"He won't last the day out," declared Captain Jeb. "Blue about the gills already! But, Lord, what could you expect, doused and drenched and shaken up like he was yesterday? It will be hard on the little chap, who was so glad to get his father back. It's sort of a pity, 'cording to my notion, that, being adrift so long, he didn't go down in deep-sea soundings, and not come ash.o.r.e to break up like this."

"O Captain Jeb, no, no!" Dan looked up from his hammering on the "Sary Ann" in quick protest against such false doctrine. "A man isn't like a ship: he has a soul. And that's the main thing, after all. If you save your soul, it doesn't make much difference about your body. And drifting ash.o.r.e right here has saved the soul of Mr. Wirt (or Mr. Neville, as we must call him now); for he was lying over on Last Island, feeling that there was no hope for him in heaven or on earth. And then Freddy came to him, and Father Tom, and he turned to G.o.d for pardon and mercy; and now his dying is all right,--though I haven't given him up yet," concluded Dan, more cheerfully. "Poor little Freddy has been praying so hard all night, I feel he is going to be heard somehow. And I've seen Mick Mulligan, that had typhoid last summer, looking a great deal worse than Mr. Neville, and before Thanksgiving there wasn't a boy on the hill he couldn't throw. Here comes Father Tom back with--with--" Dan dropped his hammer entirely, and stood up to stare in amazement at the little motor boat making its way to the broken wharf. "Jing! Jerusalem! if--if it isn't that pretty lady from Beach Cliff that Polly calls Marraine!"

XXIV.--A STAR IN THE DARKNESS.

Marraine,--Polly's Marraine,--Aunt Winnie's old friend,--the lovely, silver-robed lady of the party who had stood by Dan in his trouble!--it was she, indeed, all dressed in white, with a pretty little cap on her soft, wavy hair, and her hands full of flowers. Miss Stella always made a first appearance at a patient's bedside with flowers. She said they were a friendly introduction that never failed.

"It's the nurse woman they went for," gasped Captain Jeb, as the new arrival proceeded to step from boat to wharf with a light grace that scarcely needed Father Tom's a.s.sisting hand. "Well, I'll be tee-totally jiggered! Who ever saw a nurse woman pretty as that?"

But Dan did not hear. He had dropped nails, hammer, and all present interest in the recuperation of the "Sary Ann," and was off down the beach to meet the fair visitor, whose coming he could not understand.

"Danny," she said, holding out her empty hand to him,--"Miss Winnie's Danny!--I told you I had friends here, Father Rayburn; and this is one that I expect to find my right-hand man. What a queer, quaint, wonderful place this Killykinick is! I am so glad you brought me here to help you!"

Help them! Help them! Dan caught the world in breathless amazement. Then Miss Stella, Polly's Marraine, was the nurse! It seemed altogether astounding; for sick nurses, in Dan's experience, had always been fat old ladies who had out-lived all other duties, and appeared only on important occasions, to gossip in solemn whispers, and to drink unlimited tea. And now Polly's Marraine was a _nurse_! It was impossible to doubt the fact; for Father Tom was leading her straight to Mr. Neville's side, Dan following in dumb bewilderment.

The sick man lay in the old Captain's room, whither, at his own request, the life-savers had borne him the previous evening. His eyes, deep-sunken in their sockets, were closed, his features rigid. Poor little Freddy, tearful and trembling, knelt by Brother Bart, who paused in his murmured prayers to shake his head hopelessly at the newcomer's approach.

"I'm glad ye're here before he goes entirely, Father. It's time, I think, for the last blessing. I am afraid he can neither hear nor see."

But Miss Stella had stepped forward, put her soft hand on the patient's pulse; and then, with a quick whisper to Father Tom, she had dropped her flowers, opened the little wrist-bag they had concealed, and proceeded to "do things,"--just what sort of things Dan did not know. He could only see the soft hands moving swiftly, deftly; baring the patient's arm to the shoulder and flashing something sharp and shining into the pale flesh; holding the fluttering pulse until, with a long, deep sigh, the sick man opened his eyes and stared dully at the white-robed figure bending over him.

"Who--what are you?" he said faintly.

Miss Stella smiled. It was the question that many a patient, struggling out of the Dark Valley, had asked before, when his waking eyes had fallen upon her fair, sweet face, her white-robed form.

"Only your nurse," she answered softly,--"your nurse who has come to help you, to take care of you. You feel better already?"

"Yes, better, better!" was the faint reply. "My boy,--where is my boy?

Freddy! Freddy!" He stretched out his feeble hand. But it was met by a firm, gentle grasp that was not Freddy's.

"No boys now," said Miss Stella in the soft, steady voice of one used to such commands. "There must be no seeing, no talking, even no thinking, my patient. You must take this powder I am putting to your lips. Close your eyes again and go to sleep.--Now please everybody go away and leave him to me," was the whispered ukase, that even Father Tom obeyed without protest; and Miss Stella began her reign at Killykinick.

It was a triumphant reign from the very first. Old and young fell at once under her gentle sway, and yielded to her command without dispute. The cabin of the "Lady Jane" was given to her entirely; even Brother Bart taking to the upper deck; while a big, disused awning was stretched into a shelter for the morning and the noontime mess.

And, to say nothing of her patient--who lay, as Brother Bart expressed it, "like a shorn lamb" under her gentle bidding, gaining health and strength each day,--every creature in Killykinick was subservient to Miss Stella's sweet will. Freddy was her devoted slave; lazy Jim, ready to move at her whisper; even Dud, after learning her father's rank in the army, was ready to oblige her as a gentleman should. But it was Dan, as she had foreseen from the first, who was her right-hand man, ready to fetch and carry, to lift any burden, however heavy, by day and night; Dan who rowed or sailed or skimmed to any point in the motor boat Father Tom kept waiting at her demand; Dan who, when the patient grew better, and she had an hour or two off, was her willing and delighted escort over rocks or sea.

And as they sailed or rowed or loitered by beach and sh.o.r.e, Miss Stella drew from Aunt Winnie's boy the hopes and fears he could not altogether hide. She learned how Aunt Winnie was "pining" for her home and her boy; she read the letters, with their untold love and longing; she saw the look on the boyish face when Dan, too mindful of his promise to Father Mack to speak plainly, said he 'reckoned she wouldn't be here long if he didn't get her somehow _home_.' She learned, too, all Dan could tell about poor old Nutty's medal.

"Get it for me the next time you go to town, Danny," she said to him. And Danny drew it from old Jonah's junk shop and put it in Miss Stella's hand.

And then, when at last her patient was able to sit up in Great-uncle Joe's big chair in the cabin doorway and look out at the sea, Miss Stella wrote to dad and Polly to come and take her home.

"Lord, but we'll all miss her!" Captain Jeb voiced the general sentiment of Killykinick when this decision was made public. "I ain't much sot on women folks when you're in deep water, but this one suttenly shone out like a star in the dark."

"And kept a-shining," added Neb,--"a-shining and a-smiling straight through."

"She's a good girl," said Brother Bart. "And I'm thinking--well, it doesn't matter what I'm thinking. But it's a lonely time laddie's poor father will be having, after all his wild wanderings; and it will be hard for him to keep house and home. But the Lord is good. Maybe it was His hand that led Miss Stella here."

"Oh, what will we do when she is gone, daddy?" mourned Freddy. "Of course you are getting well now, and Dan and I can wait on you and get you broth and jelly; but it won't be like having dear Miss Stella. Oh, I just love her! Don't you, daddy? She is almost as good as a real mother."

And daddy's pale cheek had flushed as he answered:

"Almost, little Boy Blue!"

"Well, we're all going home in a week," said Dan, as he stood out under the stars that night. "But I'll miss you sure, Miss Stella; for you don't mind being friends with a rough sort of a boy like me, and you know Aunt Winnie; and if I give up and--and go down you'll--you'll understand."

"Give up and go down!" repeated Miss Stella. "You give up and go down, Danny? Never,--never! You're the sort of boy to climb, however steep and rough and sharp the way,--to climb to the stars."

"That's what Aunt Winnie dreams," was the answer. "That's what I dream, too, sometimes. Miss Stella. But it isn't for me to dream: I have to wake up and hustle. I can't stay dreaming and let Aunt Winnie die. So if I have to give up and go down, Miss Stella, you'll--you'll understand."

And Miss Stella steadied her voice to answer:

"Yes, Danny, I'll understand."

But, in spite of this, Miss Stella's parting from Killykinick was not altogether a sad one; for "The Polly" came down next morning, with flying colors, to bear her away. Dad was aboard; also Polly, jubilant at recovering her dear Marraine after three weeks of desertion; and Captain Carleton, and Miss Stella's girl friends who had been picked up from the camp at Shelter Cove. It was such a picnic party altogether that sighs and tears seemed quite out of place; for, after all, things had turned out most cheerfully, as everybody agreed.

So, with "The Polly" glittering in new paint and gilding necessitated by the storm, with all her pennants flying in the wind, with the victrola singing its merriest boat song, and snowy handkerchiefs fluttering gay farewells, Miss Stella was borne triumphantly away. It was to be an all-day cruise. Great hampers, packed with everything good to eat and drink, were stored below; and "The Polly" spread her wings and took a wide flight to sea, turning back only when the shadows began to deepen over the water, and the stars to peep from the violet sky. The young people were a trifle tired; Polly had fallen asleep on a pile of cushions, while the girls from Shelter Cove sang college songs.

In the stern, Captain Carleton had found his way to Miss Stella's side.

She was leaning on the taffrail, listening to the singing, her white fleecy wrap falling around her like a cloud.

"You look your name to-night," said the Captain: "Stella,--a star. By George, you were a star to me when the sky looked pretty black! I was thinking of that yesterday when some Eastern chap came along with a lot of diamonds for sale. I don't know much about such folderols, but there was one piece--a star--that I'd like to give you, if you would take it and wear it in remembrance of a rough old fellow who can't speak all he feels."

"Ah, Captain Carleton,--Captain Carleton!" laughed the lady softly. "Take care! That Eastern chap was fooling you, I'm sure."

"Not at all,--not at all!" was the quick reply. "I got an expert's opinion. The star is worth the thousand dollars he asked."

"A thousand dollars,--a thousand dollars!" repeated Miss Stella, in dismay. "And you would give me a thousand dollar star? Why, you must have money to burn, indeed!"

"Well, I suppose I have," was the answer,--"much more than a lonely old fellow of sixty odd, without chick or child will ever need. Will you take the star, dear lady nurse?"

"No," said Miss Stella, gently; "though I thank you for your generous thought of me, my good friend. But I have a better and a wiser investment for you. Have you forgotten this?" She took Dan's medal from the bag on her wrist.

"By George, I _did_ forget it!" said the old man. "Somehow, it slipped my memory completely in our pleasant hurry. Poor Jack Farley's medal! You've found the chap that owns it, you say?"

"Yes," was the answer--"a brave, st.u.r.dy, honest little chap, who stood by your poor old friend in his last lonely days, and helped him in his last lonely cruise, and took the medal from his dying hands as the last and only legacy he had to give. Would you consider him Jack Farley's heir, Captain Carleton?"

"Most certainly I would," was the rejoinder.

"Then make him his heir," she said softly.

"Eh!--what? I don't understand," muttered the old gentleman.

Then Miss Stella explained. It was such an explanation as only gentle speakers like Miss Stella can make. She told about bright, brave, plucky Dan and Aunt Winnie, of the scholarship at St. Andrew's and of the Little Sisters of the Poor. She told of the attic home over the Mulligans' for which Aunt Winnie was "pining," and of the dreams that Dan dreamed.