"Ta! ta!" he said, taking his hat from the peg in the dining room.

"I'm off for the clippers. When I come back I'll be the sweetest little Willie in the diggin's. So long."

Bos'n and the captain sat down to the dinner at noon alone. Mr. Smith had not returned from his trip to the barber's. He came in, however, just before the meal was over, still in an unshorn condition, somewhat flushed and very loquacious.

"Say!" he exclaimed genially. "That Simpson's the right sort, ain't he?

Him and me took a shine to each other from the go-off. He's been West himself and he's got some width to him. He's no psalm singer."

"Humph!" commented the captain, with delicate sarcasm. "He don't seem to be much of a barber, either. What's the matter? Gone out of business, has he? Or was you so wild or woolly he got discouraged before he begun?"

"Great snakes!" exclaimed the visitor. "I forgot all about the clippers!

Well, that's one on me, pard! I'll make a new try soon's grub's over.

Don't be so tight-fisted with the steak; this is a plate I'm pa.s.sin', not a contribution box."

He winked at Bos'n and would have chucked her under the chin if she had not dodged. She seemed to have taken a great aversion to Mr. Smith and was plainly afraid of him.

"Is he going to stay very long, Uncle Cyrus?" she whispered, when it was school time once more. "Do you think he's nice?"

Captain Cy did not answer. When she had gone and the guest had risen from the table and put on his hat, the captain said warningly:

"There's one little bit of advice I want to give you, Mister Man: A bargain's a bargain, but it takes two to keep it. Don't let your love for Tad Simpson lead you into talkin' too much. Talk's cheap, they say, but too much of it might be mighty dear for you. Understand?"

Smith patted him on the back. "Lord love you, pard!" he chuckled, "I'm no spring chicken. I'm as hard to open as a safe, I am. It takes a can opener to get anything out of me."

"Yes; well, you can get inside some folks easier with a corkscrew. I've been told that Tad's a kind of a medium sometimes. If he raises any spirits in that back room of his, I'd leave 'em alone, if I was you. So long as you're decent, I'll put up with--"

But Mr. Smith was on his way to the gate, whistling as if he hadn't a care in the world. Captain Cy watched him go down the road, and then, with the drawn, weary look on his face which had been there since the day before, he entered the sitting room and threw himself into a chair.

Miss Phoebe Dawes, the school teacher, worked late that evening. There were examination papers to be gone over, and experience had demonstrated that the only place where she could be free from interruptions was the schoolroom itself. At the perfect boarding house the shrill tones of Keturah's voice and those of Miss Phinney and Mrs. Tripp penetrated through shut doors. It is hard to figure percentages when the most intimate details of Bayport's family life are being recited and gloated over on the other side of a thin part.i.tion. And when Matilda undertook to defend the Come-Outer faith against the a.s.saults of the majority, the verbal riot was, as Mr. Tidditt described it, "like feedin' time in a parrot shop."

So Miss Phoebe came to the boarding house for supper and then returned to the schoolroom, where, with a lighted bracket lamp beside her on the desk, she labored until nine o'clock. Then she put on her coat and hat, extinguished the light, locked the door, and started on her lonely walk home.

"The main road" in our village is dark after nine o clock. There is a street light--a kerosene lamp--on a post in front of the Methodist meeting house, but the s.e.xton forgets it, generally speaking, or, at any rate, neglects to fill it except at rare intervals. Simmons's front windows are ablaze, of course, and so are the dingy panes of Simpson's barber shop. But these two centers of sociability are both at the depot road corner, and when they are pa.s.sed the only sources of illumination are the scattered gleams from the back windows of dwellings. As most of us retire by half-past eight, the glow along the main road is not dazzling, to say the very least.

Miss Dawes was not afraid of the dark. She had been her own escort for a good many years. She walked briskly on, heard the laughter and loud voices in the barber shop die away behind her, pa.s.sed the schoolhouse pond, now bleak and chill with the raw November wind blowing across it, and began to climb the slope of Whittaker's Hill. And here the wind, rushing in unimpeded over the flooded salt meadows from the tumbled bay outside, wound her skirts about her and made climbing difficult and breath-taking.

She was, perhaps, half way up the long slope, when she heard, in the intervals between the gusts, footsteps behind her. She knew most of the village people by this time and the thought of company was not unpleasant. So she paused and pantingly waited for whoever was coming.

She could not see more than a few yards, but the footsteps sounded nearer and nearer, and, a moment later, a man's voice began singing "Annie Rooney," a melody then past its prime in the cities, but popularized in Bayport by some departed batch of summer boarders.

She did not recognize the voice and she did not particularly approve of singing in the streets, especially such loud singing. So she decided not to wait longer, and was turning to continue her climb, when the person behind stopped his vocalizing and called.

"Hi!" he shouted. "h.e.l.lo, ahead there! Who is it? Hold on a minute, pard! I'm comin'."

She disobeyed the order to "hold on," and began to hurry. The hurry was of no avail, however, for the follower broke into a run and soon was by her side. He was a stranger to her.

"Whee! Wow!" he panted. "This is no race track, pard. Pull up, and let's take it easy. My off leg's got a kink in it, and I don't run so easy as I used to. Great snakes; what's your rush? Ain't you fond of company?

h.e.l.lo! I believe it's a woman!"

She did not answer. His manner and the smell of liquor about him were decidedly unpleasant. The idea that he might be a tramp occurred to her.

Tramps are our bugaboos here in Bayport.

"A woman!" exclaimed the man hilariously. "Well, say! I didn't believe there was one loose in this tail-end of nowhere. Girlie, I'm glad to see you. Not that I can see you much, but never mind. All cats are gray in the dark, hey? You can't see me, neither, so we'll take each other on trust. 'She's my sweetheart, I'm her beau.' Say, Maud, may I see you home?"

She was frightened now. The Whittaker place on the hilltop was the nearest house, and that was some distance off.

"What's the matter, Carrie?" inquired the man. "Don't be scared. I wouldn't hurt you. I'm just lonesome, that's all, and I need society.

Don't rush, you'll ruin your complexion. Here! come under my wing and let's toddle along together. How's mamma?"

He seized her arm and pulled her back beside him. She tried to free herself, but could not. Her unwelcome escort held her fast and she was obliged to move as slowly as he did. It was very dark.

"Say, what IS your name?" coaxed the man. "Is is Maud, hey? Or Julia? I always liked Julia. Don't be peevish. Tell us, that's a good girl."

She gave a quick jerk and managed to pull her arm from his grasp, giving him a violent push as she did so. He, being unsteady on his feet, tumbled down the low bank which edged the sidewalk. Then she ran on up the hill as fast as she could. She heard him swear as he fell.

She had nearly reached the end of the Whittaker fence when he caught her. He was laughing, and that alarmed her almost as much as if he had been angry.

"Naughty! naughty!" he chuckled, holding her fast. "Tryin' to sneak, was you? Not much! Not this time! Did you ever play forfeits when you was little? Well, this is a forfeit game and you're It. You must bow to the prettiest, kneel to the wittiest, and kiss the one you love best. And I'll let you off on the first two. Come now! Pay up!"

Then she screamed. And her scream was answered at once. A gate swung back with a bang and she heard some one running along the walk toward her.

"O Cap'n Whittaker!" she called. "Come! Come quick, please!"

How she knew that the person running toward her was Captain Cy has not been satisfactorily explained even yet. She cannot explain it and neither can the captain. And equally astonishing was the latter's answer. He certainly had not heard her voice often enough to recognize it under such circ.u.mstances.

"All right, teacher!" he shouted. "I'm comin'! Let go of that woman, you--Oh, it's you, is it?"

He had seized Mr. Smith by the coat collar and jerked him away from his victim. Miss Dawes took refuge behind the captain's bulky form. The two men looked at each other. Smith was recovering his breath.

"It's you, is it?" repeated Captain Cy. Then, turning to Miss Phoebe, he asked: "Did he hurt you?"

"No! Not yet. But he frightened me dreadfully. Who is he? Do you know him?"

Her persecutor answered the question.

"You bet your life he knows me!" he snarled. "He knows me mighty well!

Pard, you keep your nose out of this, d'you see! You mind your own business. I wan't goin' to hurt her any."

The captain paid no attention to him.

"Yup, I know him," he said grimly. Then he added, pointing toward the lighted window of the house ahead: "You--Smith, you go in there and stay there! Trot! Don't make me speak twice."

But Mr. Smith was too far gone with anger and the "spirits" raised by Tad Simpson to heed the menace in the words.

"Smith, hey?" he sneered. "Oh, yes, SMITH! Well, Smith ain't goin', d'you see! He's goin' to do what he pleases. I reckon I'm on top of the roost here! I know what's what! You can't talk to me. I've got rights, I have, and--"

"Blast your rights!"

"What? WHAT? Blast my rights, hey? Oh, yes! Think because you've got money you can cheat me out of 'em, do you? Well, you can't! And how about the other part of those rights? S'pose I walk right into that house and--"