she
turned round on me.

"You know you don't believe what you say," she said, and
laughed. "You know that Jack is Jack, right enough; and it's Jack
I am going to marry."

Of course I said so, for I didn't care whether she thought me a
weak creature or not. I wasn't going to say a word that could
interfere with her happiness, and I didn't intend to go back on
Jack Benton; but I remembered what he had said when he left the
ship in Havana: that it wasn't his fault.

"All the same," Miss Mamie went on, as a woman will, without
realising what she was saying, "all the same, I wish I had seen
it happen. Then I should know."

Next minute she knew that she didn't mean that, and was afraid
that I would think her heartless, and began to explain that she
would really rather have died herself than have seen poor Jim go
overboard. Women haven't got much sense, anyhow. All the same, I
wondered how she could marry Jack if she had a doubt that he
might be Jim after all. I suppose she had really got used to him
since he had given up the sea and had stayed ashore, and she
cared for him.

Before long we heard Jack coming up behind us, for we had walked
very slowly to wait for him.

"Promise not to tell anybody what I said, captain," said Mamie,
as girls do as soon as they have told their secrets.

Anyhow, I know I never did tell any one but you. This is the
first time I have talked of all that, the first time since I took
the train from that place. I am not going to tell you all about
the day. Miss Mamie introduced me to her mother, who was a quiet,
hard-faced old New England farmer's widow, and to her cousins and
relations; and there were plenty of them too at dinner, and there
was the parson besides. He was what they call a Hard-shell
Baptist in those parts, with a long, shaven upper lip and a
whacking appetite, and a sort of superior look, as if he didn't
expect to see many of us hereafter--the way a New York pilot
looks round, and orders things about when he boards an Italian
cargo-dragger, as if the ship weren't up to much anyway, though
it was his business to see that she didn't get aground. That's
the way a good many parsons look, I think. He said grace as if he
were ordering the men to sheet home the topgallant-sail and get
the helm up. After dinner we went out on the piazza, for it was
warm autumn weather; and the young folks went off in pairs along
the beach road, and the tide had turned and was beginning to come
in