to think before he spoke.

"I shall be a man, Madge, before you are back again," he replied slowly.
"I am twenty now, so I shall be ready to vote. But, best of all, I shall
be through college and ready to go to work." The young man threw back his
square shoulders. His black eyes looked serious and steadfast. "I am
going to make you proud of me, Madge. You remember I told you so, that
day in the Virginia field, when you helped me out of a scrape and started
me on the right road."

The little captain nodded emphatically. "I am proud of you already,
David," she declared warmly. "I think it is perfectly wonderful that you
have been able to take two years' work in college instead of one, beside
helping Mr. Preston on the farm. You are going to make me dreadfully
ashamed when I come back, by knowing so much more than I. Phil enters
Vassar this fall and Tom will graduate at Columbia in another year. I am
going to try to study on the yacht, but I shall be so busy seeing things
that I know I won't accomplish very much. Just think, David, I am going
around the world in our own boat with my father and Captain Jules! Isn't
it wonderful how one's dreams come true and things turn out even better
than you expect them to? I believe, if it weren't for leaving my beloved
houseboat chums and Mrs. Curtis and Tom, and Miss Jenny Ann and you, I
should be the happiest girl in the world."

"I don't suppose I count for much, Madge," answered David honestly, "but
I am more grateful to you than you can know for putting me on that list.
Some day----" The young man hesitated, then his sober face relaxed and a
brilliant smile lighted it. "It's pretty early for a fellow like me to be
talking about some day, isn't it, Madge?"

Madge laughed, though she blushed a little and answered nothing.

Just then Phyllis Alden and a young man in a lieutenant's uniform joined
Madge and David Brewster.

"Lieutenant Jimmy is saying dreadful things, Madge," announced Phil
mournfully. "He says he is sure you won't come back home in a year.
You'll stay over in Europe until you are grown up or married, or
something else, and you'll never be a houseboat girl again!" Phil's voice
broke.

Lieutenant Jimmy looked uncomfortable. "See here, Miss Alden," he
protested, "I never said anything as bad as all that. I only said that
perhaps Captain Morton and Captain Jules would stay longer than a year.
Almost any one would, if they owned that jolly little yacht."

"I'll wa