"Thank you--thank you," he muttered and laid his head down on his arms again.

Betty rounded the end of the Neck where the lighthouse stood. One of the lightkeepers was on the gallery just under the lamp chamber and had been watching them through his gla.s.ses. He waved a congratulatory hand as the _Merry Andrew_ shot along, under the "able seaman's" skillful guidance.

"I'm goin' to put you ash.o.r.e in the skiff right there by the store, Miss Lou," Betty said.

"Shouldn't I get a doctor and send him over to the Point?"

"They've got a telephone there," Betty told her.

"I--I hope they'll take good care of him."

"They ought to," sniffed Betty. "I'll see to it he's all right, Miss Lou, before I leave him."

"Thank you, Betty," returned the girl, too honest to make any further attempt to deny her deep interest in the man.

When the sail rattled down and Louise tossed over the anchor, Lawford roused a bit. "Sorry the trip turned out so rotten bad, Miss Grayling," he mumbled. "I--I don't feel just right yet."

Louise patted his shoulder. "You poor boy!" she said tenderly. "Don't mind about me. It's you we are worrying about. But I am sure you cannot be seriously injured. Betty will take you directly over to the Point and the folks there will get a doctor for you. Next time we'll have a much nicer fishing trip, Mr. Tapp. Good-bye."

He muttered his adieu and watched her get into the skiff after Betty and the baskets. The "able seaman" rowed quickly to the beach. The sharp eyes of Mr. Bane noted their arrival, and he strode over to the spot where the skiff came in, to help Louise out of the boat and bring the baskets ash.o.r.e.

"You need a handy man, I see," the actor observed. "What a fine catch you have had--blackfish, snappers, and fluke, eh? I'll carry the baskets up to your uncle's store for you. Fine old man, your uncle, Miss Grayling. And what stories he can tell of his adventures--my word!"

"Come over to-night and tell me how he is, betty, won't you?" the girl whispered to the "able seaman" and the latter, nodding her comprehension, pulled back to the sloop. Neither of them saw that Lawford was watching the little group on sh.o.r.e and that when Bane and the girl turned toward the store the young man looked after them with gloomy visage.

The girl's replies to Bane's observation were most inconsequential.

Her mind was upon Lawford and his condition. She was personally uncomfortable, too; for although the sun and wind had dried her hair and her blouse, beneath the dry skirt her clothing was wet.

As they came to the Sh.e.l.l Road the long, gray roadster Louise had seen before came down from town. L'Enfant Terrible was at the wheel while her two older sisters sat in the narrow seat behind. Cecile tossed a saucy word over her shoulder, indicating Louise and Bane, and her older sisters smiled superciliously upon the two pedestrians. Louise was too deeply occupied with thoughts of the injured man to note this by-play.

CHAPTER XVII

THE ODDS AGAINST HIM

"Horrid taste she has, I must say," drawled Marian. Marian was the eldest of the Tapp girls. To tell the truth (but this is strictly in confidence and must go no further!) she had been christened Mary Ann after Israel Tapp's commonplace mother. That, of course, was some time before I. Tapp, the Salt Water Taffy King, had come into his kingdom and a.s.sumed the robe and scepter of his present financial position.

"Oh!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Cecile. "That's Judson Bane, the Broadway star, she's walking with. I'd like to know him myself."

"You coa.r.s.e little thing!" drawled Marian.

"And you not out yet!" Prue, the second sister, observed cuttingly.

"You're only a child. I wish you'd learn your place and keep it."

"Oh, fudge!" responded L'Enfant Terrible, not deeply impressed by these sisterly admonitions.

Marian was twenty-six--two years Lawford's senior. She was a heavy, lymphatic girl, fast becoming as matronly of figure as her mother. She still bolstered up her belief that she had matrimonial prospects; but the men who wanted to marry her she would not have while those she desired to marry would not have her. Marian Tapp was becoming bored.

Prue was a pretty girl. She was but nineteen. However, she had likewise a.s.sumed a bored air after being in society a single season.

"That big actor man will put poor Fordy's nose out of joint with the film lady," Prue said. "Look out for that dog, Cis. It's the Perritons'. If you run over him----"

"Nasty little thing!" grumbled Cecile.

"And the apple of Sue Perriton's eye," drawled Marian. "Be careful what you are about, Cecile. It all lies with the Perritons whether we get into society this season or not."

"And that Mrs. Conroth who is with them," put in Prue. "_She_ is the real thing--the link between the best of New York and Albany society.

Old family--away back to the patroons--so old she has to keep moth b.a.l.l.s hung in her family tree. My! if mother could once become the familiar friend of miladi Conroth----"

"No such luck," groaned Marian. "After all's said and done, mother can't forget the candy kitchen. She always looks to me, poor dear, as though she had just been surrept.i.tiously licking her fingers."

"We _do_ have the worst luck!" groaned the second sister. "There's that Dot Johnson coming. Mother says daddy insists, and when I. Tapp does put down his foot----Well!"

"We'll put her off on Fordy," suggested, the brighter-witted Cecile.

"She rather fancies Ford, I think."

"Dot Johnson!" chorused the older girls, in horror. "Not really?"

Marian continued. "The Johnsons are impossible."

"They've got more money than daddy has," said Prue.

"But they have no aspirations--none at all," murmured Marian, in horror. "If Lawford married Dot Johnson it would be almost as bad as his being mixed up with that picture actress."

"For him; not for us," said Prue promptly. "Of course, as far as the Johnsons go, they are too respectable for anything. Poor Fordy!"

"Goodness!" snapped Cecile. "It's not all settled. The banns aren't up."

The girls wheeled into the grounds surrounding the Tapp villa just as Betty Gallup guided the _Merry Andrew_ to the dock and leaped ash.o.r.e with the mooring rope.

Tapp Point consisted of about five acres of bluff and sand. At great expense the Taffy King had terraced the bluff and had made to grow several blades of gra.s.s where none at all had been able to gain root before.

The girls saw the queer-looking Betty Gallup helping their brother out of the sloop.

"Say! something's happened to Ford, I guess," Cecile cried, stopping the car short of the porte-cochere.

"Run down and see," commanded Marian languidly.

But Prue hopped out of the roadster and started down the path immediately. She and Lawford still had a few things in common. Mutual affection was one of them.

"What's happened to him?" she cried. "You're Mrs. Gallup, aren't you?"

"I'm Bet Gallup--yes. You run call up Doc Ambrose from over to Paulmouth. Your brother's got a bad knock on the head."

"And he's been overboard!" gasped Prue.

"I--I'm all right," stammered Lawford. "Let me lie down for a little while. Don't need a doctor."