.

As the party settled themselves in the sternsheets Master Calvin fixed his
pale, gooseberry-coloured eyes on hers.

"You needn't show temper," he said slowly, with the air of a young
ruminant animal.

"I'm not showing temper!" Myra retorted in a tone which certainly belied
her.

"Yes, you are; and you've told a fib, which only makes things worse."
He smiled complacently at having beaten her in argument, and Myra thought
she had never met such an insufferable boy in her life.

He transferred his unblinking stare to Clem, and for half a minute took
stock of him silently. "Is he blind," he asked aloud, "or only
pretending?"

Myra's face flamed now. A little more, and she had boxed his ears; but
she checked herself and, caressing the back of Clem's hand, answered with
grave irony, "He _was_ blind, up to a minute ago; but now, since seeing
you, he prefers to be pretending."

Master Calvin considered this for almost a minute. "That's rude," he
announced at length decisively.

But meanwhile other passengers in the boat had found time to get
themselves at loggerheads.

"Your servant, Master Samuel!" began old Nicky affably, as he fell to his
oars. "I hope I see 'ee well, though 'tis a sad wind that blows 'ee here.
Ay, there's a prophet gone this day from Israel!"

Mr. Samuel frowned. "Good-evening," he answered coldly, and added, with
an effort to be polite, "I seem to know your face, too."

"He-he!" Uncle Nicky leaned on his oars with a senile chuckle.
"Know my face, dost-a? Ought to, be sure, for I be the same Nicholas Vro
that ferried 'ee back and forth in the old days afore your father's
stomach soured against 'ee. Dostn't-a mind that evening I put 'ee across
with your trunks for the last time? 'Never take on, Master Sam,' said I--
for all the parish knew and talked of your differences--'give the old
man time, and you'll be coming home for the Christmas holidays as welcome
as flowers in May.' 'Not me,' says you; 'my father's is a house o' wrath,
and there's no place for me.' A mort o' tide-water have runned up an'
down since you spoke they words; but here be I, Nicholas Vro, takin' 'ee
back home as I promised. Many times I've a-pictered 'ee, hearing you was
grown prosperous and a married man and had took up with religion.
I won't say that years have bettered your appearance; 'tisn't their way.
But I'd ha' picked out your face in a crowd--or your cheeld's, for that
matter. He features you wonder