trong strands
of seaweed, but the breeze of the later morning had treated the matter
contemptuously, and the shining waves were beautifully disordered. Out
of all keeping with this brown ruggedness were Janet's eyes. Like
colorless pools they lay protected by their dark fringes, until emotion
moved them to tint and expression. Did the sky of Janet's day prove
kind, what eyes could be as soft and blue as hers? Did storm threaten, a
grayness brooded, a grayness quite capable of changing to ominous black.

Cap'n Billy, trained to watching for storms and danger, knew the
signals, and now, for safety, lay low.

The eyes were mild and sun-filled, the face bewitchingly friendly; but
when Janet took to wheedling, Billy hugged the shore.

"You don't really mean it, Cap'n, now, do you?"

"I do that!" muttered Billy, and he pulled the twine energetically.

"What, send your own Janet off to the mainland to stay--except when she
runs back?" This last in a tone that might have moved a rock to pity.

"Yes, that, Janet; and ye mustn't come on too often, nuther."

"Oh! Cap'n, and just when we've got the blessed beach to ourselves! Mrs.
Jo G. and her kind gone; only the crew and us! Why, Cap'n, this is
life!"

"Now, Janet, 'tain't no use fur ye t' coax. Ye're goin' on seventeen,
ain't ye?"

"Seventeen, Cap'n, and eleven months!"

"It's distractin' the way ye've shot up. Clar distractin'; an' I ain't
been an' done my duty by ye, nuther." Billy yanked a strand of cord
vigorously.

"Yes, you have, Cap'n," Janet's tone was dangerously soft; "I'm the very
properest girl at the Station. Look at me, Cap'n Daddy!"

But Billy steeled himself, and rigidly attended to the net. "Well," he
admitted, "ye're proper enough 'long some lines. I've taught ye t'
conquer yer 'tarnal bad temper--"

"You've taught me to know its power, Cap'n Daddy," warned Janet with a
glint of darkness in the laughing serenity of her gaze; "the temper is
here just the same, and powerful bad, upon provocation!"

A smile moved the corners of Billy's humorous lips.

"An' the bedpost is here, too, Janet. Lordy! I can see ye now as I used
t' tie ye up till the storm was over. What a 'tarnal little rascal ye
war! The waves of tantrums rolled over ye, one by one, yer yells growin'
less an' less; an' bime by ye called out 'tween squalls, 'Cap'n Daddy,
it's most past!'" There was a mist over Billy's eyes. "Ye 'tarnal little
specimint!" he added.

"But, Cap'n, dear!