"I don't wish to be thanked in words."

"You're too generous."

"Not in the least," returned Ben quietly. "I want to be thanked. I want each of us to thank the other all our lives. I to be grateful to you for existing, and you to thank me for spending my days with the paramount thought of your happiness."

They looked at each other for a long silent minute.

"Mrs. Whipp says your mother came to call on me to-day," said Geraldine at last. "She described her manner so well that it is evident she came at the point of your bayonet. I understand the situation entirely. I've already heard that she is the great lady of the town. You are her only son. Do you suppose I blame her when out of a clear sky you produced me and made your feeling plain to her? Is it any wonder that she made hers plain to me? I should think"--Geraldine gave an appealing pressure to the hands holding hers--"I should think you could be generous enough to--to let me alone."

Her eyes pleaded with him seriously.

"What am I doing?" asked Ben. "What do you suppose is the reason that I'm wasting all these minutes when I might be holding you in my arms!"

He had to stop here himself and swallow manfully. "If you knew how you look at this moment--and I don't kiss you--just because I'm giving Mother a little time, so that you will be satisfied--"

"Then you'll promise--will you promise--you kept your promise about the farm?"

"Yes; I found Pete in the village."

"Then you do keep promises! Tell me solemnly that you will leave your mother in freedom. If you don't, Ben--Sir Galahad--I'll run away. I really will--"

In her earnestness she lifted her face toward his, her eyes were irresistible, and in an instant he had swept her into his arms and was kissing her tenderly, fervently, to the utter undoing of the droopy hat which fell unnoticed to the floor.

Voices approaching made him release her.

Very flushed, very grave, both of them, they looked into each other's eyes, and Geraldine, being a woman, put both hands up to her ruffled hair.

"I do promise you, Geraldine," he said, low and earnestly. "Whatever my mother does after this you may know is of her own volition."

Pete burst into the room wild-eyed, followed by Miss Mehitable, who was talking and laughing.

"He was afraid you'd go away without him," she said--"Mercy's sakes, Geraldine Melody, look at your hat!" She darted upon it and snapped some dust off its chiffon. "You'd better be careful how you throw this around. We can't buy a hat like this every day."

"Oh, do forgive me, Miss Upton!" murmured the girl, her eyes very bright. "It was her present to me," she added to Ben. "I'm so sorry!"

She went to Miss Mehitable and laid her cheek against hers, and Miss Upton bestowed another prodigious wink upon the purchaser of the hat.

It did not break his gravity; a gravity which Miss Upton but just now noticed.

"Come, Pete, we'll be going," said Ben, and his flushed, serious face worried Miss Mehitable's kind heart, especially as no sign of his merry carelessness returned in his brief leave-taking.

When they were gone and the door had closed after them, she looked at the girl accusingly.

"Something has happened," she said, in a low tone not to attract Charlotte.

"Don't be cross with me about the hat," said the girl, nestling up close to her again. "I just love it--much better even than I did in the store."

Miss Mehitable put an arm around her, not because at the moment she loved her, but because she was there.

"I wonder," she said, "if there's anything in this world that can make anything but a fool out of a girl before it's too late. I know you're just as crazy about him as he is about you! If you wasn't, would you have been snivellin' around because he might get hurt to the farm? And yet jest 'cause o' your silly, foolish pride you've gone and refused him. It's as plain as the nose on his splendid face. As if in the long run it mattered if Mrs. Barry was a little cantankerous. She's run everything around here so long that she forgets her boy's a man with a mind of his own. It's awful narrow of you, Geraldine, awful narrow!"

Upon this the girl lifted her head and smiled faintly into the accusing face.

"Won't it be nice to have Pete help us move," she said innocently.

Miss Upton's lips tightened. She dropped her arm, moved away, and put the droopy hat back in its box.

"You're heartless!" she exclaimed. There was such a peachy bloom on the girl's face. "I won't waste my breath."

"I love _you_," said Geraldine, meekly and defensively.

"Ho!" snorted her good fairy, unappeased.

CHAPTER XIV

The Mermaid Shop

For the next few days Miss Mehitable had no time to worry over love-affairs. No matter how early she arose in the morning she found Pete arrayed in overalls sitting on the stone step of Upton's Fancy Goods and Notions, and when by the evening of the third day all her goods, wares, and chattels were deposited in the little shop at Keefeport, she wondered how she had ever got on without him.

On that very day Ben Barry received a threatening letter from Rufus Carder demanding the return of Pete, and he knew that no more time must be lost. He flew over to the Port that afternoon, and alighting on the landing-field which had been prepared near his cottage walked to the little shop near the wharf. Here he found Pete industriously obeying Miss Upton's orders in company with his idol, the whole quartet gay amid their chaos. Even Mrs. Whipp had postponed the fear of rheumatism and had learned how to laugh.

They had formed a line and were pa.s.sing the articles from boxes to shelves when the leather-coated, helmeted figure stood suddenly before them.

The effect of the apparition upon Geraldine with its a.s.sociations was so extreme as to make her feel faint for a minute, and Ben saw her face change as she leaned against the counter.

Miss Mehitable saw it too. "Aha!" she thought triumphantly. "Aha! It isn't so funny to break a body's heart, after all."

"Well, Ben Barry," she said aloud, "why didn't you wait till we got settled?"

The aviator stood in the doorway, but came no farther.

"Because I have to take Pete away. I've had a _billet doux_ from Rufus Carder and he wants him."

The dwarf rushed to his new master on quaking legs. "Oh, Master! I won't go! I can't go." He looked off wildly on the big billows rolling in.

"I'll throw myself in the sea."

Ben put a hand on the boy's shoulder.

"Of course you won't go," he said; "but you want to brighten up your wits now and remember everything that will help us. We're going to the city to-night and begin at once to settle that gentleman's affairs." He gave Geraldine a rea.s.suring look. "I should like to take your father's letter with me," he added quietly.

"But we mustn't get Pete into trouble," she replied doubtfully.

"I'm not intending to show it. I want to familiarize myself with his handwriting. I expect to have an interview and perhaps there will be notes to examine."

"But not at the farm," protested the girl quickly. "You'll not go near the meadow?"

"No; the cows have nothing to fear from us this time."