the trees spreading their bare arms abroad. The buds were just swelling, some of them showing a faint pale green or pink at their tips. And my garden was nothing but freshly turned brown earth, not a spear of green.

I have put in my early peas, but not very long ago. They should be poking through, any morning now. And I planted some corn yesterday. It may get nipped by frost, but I hope not. What would the President think, when he found that I had let my corn get nipped by frost? I mean to do my share—in the garden. That is not the only reason why I hope my corn will not get nipped. It is not likely, for we do not often have frost here so late. It is much more likely that it will be stunted by the cold in May. But what if it does not succeed? It will only mean my planting those two rows over again, and if it escapes I shall be just that much ahead of the others who did not take the chance. I no longer plant my corn in hills. Hills have gone out. Corn is planted in drills now.

I even put in two rows of melons yesterday, but I am not telling my neighbors about it. They would be amused at my planting melons in April. Judson would not have been amused. Judson was a fine old man with an open mind, and he would have been interested to see how the experiment with melons succeeded. I should have told Judson all about it,—he might have helped me plant,—but Judson is dead, and so is Mrs. Judson. It is a loss for Eve and me, for a younger man lives in Judson's house now, a younger man who is not so fine; and he has a wife and a small girl—who pelts me with unripe pears when I venture near the wall—and he has a talking machine which sits in the open window and recites humorous bits in a raucous voice to the wide world. The girl—she is not so very small, probably ten or eleven—would have difficulty in pelting me with pears now, but she might use pebbles instead. She is a pretty fair shot; and the talking machine is not dependent upon season. They had the window open at that moment, and I found myself listening for the raucous voice, while I thought of seed potatoes—at four dollars a bushel, and scarce at that.

So the sun shone in under the branches of the pine, and I basked in its warmth, and I gazed out and saw nothing of what lay before my eyes, and I thought my thoughts. They came in no particular order, but as thoughts do come, at random: the season, and peas and corn and melons and Judson and his successor and the girl and the talking machine and pears and potatoes. I suppose I should not speak of such rumblings of gray matter as thoughts, for thoughts, we are told, should come in order, and should be always under the control of the thinker. Mine are not always under my control, and they seldom come in order. I might as well say that they are never under my control, but are controlled by interest of one sort or another. I make no claim to efficiency. Efficiency is a quality of a machine, as I take it. When our brains become machines, why, Heaven help us! But whatever my thoughts were, whether of my planting or my neighbor's talking machine, they revolved around one idea, and always came back to the point they started from, which sufficiently accounts for the fact that I was looking at the harbor and not seeing it.

War. That was the central idea. We are at war. I looked out upon the peaceful, smiling water and the peaceful, smiling country beyond, and the tree like a cross upon its distant hill, and I laughed. I confess it: What had war to do with that, or with me, or with mine? I could not realize it. War means nothing to me. It means nothing to many people over here, I believe, but flags flying, and parades, and brass bands, and shouting. If we were in France now—but I am thankful that we are not in France, and that there are two thousand and odd miles of water between.

As for submarines—submarines in that harbor, where they could not turn around without getting stuck in the mud! Or in the bay, where there is none too much water either, and ledges and rocks scattered around impartially and conveniently here and there! I know them well: one ledge in particular which has but one foot of water on it at low tide. And with a sea running—well, I could lead a submarine a pretty chase. I would if the submarine was bound for this harbor. It might choose to get stuck in the mud and sand of my clam beds, which would make them unproductive for years. Even as a civilian I will defend my own.

Well, we shall see; but I cannot believe that the matter concerns us very nearly. And I sighed softly, and smiled, and again I looked at the harbor, and I saw it; saw it with the warm spring sun on its quiet water, and the wooded hills beyond bathed in a blue haze. And I heard a soft footstep behind me, and there came from above my head a low ripple of laughter, and my head was held between two soft hands and a kiss was dropped on the top of it. And Eve slipped down on the bench beside me.

"Why do you sigh?" she asked. "What were you thinking of, Adam?"

"War," I said, and she sobered quickly. Eve seems to have pacifist leanings. I smiled at her to comfort her. "I was thinking that if a submarine should come into this harbor, it might happen to get stuck in my clam beds, and it would stir them all up, and would be bad for the clams. I am afraid I should have to take a hand then. Do you suppose your father would object to my mounting a gun on the point?—say, just under that tree where he keeps his rubber boots?"

She laughed, which was what I wanted. Eve is lovely when she laughs—she is lovely always, as lovely as she was when I first saw her. And the warm spring sun, shining in under the branches of the pine, shone upon her hair, and it was red and gold; as red and as shining gold as it ever was—or so it seemed to me.

"My father would probably help you mount the gun," she said. "Shall I ask him?"

"I will ask him. But your hair, Eve,—"

"Oh, my hair, stupid, is turning dark. Everybody sees it but you. But I don't care, and I love you for it. And you must look out now, for I'm going to kiss you." She seized me about the neck as she spoke, and she did as she had said she would. "There!" she said, laughing. "Did anybody see? Look all about, Adam. The mischief's done. As if a woman couldn't kiss her husband when she wanted to! Now, I'm going to rumple your hair."

She proceeded to the business in hand thoroughly.

"Eve," I cried between rumplings, "there are laws in this State—I don't believe they have been repealed—which forbid a woman's kissing her husband whenever she wants to. It can't be done. And—"

"It can't be done? Oh, yes, it can." She did it. "Now, can it? Say—quickly."

"Yes, yes, it can, Eve. I acknowledge it. But the submarine. You interrupted me. I had not finished."

"Well," she asked, subsiding upon the bench and smiling up into my face, "what about your submarine? I know of many things which I think more important."

"I've no doubt that there are laws against rumpling hair. There ought to be. It's important enough. But the submarine," I added hastily, for I saw indications of further rumpling; "I was only about to remark that if I were out in the bay—"

"In a boat?" Eve asked, still leaning forward and looking up into my face with the smile lurking about her lovely eyes.

"In a boat. If I were out in the bay, and a submarine suddenly popped up beside me, I should feel much more inclined to offer the crew my luncheon than to shoot them."

"They would all line up on the deck, I suppose, and you would have your choice."

I laughed. "I should have no gun. Besides, I am a civilian. That is against me. Civilians seem to have no chance worth mentioning."

Eve was looking at me thoughtfully, and there was a look deep in her eyes that I could not fathom.

"You are a civilian," she said softly, "and civilians have no—and what then, Adam? Did you think of—"

"They don't want doddering old men of forty-three, and there is no need. But if my clam beds were in danger I should not feel so amiable. I might even strain a point and try to get a standing that would enable me to shoot alien trespassers properly. But why, Eve? Did you want me to—"

"No," she answered quickly. "Oh, no. I was only thinking."

"I have been thinking. If we had to have a war I am glad that it has come now. Pukkie cannot possibly go, and he might want to. How would you like that?"

Pukkie is our son, and he is ten years old. I knew how it would feel to have him go. I took him off to school last fall. It is a beautiful school, with fine men for masters, and dignified buildings and extensive grounds, nearly three hundred acres, with woods and a lake. I wish I could have gone to such a school. It would have done me good. I mooned about with Pukkie, seeing his room and the other dormitories, and the dining hall and the gymnasium and the classrooms, and the football field, and the woods and the lake, and I tried to be cheerful, but I did not make a success of it. I could not say much. Pukkie was silent too.

And all too soon it was time for me to start on my three-mile ride for the station, and I gave him a long hug and a short kiss behind a clump of bushes; the last kiss, I suppose, that I shall ever give my little son. I have not forgotten how a boy of ten feels about that. And I jumped quickly into the car, and we started. I looked back and waved to him as long as I could see, and he waved to me once or twice. But he looked very small, standing there in the middle of three hundred acres, gazing after the car and waving his cap, and I almost broke down then. It seemed almost as if I were deserting my small son among strangers—enemies, perhaps, for he did not know a soul; my little son who had never before been away from home a single night without Eve or me. For Eve had taught him up to that time, and I had done what I could,—with his Latin and the groundings of his Greek, the very beginnings of it,—what one of my students once called the radishes. I had not the heart to inflict science upon him. I hate it. I ought not to, for I was bred in it, and taught it for some years, which are well behind me. But that was small comfort to me then, and I had hard work to keep myself in control all the way home. But Pukkie did not break down. He may have come near it. I do not know. He has never said anything about it. I have—to Eve. She understood. She always understands. That is the comfort of it.

But Eve had made no reply. She was still regarding me with that look that I could not fathom, although I looked deep into her eyes.

"I think I could manage it," I said, feeling strangely uneasy.

"Manage what?" she asked. "Pukkie's going?"

"Heaven forbid! It was that civilian business that I meant. I think I could manage to change my condition."

"No, no. I want you here, Adam. There is no need to change, is there?" I shook my head, and Eve reached out and took my hand. "You need not change—anything."

It was as if with her love for me, she had great sorrow, and great pity; though why I was to be pitied was beyond my understanding. I do not regard myself as a proper subject for pity. But there are many things beyond my understanding. Eve will enlighten me in her own good time. And as we sat, there was another step on the grass behind us, not soft, but hasty. And Eve unclasped her fingers from mine, and turned. It was Ann, the nurse.

"What is it, Ann?" Eve said. "Where's Tidda? Gone again?"

Then Ann explained that she had but turned her back for a minute, had gone into the house for her knitting, and come right back—had run every step of the way going and coming—and Tidda had disappeared. Tidda is our daughter, aged eight. Her name is not Tidda, but Eve, as it should be. She has a propensity for running away, although I do not think that her excursions are planned. She is a true apostle of freedom, and when she observes that nobody is about, she regards it as an opportunity heaven-born, and she makes the most of it. I can hardly blame her. A girl of eight, and tied to the worthy Ann's apron strings! How should I have liked it, at the age of eight? She would sympathize with our aims in this war we have undertaken. But Eve had risen, and was about to go.

"I suppose I had better stop at Cecily's," she said, "and at every house on the road to father's. She may turn up there. Ann can stay here. I wish," she added, laughing, "that I knew some way—"

"I'll go with you."

"I'd love to have you, Adam, but you'd better go around by the shore. Meet me at father's. Good-bye."

And she was gone, swiftly. She always has some ill-concealed anxiety over these disappearances of Tidda's, and so, for that matter, have I. I got up slowly and started toward the head of that steep path to the shore; but stopped halfway, and turned and went to my shed, and got my hoe and my rubber boots. It was yet early in the season for clamming, but my way led past the clam beds, and the tide was almost down, and I might at least see how they were getting on. So, my hoe and my boots in my hand, I went down the steep path, and strode along the shore. And, as I came nearer that place which is ever near my heart—where the sod breaks off to the sand just above my clam beds—I thought I got a glimpse of drapery behind a tree-trunk. There are trees there, pretty near the edge of the three-foot bluff, the beginning of a grove which is Old Goodwin's; and a path runs back to his house. I saw that the gleam of white I had seen was from a white dress, a small white dress, a dress that somehow seemed familiar; and I saw a small leg in the air, its stocking in the process of removal. I stepped forward without caution, and I grinned down at my small daughter. It is impossible to be cross with her, she is always so perfectly confident of having done nothing which she should not have done.

So I grinned down at her, and she looked up and grinned back at me.

"Going in wading," she announced cheerfully, continuing to push the stocking, which did not seem to want to come off.

"Going wading, are you? Well, don't be in a hurry, Tidda. Let's talk it over."

She did not relax her efforts, but she shook her head.

"Haven't got time to talk now," she said. "Daddy, you help me get my stockings off. They won't un-come. They're an awful bother."

"Wait a minute." I stepped back and looked up at my bluff. There was Ann watching me, and evidently anxious. I signalled to her that Tidda was found—we have a code for the purpose, and Ann is letter-perfect in it—and she signalled that she was much relieved and would find Eve and tell her. Then she disappeared.

I sat down beside my daughter. "Now, Tidda," I said, "there are several good reasons why you should not go wading. The water is very cold still, and—"

"Pull this one, daddy," she said, ignoring my remarks, and sticking out toward me the leg with its stocking half off. "If you take hold of the toe and the heel and pull, it'll un-come. I can't do it, because I can't get hold from that end."

I laughed.

"I was saying that the water is very cold, and that mother wouldn't want you to go wading."

She pointed accusingly at my rubber boots. "You're going."

"Not necessarily. I only brought them down in case I should want to."

"Well, I do want to."

"If you had rubber boots and warm stockings under them—"

"Get me some rubber boots."

I sighed and laughed. "I will," I said, "but I can't get them this minute. Will nothing less satisfy you? You sit here, and I'll go and see how the clams are getting on. I will bring you one."

She was on the verge of tears. "I was going to see how the clams were myself. Dig 'em with a stick. I can find 'em. I've found lots."

"What do you do with them when you've found them?"

"We play with 'em, and we had a clambake once."

"Were the clams good?"

"Pretty good. There were six of 'em, one apiece and two for Ann. But she didn't eat hers. She said they weren't done, and that she wasn't a fish to eat raw clams. Oh, look, daddy!"

Old Goodwin's ocean steamer was lying at her anchor, but I could see nothing unusual about her.

"No," said Tidda, "not grandpa's, but out that way. Is it coming in here? It comes fast, doesn't it?"

Set right by Tidda's pointing finger, I saw the steamer, but I could not make out what she was, whether yacht or war vessel. She had the lines of a torpedo boat, and was painted gray, with lines of bull's-eyes along her sides, and no deck to speak of, where one could sit in comfort; but plainly she was no torpedo boat, and as plainly she was not a steam yacht of the common type. She was nearly two hundred feet long, I judged, and of great speed.

"It is coming here," cried Tidda in some excitement. "See! It's going close to grandpa's."

As she spoke the vessel rounded to an anchorage at a safe distance from Old Goodwin's. She came at very nearly full speed, then there was a tremendous commotion under her stern which seemed to stop her short, her chain rattled out, and she lay quiet, the only evidence of her effort being the white water, which spread on either side of her and for a long distance ahead. A motor launch was lowered before her anchor touched bottom, several men got in, and it made for Old Goodwin's landing.

We had not heard the step behind us.

"So here's my little girl," said Eve. "Oh! What boat is that, Adam?"

"That is a little boat of Tidda's. She found it. But I'm glad you have come, Eve."

Eve laughed and sat beside me, and she began to pull Tidda's stockings into place. But she said nothing about it, and Tidda did not notice it. And when she had the stockings smooth on the little legs she stood her daughter on her feet and straightened her dress with a touch. Then she got up.

"Come, Adam," she said, "let's go up to father's. He wants to see you. He told me as I came down."

And I got up without a word, and I took one of my daughter's hands in mine, and Eve took the other, and Tidda danced along between us on the path all the way up through the grove to the great house. And I looked at Eve, and I smiled a smile of content, and she smiled back at me. Then her smile changed to one of amusement as she saw what was in my other hand, and I looked, and I was carrying my old battered boots and my clam hoe. But Old Goodwin would not mind.

II

Old Goodwin saw us coming from afar, Eve and me and our daughter, and he ambled down to meet us. He gave me his old slow smile of peace.

"You see," I said, holding up my boots and my clam hoe, "I'm getting flustered. I didn't know I had them. I should have left them at the shore."

"I see," he said. "Let me take them, Adam. You will need these. But perhaps you had better take them with you. You might forget again."

"I'll hang them on my watch chain. But Tidda ran away again."

"I know," he said. Tidda had run to him, and was clinging to his hand. He stooped and swung her up to his shoulder. She has got to be a heavy load for a man's shoulder, and he an old man. But Old Goodwin did not look like an old man. "I wish Pukkie were here," he said, "to balance."

"We wish he were—to balance. It is less than two months now, and he will be."

"Put her down, father," said Eve. "She is heavy."

"I like her up here," he said, "where she is near. I'll put her down if she gets too heavy."

And he led the way to the house, and up the steps, and through various sections of piazza, each with its tables and chairs and cushions, to that ample section on the water side, with its telescope and its view of the bay. There, before us, were the ocean steamer of Old Goodwin and the new arrival, as yet unknown to me; and beside us was Mrs. Goodwin, and as I turned to greet her I saw a girl sitting beside her, but a little withdrawn and in the deeper shadows. In the glance I gave, I saw only that she was of pleasing countenance, and quiet eye that seemed to take in all that passed, and mouth with little curves of humor about the corners, and she had hair of the colors of Eve's great beaver muff. There are beautiful colors in that beaver muff. Introductions followed. I missed her name, as I always miss new names; and before the introductions were well over, there trooped in Jimmy Wales, and Bobby Leverett, and a young fellow whom I did not know, all in uniform of one sort or another, and Tom Ellis, whom I did know. He lives almost across the road from me.

More introductions followed; but when it came the turn of the young fellow whom I did not know, the girl laughed, and held out her hand.

"Hello, Jack," she said with evident satisfaction. "I had no idea that I should see you here."

"Nor I you," he replied. "But aren't you glad? I am."

And she laughed again, and bade him wait and see.

The young fellow's name was Jack Ogilvie. And when I had found that out we drifted into chairs, and began to ask questions. I was next to Bobby, who is a cousin of Eve's.

"What boat is that, Bobby?"

"Rattlesnake," said Bobby. "She was the Ebenezer, but they changed it. Too bad, when we had a name that just fitted. We're in the navy now, you know. We're all U.S.N.R.F., Class four. The Ebenezer belonged to Jimmy and me, but the Rattlesnake belongs to the U.S. We offered it to them, and they took it so quick it almost took our breath away. She makes thirty miles an hour easy, and a little better if we drive her. You know that I'm a partner of Jimmy's now."

I nodded. Seven years ago he was office boy, just out of college.

"Any clams on this piazza, Adam?" Bobby asked. "I see—"

"Yes," I interrupted, "anybody might. These boots are not invisible. I wish they were. Neither is the clam hoe. Circumstances beyond my control, Bobby,—But what is Jimmy?"

"Jimmy? Oh, Jimmy's lieutenant commander."

"And you are an admiral?"

"Well, no. They offered me that rank, of course, but I thought I'd rather be under Jimmy. I'm a lieutenant. Ogilvie'll be an ensign as soon as he's of age. They don't often give commissions to fellows until they are twenty-one. He's not through college yet."

"Chasing submarines, Bobby? How many periscopes have you shot off?"

Bobby laughed. "That information I am unable to impart, Adam. Undoubtedly it would give comfort to the enemy. But we shall be chasing submarines pretty soon. That is to be our job, so far as we know now. We have a number of chasers under our command. Personally, I'd like to be in patrol work out in the steamer lanes. Our boat is too good for this in-shore work. You know the Smith saw a submarine a week or two ago."

I shook my head. I have no faith in that report. Everybody has been seeing submarines from Eastport to the Gulf.

"We picked up Ogilvie at Newport," Bobby continued. "I knew him, and he'd been doing police duty there, and going through training that he knew as well as his alphabet; nothing that was any mortal use. So I asked for him, and he was transferred. They don't seem to get on very fast at Newport with our fellows. I don't know why. They have more boats than they are using, but most of them are small and slow, and they have been busy with men for the regular navy. I suppose they'll get around to the rest of them in time. We are going to have good big chasers some time soon."

"Ah, Bobby, but when? I could give you some statistics of our navy, but I won't, for I don't believe you'd stay. I have been reading an article packed full of valuable information which ought to be of some comfort to the enemy. It seems that nearly all of our vessels are old or slow or both—or they are in reserve in one form or another, without full crews; and we have no submarine chasers—literally none that would be of any use in chasing. We shall not get any before next January, and then only a beggarly hundred or so. It looks pretty bad, Bobby. We might as well surrender at once."

Bobby smiled. "I know where you got that dope. I saw it too, and I wonder what good the chap thinks he is doing by making out that we have gone to the dogs. He's a knocker. Pay no attention to him, Adam. I have faith that all our navy men aren't fools. There may even be one or two who know almost as much as he does. You ought to conduct a few patriotic meetings. And be a speaker, Adam. You could make glorious speeches. I'd come."

"Flags flying,—to the great advantage of the Bunting Trust,—and 'The Star Spangled Banner' sung several times, and you'd have to stand with your hat off, and take cold in early May, and hear every man in the county who has ever held office give the history of the country, and Washington's Farewell Address, and Lincoln's Gettysburg Speech delivered by a talented young lady from our high school,—if we had one,—and brass bands, and parades, and me for drum-major, I suppose, Bobby. Buncombe! There wouldn't be an able-bodied man in the glorious assemblage—except the band and the speakers. Humbug and buncombe! True patriotism doesn't go about waving the flag and shouting. Patriotic meetings are essentially for women and children."

Bobby laughed delightedly. "Noble sentiments, Adam. But I wish you would."

I shook my head. "Never," I said. "But I could give you some hints for your submarine chasing. You could put them in as your own ideas too. I promise not to dispute your claims."

"I'm a little shy of your hints, but fire away."

"Well, this is my best. I have others, but they are too obvious. First you would have to set a spindle on Great Ledge, a spindle with a capacious cage at the top. Another one on Sow and Pigs, and one on Hen and Chickens, and on Devil's Bridge. Then, when there were some submarines over here,—Germany says there are none now, and I believe it,—when they came, put a live pig in each of the cages. It's in the nature of baiting the trap, you see. All you'd have to do would be to sit tight, and remove the wrecks. They'd all pile up on those ledges. Germans can't resist the lure of pig."

"That's not a half bad idea, Adam," Bobby said. "Of course it might be necessary to renew the bait or feed the pig, but that would be easy; and pig is pretty high just now. There's a good pun there, but I'll leave it to you.—Jimmy!"

Jimmy was talking to the girl whose name I did not yet know, but he turned at Bobby's hail.

"Jimmy," Bobby said, "Adam's just given me a most valuable hint for trapping submarines. Here it is in all its beauty." And he proceeded to give my idea in more detail than I had done, adding some more ledges which appealed to him as likely spots, Watch Hill Ledge, to the east of Fisher's Island being one, I remember. "You forgot that, Adam. It would be a crackerjack, almost level with the water. In any sea at all, and the tide right, the water opens every little while and shows the rock. It's fearsome."

"Is Adam going to leave all the work of danger," asked Jimmy, "to us?"

"Yes," Bobby cried, "that's what I want to know. Like baiting the traps, you know. It'll be no snap to get the pigs into their cages."

"You can't expect to have all your problems solved for you, Bobby," I said. "You would always have the benefit of my counsel, and giving counsel to you and Jimmy is not without its dangers. Besides," I added, modestly I hope, "I did have something else in mind. In addition to the arduous toil of tilling the soil—"

"Cut that," said Bobby. "As if you didn't always till the soil!"

"In addition to that," I continued with dignity, "I thought of organizing a company to protect some of our most valuable property here. It would be a sort of Home Guard. Submarines, if they escaped the traps and the hawk eyes of the patrol fleet, and the stings of the wasps, might get into the harbor. Then they would surely get aground, possibly on my clam beds, and they would ruin the dispositions of my clams. So I thought of mounting a gun on the point—with Mr. Goodwin's permission—and enrolling all here present in the Clam Beds Protective Company, of which I should be captain."

Old Goodwin applauded the idea at once, but as well as I could judge in the confusion which followed, Jimmy and Bobby and Tom Ellis were not of the same mind.

Finally Tom made himself heard. "What I want to know, Adam," he asked, "is where do we come in? I think I voice a general question."

"I was about to nominate Mr. Goodwin for colonel,—honorary, if he prefers,—and Jimmy for adjutant, and Bobby and Mr. Ogilvie for lieutenants. Those posts would have to be honorary also, unless the navy could be prevailed upon to assign them to that duty. I don't see that there is anything left for you, Tom, but to be the private. It would be a highly honorable office. You would be the only private."

"I say," Tom protested, "I like that! But I have an idea. What about the Susies who sew shirts for soldiers? Aren't you going to give them a chance?"

Eve interrupted at this point. I was glad to have her.

"Oh, yes, he will," she said. "I promise that he will."

"Seems to me that Eve ought to be elected captain," Tom observed. "But perhaps it isn't necessary. She will be anyway." They all laughed at that—all but me and Ogilvie. Eve noticed that. I did not see anything ridiculous about the idea. I am glad to serve under Eve, and everybody knows it.

"I will enroll Cecily," Tom pursued; "but, Adam, make me a sergeant, won't you?" he added in a hoarse whisper. "I want to have some authority over her."

"I'll see about it. I shall have to think it over, and perhaps get some advice." And Tom turned at once to Eve, and whispered, and she smiled and nodded.

"The uniform, Adam?" asked Old Goodwin. "Don't put us to any unnecessary expense."

"I was about to speak of that. I have brought some samples with me." And I held up my boots and my clam hoe.

Old Goodwin smiled. "That is very satisfactory." He looked at Tom. "If anybody prefers a rake for arms, I suppose there would be no objection, Adam?"

I shook my head. Then there were objections from Jimmy and Bobby, on the ground that they would have to buy boots and hoe, and that the boots would be new and not in keeping. But I said that, as their offices were honorary, they would not have to provide themselves with uniforms, and they could go clamming in their naval uniforms if they liked. I should not object.

"Well," said Bobby thoughtfully, "we have boots and slickers and sou'westers. Perhaps they will do. When is the first meeting of our company—at the clam beds, Adam?"

I told him that it was a trifle early for that yet. It would be as soon as I thought it safe for the clams. Then a thought struck me.

"How does it happen," I asked, "that a patrol boat can be coming in here—for all the world like a yacht—and all its officers come ashore, as if they had nothing to do?"

Eve had been silent for some minutes, occupied with her daughter, who stood silent beside her. Tidda had been strangely quiet.

"Yes, Bobby," said Eve, "account for yourself. What are you here for? It is not for nothing."

"Sh! The movements of shipping are not to be reported. But I don't mind telling you, Eve, that we regard this as a base, in a sense. I came because my superior officer ordered it. I don't know his reasons, but I surmise that he hoped that some of you people would be charitable enough to ask us to dinner."

Jimmy grinned, and Old Goodwin smiled, but he said nothing. Jimmy Wales and Bobby are especial favorites of his, and Bobby is his nephew.

"I speak," said Eve, "for Mr. Ogilvie. You can't come, Bobby. You'll have to stay here with Jimmy."

"Oh, I say, Eve!"

"No. You may bring Mr. Ogilvie within sight of the house, and show it to him." She turned to Ogilvie. "You'll come?" she asked, holding out her hand.

Ogilvie seems a nice young chap. He bowed very prettily over Eve's hand, and said something nice, I am sure, for I was watching Eve's face. I can tell always. And Ogilvie smiled, and Eve got up to go, and I got up too, of course, and Jimmy and Bobby and everybody got up one at a time, as if it were a prayer-meeting. It broke up the party to have Eve go. Eve's going is very apt to break up any party.

Bobby came out with us through the interminable series of piazzas.

"I say," he whispered, "who's the new girl, Adam? Do you know?"

I shook my head. "I didn't hear her name, Bobby, and I don't know anything about her. She is attractive."

"M-m. I'll ask Eve."

Eve said that the girl's name was Elizabeth Radnor, but she knew nothing about her, and had never heard of her before. "But," she added, "why don't you ask Jimmy?—or Mr. Ogilvie? He knew her before."

"So he did. Good idea, Eve. I will. But Jimmy ought to be ashamed of himself. He's married, and I might tell Madge. We never know what we might do."

Eve laughed at him. "Did you think you could worry Margaret?"

"I thought perhaps I could worry Jimmy. But he doesn't worry much." We were at the head of the steps. "Well, good-bye, hard heart, spurning the beggar from your door. I hope your conscience will give you no rest."

Eve laughed again, and Tidda piped up a good-bye, and Bobby turned back. And, by the time we had reached the bottom of the steps, Old Goodwin had caught us, and had taken Tidda's hand.

"I thought I'd better come, Adam," he said, "and see about the emplacement for that gun."

So we wandered down to the bank, where the sod breaks off to the sand, and we lingered there, saying nothing and watching the sun get lower. And the day, that had been as warm as summer, grew somewhat chill as the sun sank nearer to the bearded hills, and our daughter was restless and wanted to go home. So we wended along the shore, and Old Goodwin left us, and we went up the steep path that leads to my bluff, and there we found Ogilvie under my pine, standing silent and looking out over the harbor to the west.

Ogilvie was modest and unassuming and pleasant. He spoke when he was spoken to, and sometimes when he was not, but he did not volunteer anything about himself, although he was very ready to answer questions. Eve succeeded in finding out something about him without seeming to try. He went down to Newport about the first of April. Naturally enough, he seemed a little disappointed that the authorities at Newport had not seemed to be ready for him, and that his preparation had been largely a waste of time. He had been four days on a watch boat, guarding Newport harbor, piloting vessels in through the nets, and incidentally, one very thick night, carrying away the mooring buoys of one of the nets; then he had been put on police duty in Newport, running in drunken sailors, or just walking back and forth on his beat, trying to keep awake. Then there had been more drill, and he had been transferred to the Rattlesnake.

Then we talked of books, the theatre, and gardening, in which he had had experience. My heart warmed to him, and we discussed corn and melons and asparagus and peas and beans and squashes and cucumbers and chard and okra and such like for more than an hour. From them we progressed to more intimate things, when suddenly a noise started just outside the window, and he rose with a smile, saying that it was a noise of Jimmy and Bobby singing "Poor Butterfly," and he supposed it meant that he must go. And he thanked us very nicely, and went out into the night. I went with him and asked them in, but they assured me that I was an ungrateful wretch, and they would have nothing to do with me and my invitation.

So they went off down my steep path to the shore, still singing "Poor Butterfly," I suppose, although I am unfamiliar with modern classics. And Eve came out and joined me, and we heard them going along the shore, stumbling over great pebbles, and the poor butterfly fluttering off into the distance. And when we could hear no more of it we went in, and I shut the door as softly as I could, but the sound of its shutting went booming through the house; and I smiled as I blew out the candles, and I was smiling still as Eve took my hand in hers and we mounted the stairs together.

III

Joffre was in Boston on Saturday, the 12th of May. Viviani also was there, and some others, but the marshal, the hero of the Marne, was the attraction. Eve acknowledged as much to me on the evening before the event.

"I do want to see him," she said, "and I suppose you'll think it foolish, but I'm going up. Probably I shall cry when I see him. Adam," she added somewhat wistfully, "you don't want to go, I suppose? Father will take us in his car—the new one."

That about the "new one" was plainly nothing more than bait.

"Why should I want to go," I said, "except to go with you? I always want to do that. And I should be glad to be with your father, but no more in his new one than on our bank at the shore. Not so much. There is much to do here. Why should I want to go, Eve? I don't want to cry."

She laughed. "No reason, Adam, unless it is to stir your imagination."

"My imagination is stirred sufficiently here. You know that I detest crowds, and parades. And I was going to plant again to-morrow."

She sighed softly, and smiled adorably. "Well, Adam, plant then. I knew it would bore you to go. The middle of a crowd watching a parade is no place for you. I should love to have you with me, but I think you had better not come. I don't want you to cry." And she laughed a little, unsteadily.

"I might," I said somewhat gruffly. "It is conceivable. But there is one thing. I hate to speak of it. Your father ought not to go off on these long trips any more without a chauffeur. There may be hard work to do, and he is—not young, Eve. Besides—"

"He is going to take a chauffeur," said Eve, interrupting me hurriedly. "I think it almost breaks his heart to acknowledge it, but he realizes that he ought to. Of course that wouldn't make any difference about your going."

I shook my head. It was no part of my objection that I might be called upon to do some hard work. I had planned to do a good deal of hard work at home.

So Eve set off about eleven the next morning alone with her father and the chauffeur. Old Goodwin was in the driver's seat, and it did not seem likely that the chauffeur would have anything to do. And I stood in my garden clothes, leaning on my hoe, and waved a good-bye to them, feeling half regretful and wholly self-reproachful; and Eve made her father stop, and she called me, and I came running, and she leaned out and kissed me, and she went off smiling. I looked after them, and they had not gone more than a hundred yards or so when they stopped again, and Tom Ellis and Cecily came out of their door and got into the back seat with Eve. And I smiled, and turned, and went back to my garden, thinking that the best of women—and I gave a little start, for it had occurred to me that the chauffeur was a Frenchman. And I wondered if they—but of course they did. Such things do not happen by accident—with Old Goodwin and Eve.

It was cold for the season. It had been cold and wet for three weeks, and my corn was not up, nor my melons that I had put in three weeks before, nor my beans. My experiment with melons has not yet been a failure if it has not been a success this year. I was doubtful about the corn, so I dug up a kernel, and I found it sprouted, and I put it back and covered it. My peas were up, and doing bravely, and the beans were about breaking through, for the earth was cracked all along the rows. And I got out my sections of stout wire fencing, and put them in place along the rows of peas. They take the place of pea-brush, and are much easier to put up and to take down. The fencing is fastened to stout posts, and the posts have pieces of iron, about a foot and a half long, shaped much like a marlin-spike, bolted to them for driving into the ground. I can take my sledgehammer and drive the posts, and get a row of peas wired in a tenth the time needed to set brush, and the fencing is much less expensive, in the long run. My fences have done service for thirteen years already, and they are perfectly good.

So I fussed around among the peas, and planted more corn and more beans, and more melons, and a row of chard, and two rows of okra, and some other things. I often think that the place for tall green okra is the flower garden. The blossoms are beautiful, delicate things, more beautiful than most of the hollyhocks. And now and then I stopped my planting—a man has to rest his back—and I leaned on my hoe or my rake or whatever I happened to have in my hand, and I thought my thoughts. They were many, and they were not, at such moments, of my planting.

The harbor was almost empty still. There was but one fisherman's boat and two motor boats, little fellows, not suited to patrolling. And the sky was gray, and getting darker, and the winter gulls flying across, and wheeling and screaming harshly. Occasionally a gull beat across my garden, flying low and screaming his harsh note. I watched them, and envied them until I saw a fish-hawk sailing high up among the clouds. Then I envied him: his calmness and serenity, and his powers of wing and eye, seeing the swimming fish from that height, and perfectly secure. Then, naturally enough, I thought of aeroplanes, sailing and circling like the great hawk, and seeing their prey as surely as he. I never had the slightest wish to go up in an aeroplane. The hawk seems secure in his sailing, the aeroplane does not, and I may envy the hawk while shrinking unaccountably from the aeroplane. But if they can see the submarine from up there, and can pounce upon it as surely as the hawk strikes his fish—well, if we had a plague of submarines, it would be a comfort to see a hawk now and then. And I thought of Jimmy Wales and Bobby Leverett and Ogilvie searching the waters for that which was not.

Jimmy has put in here every few days. It is hard to see why, but we have seen a good deal of Ogilvie and Bobby, and Bobby has seen more or less of Elizabeth Radnor. She is still rather a mystery to me, a girl that Mrs. Goodwin chanced upon somewhere, and took a great fancy to. That is not strange, that Miss Radnor should have been fancied, but it is strange that Mrs. Goodwin should have taken the fancy, and that she should have asked her here for an indefinite stay. Mrs. Goodwin did not use to fancy obscure teachers of athletics or gymnastics or dancing in girls' schools, and Miss Radnor is or was something of the kind. She may be giving lessons in dancing to Mrs. Goodwin for all I know—or to Bobby. It is not of much consequence. If Bobby should really come upon submarines, it would be of little consequence to him.

Thinking upon submarines, there came into my head the account that I had just seen in the London "Times" of the capture of a submarine by a trawler. As I recollect it, the trawler was going about her business in the North Sea—a business not unconnected with submarines—when suddenly a submarine began to emerge from the deep just ahead. The trawler put on all the speed she had time for, and rammed the submarine amidships, sliding up on its body half her length, so that the captain found himself well-nigh stranded near the periscope. Whereupon he called for an axe, and smashed that periscope into scrap iron and fragments of glass. The trawler then slid off, and the submarine opened, and the crew poured forth upon her deck and forthwith surrendered, and the trawler towed them into an English port. Thinking upon this, I laughed aloud to the gulls and the hawk. I had refrained from going to Boston to have my imagination stirred by looking at a parade and listening to the bands!

To stir my imagination! I had but to picture to myself the destroyer fight in the Channel on the night of April 20, two English destroyers, Swift and Broke, against six German destroyers, in the darkness of a black night; a five-minute battle, but those five minutes crowded full. Ramming, torpedoing, repelling boarders, fighting with pistols and cutlases and bayonets, responding to a treacherous call to save—it was all worthy of the times of Drake. Stir my imagination! I found myself starting forward and brandishing the hoe, my breath coming fast, and my eyes, I have no doubt, flashing fire. I laughed again. It was raining. It had been raining, I suppose, for five minutes at least, and I had not known it. I gathered up my tools, put them in the shed, and went into the house to change my clothes, and to consume my pint of milk, while my daughter, opposite me, consumed hers—and some other things besides.

After luncheon I put on my rubber boots and went out. It was still raining, a good hard drizzle from the southeast. It suited me well enough, and I wandered the shores all the afternoon, or stood in the shelter of a tree and looked out over the bay. I liked it. There is something soothing and at the same time stirring in such a day and such a place. There was a good heavy breeze, and the seas marched, and the sound of their breaking, and the fresh wet wind on my cheek, and the gray veil of rain over the rolling water, with not a sail or so much as a smudge of smoke in sight—well, it is hardly worth while to say how it affects me. Those who feel as I do will not need to be told, and for those who do not it would be useless. But man seems a little thing, and the affairs of man of no importance—absolutely none.

As the afternoon wore on, the drizzle became less and finally stopped, although it was still gray. And then the clouds began to break, and I wandered homeward along the shore, and I climbed the steep path, and sat me on the seat under my great pine, where I could see the water and the sun when he was ready to show his face. A long time I sat there, and I heard no sound from the harbor except the screams of the gulls, and no sound from the land except the sound of the wind blowing among the needles of the pine above my head. And at last the gulls were gone, and the sun peeped out from under the edge of the ragged and scudding cloud, and I felt a gentle touch upon my arm. And I turned my head and looked, and there was Pukkie; Pukkie, my little son, my well-beloved.

I put both arms around him, and I hugged him shamelessly. I was glad to feel that he hugged me in turn, and hugged me hard. Usually I put my arm around him gently and surreptitiously, for I would not draw his attention to the act. I dread the time when he will shrink from my embraces; but that time does not seem to have come yet.

"Oh, Pukkie!" I cried. "My dear little son, where in the world did you come from?"

He laughed delightedly. "From school," he said; and he nestled against me.

"But how did you get here? Your mother went—but have you seen her? Where is she?"

He glanced up over my shoulder, and smiled. "Turn around, daddy."

And there came from over my head a low ripple of laughter, and I looked up into Eve's lovely, smiling face. She slipped down upon the seat beside me, and I reached out for her hand, that was already reaching out for mine, and her fingers clasped mine close.

"My goodness, Eve," I said, "but I'm glad to have you back—and Pukkie."

"You're no gladder to have me than I am to get back. I don't ever want to go anywhere without you, Adam. But I've seen him—seen Joffre—and I waved with all my might, and I cried. I knew I should."

"And Pukkie?"

"Oh, father stopped for him on the way up. He said until the end of the year was too long to wait, and he'd bring him back in two days. The headmaster didn't want to let him go, but father generally has his way. And it began to rain, but we didn't mind."

"And when you saw Joffre you wept?"

"Not exactly. There was a young fellow standing in the crowd quietly, with his arm in a sling. He was hardly more than a boy, and he looked sick. He had beautiful sombre eyes, with a look in them that—well, as if he had seen so much, and as if he did not quite understand. You should have seen his eyes. Like a wild thing. And when Joffre came, I thought he would go crazy. He waved his cap frantically, and the tears just streamed out of his eyes, and you should have heard him. Joffre heard, and saw, and he leaned out of the car, and he saluted that boy. My! That boy was proud. You can guess—that was when I cried. And we got him into the car with us. He didn't look able to go far. He was a soldier who had been with the Canadians over there, a Frenchman by birth. He told us a little about it, but he didn't seem to want to talk. He had been wounded, and sick, and had come back over here on sick leave or something of the kind. And he and Lejeune, the chauffeur, got to talking, and we took him home. He wants to get back into the fighting as soon as he can. And when he got out, Lejeune got out too. He was going to enlist."

"Left you on the spot?"

Eve laughed. "Yes," she said, "but I rather guess that it wasn't unexpected. I shouldn't be surprised if that was what father took him for. At any rate, father just smiled, and gave them both his blessing, and told Lejeune to come back when the war was over. And he gave him some money, and said that they could divide it between them."

"How much, I wonder?"

"I don't know how much, but a good deal, considerably more than a hundred dollars. He had a note already written, too, a 'character,' as the maids call it, saying that he was a good chauffeur. Then Tom—he had been getting uneasy—said that he wanted to be in on this too, but he wasn't so well prepared as father. And he gave them all he had with him, except a dollar or two. That was too much for the French boy, and he waved his cap again, and cried, 'Vive la France! Vive l'Amérique!' with the tears streaming down his face again. And I cried some more, and so did Cecily. Oh, I had a lovely time, Adam."

Eve was laughing again, and pressing closer to me. "That French boy was a machinist before he went to the war, and Lejeune is a good chauffeur, and I shouldn't wonder if they'd both get into driving when they get over there. I hope so. But he wasn't thinking of that, the French boy. He is ready to go back, when his time comes, and meet his fate with a high heart. With a high heart, Adam. Oh," she cried, "don't you think it is stirring—just a little—to the imagination? Don't you?" And she gave me a little shake.

I nodded soberly, and hugged Pukkie closer. "I rejoice, Eve," I said irrelevantly, "that Pukkie is not yet eleven."

Eve did not reply directly. Her eyes filled with tears, and she drew Pukkie around between us. "I suppose it is selfish," she said. "If a French machinist goes—only about eight or nine years older than Pukkie—and can stir me all up with the idea of it—why—"

She did not finish, so I did not know what she would have asked. But I could guess.

"War is wicked," I said. "There is no novelty in that idea. But if a wicked war is started, it may be more wicked to keep out of it than to go in, and there may be more misery involved in keeping out than in going in. I don't know about this one, and I don't believe that anybody knows. One thing I do know, and that is that wars will continue to occur at intervals as long as human nature is what it is. Man is a fighting animal. When he ceases to be, the time of his fall will have arrived. I have spoken."

Eve laughed merrily. "But you have not finished. Go on, oracle."

"No more from the oracle. Only a purely personal observation. I could go into the fighting with a sort of a titillation—an unholy joy in fighting for its own sake, quite apart from any feeling for any cause. I believe that that is the feeling which animates most men who volunteer to fight. Of course they choose their side from conviction. At least, it is to be hoped that they do. But as for the actual combat, there is a joy in the fight—why, that alone accounts for all our games, at bottom."

Eve was looking at me doubtfully. "But, Adam," she said slowly, "you don't mean to—you aren't going to—"

I shook my head. "I have no such intention. Make your mind easy. I have a dependent family. I don't know what you would do without my efforts to support you. It would be a terrible misfortune if you were cast upon your father's shoulders. You might starve."

Eve seemed to be amused. But Pukkie had been getting uneasy, and he began to squirm. Then he seized my arm.

"Look, daddy. See that big schooner. I never saw her before. What is it?"

I looked. A great white schooner was headed in, and she was almost at the entrance of the harbor. The wind had fallen light with the approach of the sun to his setting; the schooner had all her light sails set and came on fast. Suddenly the light sails began to come off, slacking down, wrinkling, and gathered in, and stowed, as a man would take off his coat. Before one was well in another would start slacking down, wrinkling, gathered in, and stowed, almost as fast as I tell it. That meant a big crew well trained. All her kites were stowed, and she began rounding into the wind, letting her jibs go as she came around. She shot a long way, but stopped at last, and her chain rattled out, and she began to drift astern. Then her foresail came down steadily, and before it was down, sailors swarmed out upon the footropes of the mainboom, and the great mainsail began to come down, slowly and steadily, gathered in as it came by the men upon the footropes. By the time all her chain was paid out, and she was finally at rest, all her sails were furled, and they were getting out the covers.

A shining mahogany launch was dropped into the water, run back to the gangway, and a girl ran lightly down the steps.

"Elizabeth Radnor," said Eve, wondering. "What can she be doing there?"

"Perhaps the owners take lessons in dancing," I suggested.

Eve smiled. "She gives lessons in swimming too," she said.

A man followed Miss Radnor. He seemed strangely familiar.

"Bobby!" cried Eve. "I think it's funny. I'm sure it's Bobby."

I was sure it was Bobby. It might be funny, but it was not strange. The launch made for Old Goodwin's landing at forty miles an hour.

IV

I lay against the bank above my clam beds, with my hands clasped behind my head, and I gazed up at the whitish blue of the sky, and at the little floating clouds flecking the blue, and at an occasional herring gull flying across my field of vision with moderate wing-beats and with no apparent object, and at the procession of screaming terns busy at their fishing. For the terns have come, which always marks the change of season for me, but the winter gulls have not all gone. And I looked at the tree over my head, and I cast back over the years. I could see the tree merely by raising my eyes, without raising my head.

That tree has associations and a history: for under that tree Eve stood the fifth time that I saw her,—I remember each time,—and it was raining, a hard drizzle from the southeast, and the water dripped from her wide felt hat, and shone upon her long coat, and she was smiling. So that tree has associations for me—and for Eve as well, I believe. And sundry pairs of rubber boots have been hung in a crotch of it, both Eve's, and at a somewhat later time, Old Goodwin's; wherefore it has a history. And here, too, just where my head was pillowed, Eve had sat but a scant two hours after I had found her out,—I had thought she was a governess in Old Goodwin's house,—and she had set us both right for ever. And now there were many happy years behind us, and more happy years ahead of us, and there were Pukkie and Tidda; but most of all there was Eve.

So I lay and drank in the sunshine, and basked in its warmth, and my mind was a blank save for these pleasant musings. My poor little son! All of the Sunday that he was here—two days ago—it rained hard. He did not seem to mind it, but dragged me out in it—he had not such hard work to get me out. I like the wet well enough, but we have had a long stretch of cold and wet. But he got me out, and wandered the shore, clad in his rubber coat, and his rubber boots, and his little sou'wester, and he watched the white schooner; but on the schooner there was no sign of life save some sailors standing like statues in their dripping oilskins, and a man in a pea-jacket and faded old blue cap, who paced back and forth at the stern, or stood still by the rail for long periods, and then took up his pacing again. And Pukkie looked up at me and asked whether I thought he was the captain or the mate, and would have gone out there in one of Old Goodwin's boats, with me to help him row. But I refused. It is wet and uncomfortable rowing in a pouring rain; better standing.

And he would go up to his grandfather's in the hope of finding Bobby Leverett. So we went, and we found Bobby sitting on the piazza with the telescope and Miss Radnor; and Pukkie bearded Bobby in his chair, and asked him point-blank what he had been doing in that schooner. We had told Pukkie about the Rattlesnake, and Jimmy Wales and Ogilvie.

And Bobby grinned at my son, and answered him, if you call it an answer.

"Sorry not to be able to tell you, Puk, old chap," he said, "but you know we are enjoined not to publish information of the movements of vessels, and the plans of the navy are a dead secret. It might give information to the enemy." And he pointed at me.

"Do you know the plans of the navy?" asked Pukkie.

Bobby laughed, and so did Miss Radnor. "I refuse to answer," said Bobby, "on the ground that it would incriminate me. We may have been out baiting our traps. Ask your father about it."

"I don't believe the navy has any plans," I said, "so far as you are concerned. They just want to make you think that you are busy."

"Treason!" Bobby cried loudly. "Treason! I'm afraid it's my duty to lay charges against you, Adam."

"And I," I retorted, "will expel you from membership in the Clam Beds Protective Company—if you persist."

"There!" said Miss Radnor. "How will you like that, Mr. Leverett?"

"I'll have to give in," Bobby replied. "It's a cruel and unusual punishment, and therefore unconstitutional, but Adam wouldn't mind a little thing like that. I am moved by the thought of Eve's grief, although you wouldn't think that a good sport like Eve would object to a traitor's taking off. I surrender, Adam. Be merciful."

Our noise had attracted Old Goodwin, and he joined us. And, thinking that Bobby might as well be left to the society of the telescope and Miss Radnor, we left him, we three, and betook ourselves to the shore. On the white schooner the man in the pea-jacket and old faded blue cap was still pacing back and forth by the rail, and Pukkie turned to his grandfather and asked him the question which I could not answer.

At that moment the man caught sight of Old Goodwin, and waved his arm, and Old Goodwin answered the wave.

"That is Captain Fergus, Pukkie. He's the captain. Some years ago he was captain of vessels that sailed the deep oceans."

My son was astonished. Captains who sail the deep oceans command his unbounded respect. I inferred from his reply that skippers of yachts, even of great white schooner yachts, do not.

"Was he?" he said. "How does it happen that he is skippering a yacht then?"

Old Goodwin laughed his pleasant, quiet laugh.

"He owns the yacht—or he did. I think it likely that he gave up going to sea on account of his wife. He was married four or five years ago."

"Oh, his wife!" my son replied in accents of deep scorn. It was evidently incomprehensible to him that a man should give up such a delightful occupation for a mere wife.

Old Goodwin laughed again. "I'd take you out there if it weren't so wet. But never mind. She'll be in here again some time when you're at home."

Then we wandered the shores until the rain stopped and the sky was a mass of heavy gray clouds, but the sun did not come out; and Pukkie had to go in.

The next morning Pukkie found that the yacht had gone, and Old Goodwin took him back to school, alone with him in the great car. Pukkie did not mind going back. He has become acclimated at school, and he likes to ride with his grandfather, sitting in the front seat with all the clocks and meters and switches and the little lamps like eyes and the levers and pedals spread out before him. There is reason to suppose that Old Goodwin gets some pleasure out of it. That is why neither Eve nor I went. There is more pleasure for him when they two are alone. Old Goodwin and his grandson are great chums.

When I had got to this point in my ruminations, I realized that the great pebbles under me, although partly cushioned by sand and by the dried seaweed which had washed up among them, had been getting harder and harder. I moved, and groaned involuntarily, and sat up—and rubbed my eyes. There was the white schooner lying quietly at anchor, her sails all furled and covered, and no movement on her decks. She lay so still that she seemed immovable; as firmly fixed as the breakwater itself, or as the Long Stone, or as one of the distant islands, which swam high in a bluish haze and flickered in mirage.

I got up slowly, and heard a noise of a rolling pebble; and I turned, and there was Eve coming along the shore. I went to meet her, and we came back and sat upon the bank. And Eve looked up at me and smiled, and her hand went out slowly, and mine met it, and we put our clasped hands down between us.

"Now they can't see," said Eve. "Can they?"

I smiled and shook my head.

"And it wouldn't make any difference," Eve pursued, "if they could. Would it? Say quickly, Adam," she cried, shaking our clasped hands in mid air. "You are too slow. Would it?"

"No, Eve," I answered, smiling again. Indeed I had not stopped smiling. "But we might excite envy in their breasts, which is a sin we pray to be delivered from."

"Oh, well," she said, "there is nobody to see but Captain Fergus, and he has not been married long. I love this place, Adam. Do you remember—here were your pebbles, in the sod just here. And here I sat when you warned me not to spot my dress,—when I took you for a fisherman,—and you took me for a governess."

"Did you think I could forget?"

And we fell silent, and presently Eve would have me row her out upon the water, for it was as warm as summer. And, that pleasing me,—although it would have been enough for me that I was pleasing Eve,—we wandered to Old Goodwin's stone pier, and took one of his boats, and rowed out. And I paddled about, having nowhere in particular to go, and we found ourselves near the great white schooner, almost under her stern; and I looked up, and read her name, Arcadia, and there was Captain Fergus, in his faded old blue cap, looking down at us over the rail. His face was bronzed by sun and wind and rain, and there were little wrinkles about his eyes after the manner of your seafaring men, and his eyes were of a deep blue—the blue of the deep sea. They made me think of Old Goodwin's eyes, although Old Goodwin's eyes are not blue.

He touched his cap. "Won't you come aboard?" he asked in a deep voice which made one think of rolling seas and fresh winds and bellying sails.

"Thank you." I hesitated, and looked at Eve, but she did not wait for me.