Come and see us again, Mr. Paine," he said. "Come any time and fetch
your lady along. She's a good one, she is, and nice-lookin', don't talk!
You're a lucky critter, did you know it? Haw! haw! Good-by."

The Comfort never made better time than on that homeward trip. I
anchored her at her moorings, went ashore in the skiff, and hastened up
to the house. It was past ten o'clock and I would be over an hour
late at the bank. A fine beginning for my first day in charge of the
institution!

The dining-room door was open, but no one was in the dining-room. The
kitchen door, however, was shut and from behind it I heard Dorinda's
voice.

"You can get right out of this house," she said. "I don't care if you've
got a mortgage on the rest of the Cape! You ain't got one on this house,
and you nor nobody else shall stay in it and talk that way. There's the
door."

"Dorindy!" wailed another voice--Lute's. "You mustn't talk so--to him!
Don't you realize--"

"I realize that if I had a husband instead of a jellyfish I shouldn't
have to talk. Be still, you!"

A third voice made itself heard.

"All right," it growled. "I ain't anxious to stay here any longer than
is necessary. Bein' an honest, decent man, I'm ashamed to be seen here
as it is. But you can tell that low-lived sneak, Ros Paine, that--"

I opened the door.

"You may tell him yourself, Captain Dean," said I. "What is it?"

CHAPTER XX

My unexpected entrance caused a sensation. Lute, sitting on the edge of
one of the kitchen chairs, an agonized expression on his face, started
so violently that he almost lost his balance. Dorinda, standing with her
back toward me, turned quickly. Captain Jedediah Dean, his hand on the
knob of the door opening to the back yard, showed the least evidence of
surprise. He did not start, nor did he speak, but looked at me with a
countenance as grim and set and immovable as if it had been cast in a
mould.

Lute, characteristically enough, uttered the first word.

"By time!" he gasped. "It's Ros himself! Ros--Ros, you know what he
says?" He pointed a shaking finger at the captain. "He says you--"

"Keep still!" Dorinda struck her palms together with a slap, as if her
husband had been what she often called him, a parrot. Then, without
another glance in his direction, she stepped backward and took her stand
beside me.

"I'm real glad to see you home safe and sound, Roscoe," she said,
calmly.

"Thank you, Dorinda. Now, Captain D