at. Don't ever say that it was a
mistake, please. But I do so hate all this hiding and pretending. Some
day it will have to end, but how I don't know. Nelson comes first,
of course; but how can I leave father? I shall see him--Nelson, I
mean--to-night, Mr. Bangs. He has written me saying he is coming over,
and I am going to meet him. He says he has good news. I can't think what
it can be. I can't think of any good news that could come for him and
me, except that father has stopped believing in Marietta Hoag's
spirits and has gotten over his ridiculous prejudice; and that WON'T
come--ever."

"Oh, yes, it will! I'm sure it will. Dear me, you mustn't lose heart,
you know."

"Mustn't I? No, I suppose I mustn't. Thank you, Mr. Bangs. Nelson and I
are ever and ever so much obliged to you. You are a great comfort to me.
I told Martha that very thing yesterday," she added.

Galusha could not help looking pleased. "Did you, indeed?" he observed.
"Well, well--ah--dear me, that was a rather rash statement, wasn't it?"

"Not a bit. And do you want to know what she said? She said you were a
great comfort to a good many people, Mr. Bangs. So there; you see!"

That evening the moon rolled, like a silver bowl, over the liquid rim of
the horizon, and, upsetting, spilled shimmering, shining, dancing
fire in a broad path from sky edge to the beach at the foot of Gould's
Bluffs. At the top of that bluff, in the rear of a clump of bayberry
bushes which shielded them from the gaze of possible watchers at the
lighthouse, Nelson Howard and Lulie, walking slowly back and forth, saw
it rise.

Nelson told her the good news he had mentioned in his letter. It was
that he had been offered a position as operator at the great wireless
station in Trumet. It was what he had been striving for and hoping for
and his war record in the radio service had made it possible for him
to obtain it. The pay was good to begin with and the prospect of
advancement bright.

"And, of course, the best of it is," he said, "that I shall be no
further away from you than I am now. Trumet isn't a bit farther than
South Wellmouth. There! Don't you think that my good news IS good news?"

Of course she did and said so.

"And I'm awfully proud of you, too," she told him.

"Nothing to be proud of; I'm lucky, that's all. And don't you see, dear,
how this is going to help us? I shall be earning good pay and I shall
save every cent possible, you can bet on that. Rooms are