"You can steer 'most anywhere when they shine like that. Don't want none
of these 'ere winking, blinking lights to show you the way," he said.

"But the trouble is they don't always shine," answered Dan.

"No," said Neb, slowly, "they don't; that's a fact. But they ain't ever
really out, like menfolk's lights. The stars is always thar."

"Always there,"--yes, Dan realized, as, with his head on the dank, fishy
pillow, he looked up in the glory above him, the stars were always there.
Blurred sometimes by earthly mists and vapors, lost in the dazzling gleam
of jewelled lights, darkened by the shadows of crooked trees, they shone
with pure, steadfast, guiding rays,--the stars that were always there. A
witching little Will-o'-the-wisp had bewildered Dan into strange ways this
evening; but he was back again in his own straight honest line beneath the
stars.

On "The Polly," making her way over the starlit water to Killykinick,
things were not so pleasant.

"It was a mean, dirty trick to give Dan away. I don't care who did it!"
said big-hearted Jim, roused into spirit and speech.

"It wasn't I,--oh, indeed it wasn't I!" declared Freddy. "I told Tad Dan
was the biggest, strongest, finest fellow in the whole bunch. I never said
a word about his being a newsboy or a bootblack, though I don't think it
hurts him a bit."

"And it doesn't," said Jim, whose blood had been a "true blue" stream
before the Stars and Stripes began to wave. "But there are some folks that
think so."

"Calling me fool, are you?" said Dud, fiercely.

"No, I didn't," retorted Jim. "But if the name fits you, take it. I don't
object." And he turned away, with a flash in his eyes most unusual for
Sunny Jim,--a flash that Dud did not venture to kindle into angry fire.

But, though the storm blew over, as such springtime storms will, Dan had
learned a lesson, and felt that he never again wished to venture on the
dizzy heights where wise heads turn and strong feet falter. Though Dud and
Jim, who both had pocket money in plenty, made arrangements at the Boat
Club for the use of a little motor boat several times a week, Dan held his
own line as second mate at Killykinick, and was contented to share old
Neb's voyaging. They went out often now; for, under the old sailor's
guidance, Dan was becoming an expert fisherman. And soon the dingy boat,
loaded with its silvery spoil, became known to camps and cottages along
the other shores. Poor old Neb was too dul