hadrach and Zoeth when John Keith entered.
The Keiths were leaving South Harniss rather early that year and the
head of the family had dropped in to say good-by. Mr. Keith's liking for
Mary was as strong as ever, and for her uncles he had, by this time, a
very real regard, a feeling which was reciprocated by them.

Conversation began in the way the majority of conversations begin, with
a discussion of the weather, its recent past, present, and probable
future, shifted to the tea-room and its success and then to the
visitor's recent trip to New York, from which city he had just returned.
It was near the noon hour and there were few customers to interrupt.
Those who did come were taken care of by Mr. Crocker.

"Anything new happenin' over there?" inquired Captain Shadrach, asking
news of the metropolis exactly as he would have asked concerning the
gossip of Harniss Center. "Meet anybody you knew, did you?"

Keith smiled. "Why, yes," he said. "I met the people I went to see. Mine
was a business trip. I didn't meet anyone unexpectedly, if that's what
you mean."

The Captain nodded. "Didn't get down on South Street, did you?" he
asked. "No, I thought not. If you had you'd have met plenty. When I was
goin' to sea I bet I never went cruisin' down South Street in my life
that I didn't run afoul of somebody I wan't expectin' to. Greatest place
for meetin' folks in the world, I cal'late South Street is. Lots of
seafarin' men have told me so."

Keith's smile broadened as he was handed this nugget of wisdom. Then he
said:

"You remind me, Captain, that I did meet someone, after all. In Boston,
not in New York, and I met him only yesterday. It was someone you know,
too, and Mary here used to know him quite well, I think--young Crawford
Smith, Sam's Harvard friend. He visited us here in South Harniss one
summer."

Shadrach was the only one of the trio of listeners who made any comment
at all on this speech. Even he did not speak for a moment, glancing
apprehensively at Mary before doing so. Mary said nothing, and Zoeth,
leaning back in his chair, his face hidden from his partner's gaze by
the end of the counter, did not speak.

"Sho!" exclaimed the Captain. "Sho! So you met him, did you! In Boston?
That's funny. I had an idea he was out West somewheres."

"So did I. The last I heard concerning him he had given up his studies
in the East here--he was studying medicine, as perhaps you know--and had
gone back to his home in N