just as Cap'n Abe said he would.

Louise was curious to see the returned mariner; but it was too early to
go down yet. She might really have another nap before she dressed, she
thought, yawning behind a pink palm.

There was a step in the store. Her room overlooked by two windows the
roof of the front porch and she could hear what went on below plainly.
The step was lighter than Cap'n Abe's. The bolts of the two-leaved
door rattled and it was set wide; she heard the iron wedges kicked
under each to hold it open. Then a smell of pipe smoke was wafted to
her nostrils.

A footstep on the Shell Road announced the approach of somebody from
The Beaches. Louise yawned again and was on the point of creeping into
bed once more when she descried the figure coming through the fog. She
saw only the boots and legs of the person at first; but the fog was
fast separating into wreaths which the rising breeze hurried away, and
the girl at the window soon saw the full figure of the approaching
man--and recognized him.

At almost the same moment Lawford Tapp raised his eyes and saw her; and
his heart immediately beat the call to arms. Louise Grayling's morning
face, framed by the sash and sill of her bedroom window, was quite the
sweetest picture he had ever seen.

It was only for a moment he saw her, her bare and rounded forearm on
the sill, the frilly negligee so loosened that he could see the column
of her throat. Her gray eyes looked straight into his--then she was
gone.

"Actress, or not," muttered the son of the Salt Water Taffy King,
"there's nothing artificial about her. And she's Cap'n Abe's niece.
Well!"

He saw the figure on the porch, smoking, and hailed it:

"Hey, Cap'n Abe! Those fishhooks you sold me last evening aren't what
I wanted--and there's the _Merry Andrew_ waiting out there for me now.
I want----"

The figure in the armchair turned its head. It was not Cap'n Abe at
all!

"Mornin', young feller," said the stranger cordially. "You'll have to
explain a leetle about them hooks. I ain't had a chance to overhaul
much of Abe's cargo yet. I don't even know where he stows his small
tackle. Do you?"

Fully a minute did Lawford Tapp keep him waiting for an answer while he
stared at the stranger. He was not a big man, but he somehow gave the
impression of muscular power. He was dressed in shabby
clothing--shirt, dungaree trousers, and canvas shoes such as sailors
work and go aloft in. The pip