isn't my father's fault if I don't know some simple
things. He was always teaching me, because Ned was too little and my
mother--well, business always worried her and he'd do anything to save
her worry, even talk to a little girl like me. And as Samson was to do
with the cattle, so George Cromarty was to do with the raisins and
oranges. The ostriches--Oh! but they were to be Antonio's charge. And
now----"

"They're yours, captain, with any one or lot of us you choose for
helpers."

"Ferd knew much about them, and they minded him. But----"

"Ferd'll trouble Sobrante none while the senor is away. Joe is a
good hand at all live stock, and I'll pledge you'll get every feather
that's plucked when he does the counting. He won't let any eggs get
cooked in hatchin', neither. You can trust Joseph--if you watch him a
mite."

A laugh at honest Joe's expense, in which he heartily joined, followed
this and Lady Jess stepped down among her friends, holding out her
hands to first one, then another. Her blue eyes were filled with happy
moisture, for she was not too young to feel their devotion to be as
unselfish as it was sincere, and her smile was full of confidence in them
and in herself.

"Eleven years old is pretty early to be a captain, I guess, but I'll
be a good one--just as good and true as you are! What I don't know
you'll teach me, and if I make mistakes you'll be patient, I know.
One thing I can do, I can copy bills and papers. I can put down figures
and add them up. It was good practice for me, my father said. So I'll
put down your names and all your business in these new books he bought
and was going to use in his co--co-operation--is that right, John?"

"Right as a trivet."

"And our admiral, that's the dear mother, will not have to fret so any
longer. Between us we'll make Sobrante all my father meant it should
be and--as soon as I have my breakfast--I will find that title. I must
find it. I will. Sobrante is yours and ours forever. Oh, boys, I love
you! I'm all choked up--I love you so and I feel like that my father
used to read in Dickens: 'God bless you every one!'"

With her hands clasped close against her breast, and her beloved face
luminous with her deep affection, their little maid stood before her
hardy henchmen, a symbol to them of all that was best and purest in
life. Their own eyes were moist, and even Mr. Hale had to take off
his glasses and wipe them as, looking around upon his comrades, great
S