is roughness was
assumed. His eyes were moist as his gaze rested on her face, and he
blew his nose noisily at the end of his speech.

"You take keer o' yourself, Louise," he added huskily. "If anything
should happen to you, what--what would Abe say?"

The depth of his feeling for her--so plainly and so unexpectedly
displayed--halted Louise in her already formed intention. She had
arisen on this morning, determined to "have it out" with Cap'n Amazon
Silt. On several points she wished to be enlightened--felt that she
had a right to demand an explanation.

For she was quite positive that Cap'n Amazon was not at all what he
claimed to be. His actual personality was as yet a mystery to her; but
she was positive on this point: He was _not_ Captain Amazon Silt,
master mariner and rover of the seas. He was an entirely different
person, and Louise desired to know what he meant by this masquerade.

His seamanship, his speech, his masterful manner, were assumed. And in
the matter of his related adventures the girl was confident that they
were mere repetitions of what he had read.

Now Louise suddenly remembered how Cap'n Abe had welcomed her here at
the old store, and how cheerfully and tenderly this piratical looking
substitute for the storekeeper had assumed her care. No relative or
friend could have been kinder to her than Cap'n Amazon.

How could she, then, stand before him and say: "Cap'n Amazon, you are
an impostor. You have assumed a character that is not your own. You
tell awful stories about adventures that never befell you. What do you
mean by it all? And, in conclusion and above all, _Where is Cap'n
Abe_?"

This had been Louise's intention when she came downstairs on this
morning. The nagging of Betty Gallup, the gossip of the other
neighbors, the wild suspicions whispered from lip to lip did not
influence her so much. It was what she had herself discovered the
evening before in the captain's "cabin" that urged her on.

Now Cap'n Amazon's display of tenderness "took all the wind out of her
sails," as Betty Gallup would have said.

Louise watched him stirring about the living-room, chirruping to old
Jerry and thrusting his finger into the cage for the bird to hop upon
it, and finally shuffling off into the store. She hesitatingly
followed him. She desired to speak, but could not easily do so. And
now Cap'n Joab Beecher was before her.

Amiel Perdue had been uptown and brought down the early m