f."

"You don't feel," she echoed, "_that you've done anything for which you
need my forgiveness_? Oh, then you're more hardened than I thought. I
hoped that by this time you were repenting."

"Repenting of what?"

"Of everything. Of--putting yourself in your present position, among
other things."

"You mean in the position of your skipper? I may say, that if I haven't
repented, it isn't your fault. But, really, I've been so busy trying to
make myself useful to the party in more ways than one, that I've had no
time for repentance."

"Oh, you have made yourself useful," she had the grace to admit. "If--it
hadn't been for the _beginning_, I--I should have been grateful. You
know things which none of the rest of us know. You've shown us sights
which without you we should never have seen or heard of. But as it is,
how can I, why should I, be grateful? It's only for the sake of the
others, and their pleasure, that I----"

"So you said before," I broke in. "But now I refuse to accept toleration
from you--we won't say consideration, for that's too warm a word--for
the sake of others. The boat is yours. I am your skipper. If, after
serving you as well as I could for a week, you wish me to go, I will
go."

She stood and stared at me from under lashes meant only for sweet looks.

"You will go?"

"Certainly. This moment. I only wait your word." I heard myself saying
it; and in a way I was sincere, though I was the same man who, only a
few minutes since, had vowed to do anything rather than let the trip
end. Of course I would have to go now, if she told me to go. But I knew
that I should not go. As skipper, I was her servant, if she chose to
give me the name; but as a man I felt myself her master.

"I--I--" she faltered, and I saw her throat flutter. "You're putting me
in a horrid position. We--I thought we'd settled this matter, things
being as they are."

"Not at all," said I. "Nothing was settled."

"You're Mr. Starr's friend, and I can't send you away."

"You can, easily," I replied. "And since that appears to be your only
reason for not doing so, I'll not wait for your orders to go. Good-by,
Miss Van Buren, I'll do my best to get you another skipper, a
professional this time."

I moved a step away, and my blood was beating fast. Everything depended
on the next instant.

"Stop! Please stop," she said.

I stopped, and looked at her coldly.

For a moment we stood regarding each other in silence, for it seem