as always earnest; but,
like Ambrose, of no consequence.

Bro made his application in due form. Young Vickery volunteered to write
to an acquaintance in Washington, a young lawyer, who aspired to "patent
business," asking him, as he expressed it, to "see Bro through." "No
sharp practice in this case, Dan," he wrote privately. "Cranch is poor,
and a friend of friends of mine; do your best for him."

But, although he thus good-naturedly assisted the man, he laughed at the
woman for her part in the figures, which Bro had related with pride.

"What will you do next?" he said. "Build a stone wall--or vote? Imagine
a girl taking light recreation in equations, and letting her mind wander
hilariously among groves of triangles on a rainy day!"

Marion colored highly, but said nothing. Her incisiveness seemed to fail
her when with Lawrence Vickery. And, as he was never more than half in
earnest, it was as hard to use real weapons against him as to fence with
the summer wind. The young man seemed to have taken a fancy to Bro; he
spent an hour or two at the saw-mill almost every day, and Caesar had
become quite accustomed to his voice shouting for the boat. But the old
negro liked him, and came across cheerfully, even giving him voluntarily
the title "marse," which the blacks withheld whenever they pleased now,
and tenaciously. Vickery took Bro over to see his grandfather, the old
house, and the wastes which were once their cotton-fields. He had no
pride about the old gentleman's lowly office; he had roamed about the
world too much for that. And, when Bro suggested that he should take the
position himself and relieve his grandfather, he answered carelessly
that his grandfather did not want to be relieved, which was true--old
Mr. Vickery deriving the only amusement of his life now in plans for
outwitting, in various small ways, the spirited superintendent.

"However," said Lawrence, "I could not in any case; I have plans of
importance waiting for me."

"Where?" asked Bro.

"Well--abroad. I don't mind telling _you_," said Vickery; "but it is a
secret at present."

"Then you do not intend to stay here?"

"Here? Bless you, no! The place is a howling, one-horse desert. I only
came back awhile to see the old man."

The "while" lasted all winter, Young Vickery exhausted the town, the
island, and the whole district; he was "hail fellow" with everybody,
made acquaintance with the lighthouse-keeper, knew the captains of all
the s