t faint signs of dawn were beginning to break through
the gray in the eastern sky, I bade farewell to the Ark forever,
lingering a moment on the old familiar doorstep for a last word with
those of the neighbors who had gathered there to see us off, for the
whole Keeler family accompanied me to the station.

There were others waiting at the gate to say good-bye, and at various
posts all the way down the lane. At the big white house, Emily came
running out, breathless. She whispered hurriedly in my ear; "There was a
message left. Ye wasn't well. I reckon 'twas a message. When fisherman
and that other one came up from the shore, day o' the storm, he came to
our house for Sim to take him to Wallen. He said it was better to be the
dead one than him. He was awful white, and Sim got harnessed, and just as
fisherman was goin' out, he left a message along o' me, though there
wasn't no names mentioned, and he talked queer; but he wanted as somebody
should know that he realized it all now, and he couldn't make up for it,
never; but it was go'n' to be new or nothin' for him, and they shouldn't
want for nothin', never, and kep' a sayin' more, and no message, exactly,
as ye could call a message, but I reckoned--I thought--may be--"

Emily's glowing eyes, fixed on my face, grew very wide and grave. I could
only press her hand in parting for Grandpa, growing impatient, had
succeeded in clucking Fanny on again.

We drove along the river road, and, passing through the Indian
encampment, there were more good-byes exchanged by the roadside.

Then climbing up "Sandy Slope," beyond the settlement, we heard the
shrill "Hullo!" of a familiar voice, and looking back, saw Bachelor Lot
running after us very swiftly, his head destitute of covering, and his
little wizened face glowing red as the celestial Mars in the distance. He
looked like some odd, fantastic toy that had been wound up and set going.

So he came up with us, and trying to conceal his breathlessness in polite
little "hums and haws," delivered aside, he offered me a huge bouquet,
composed, I should think, of every sort of wild-flower available on the
Cape at that season, and showing, in its arrangement, marks of the most
arduous striving after artistic effect. In the other hand, he held out to
me a basket of large, selected boxberries.

I accepted the gifts with unaffected delight, and thanked Bachelor Lot
warmly. I looked back at him, trudging cheerfully homeward through the
s