her blue-gray eyes, wide open, fixed on the chaos ahead,
were shining with excitement. Now and then a long curling wisp of her
hair would get in her eyes and savagely she would blow it back. And her
lank quiet father puffed his cigar, with his gray eyes restfully on her.
"The serenity of her," he murmured to me.

"Oh, now, my dear," he said gently, as we careened to starboard, "_that_
was a slip. I can't say I would have done it like that."

"Have you ever run a boat in your life?" came back the fierce rejoinder.

"No," said Dillon calmly, "I can't exactly say I have. Still"--he
relapsed and enjoyed his cigar.

Just a short time after this, we had the only ugly moment that I had
been through in all our rides. A huge Sound steamer was ahead. Dashing
close along under her port, we came suddenly out before her and met a
tug whose fool of a captain had made a rush to cross her bow. It was one
of those sickening instants when you see nothing at all to do. But
Eleanore saw. A quick jerk on her lever, a swift spinning of her wheel,
and with a leap we were right under the steamer's bow. It missed our
stern by a foot as it passed and then we were safe on the other side.
She made a low sound, in a moment her face went deathly white, her eyes
shut and she nearly let go the wheel. But then, her slight form
tightening, slowly opening her eyes she turned toward her father.

"Now?" he asked very softly. And there passed a look between them.

"All right," she breathed, and turned back to her wheel. And for some
time very little was said.

But I understood her love for him now. These two were such companions as
I had never seen before. And though I myself felt quite out of it all,
this did not bother me in the least. For watching her father and feeling
the abounding reserve of force deep under his quiet, I told myself that
here was a big man, the first really big one I'd ever come close to. And
I was so eager to know him and see just what he was like inside, that I
had no room for myself or his daughter--because I wanted to write him
up. What a weird, curious feeling it is, this passion for writing up
people you meet.

On the remainder of the ride, and at supper that night on the porch of
their cottage, a little house perched on a rocky point directly
overlooking the water, I did my best to draw him out, and Eleanore
seemed quite ready to help me. And later, when he went inside to do
some work, I went on with the same eagerness