ouse boarders weak-minded nowadays?" asked the depot
master.

Mr. Wingate answered the question.

"My land!" he snapped; "would they board at the Ocean House if they
WA'N'T weak-minded?"

Captain Bailey did not deign to reply to this jibe. He continued calmly:

"This feller wa'n't an Ocean Houser, though. He was young Stumpton's
automobile skipper-shover, or shofer, or somethin' they called him. He
answered to the hail of Billings, and his home port was the Stumpton
ranch, 'way out in Montana. He'd been here in Orham only a couple of
weeks, havin' come plumb across the United States to fetch his boss the
new automobile. You see, 'twas early October. The Stumptons had left
their summer place on the Cliff Road, and was on their way South for
the winter. Young Stumpton was up to Boston, but he was comin' back in
a couple of days, and then him and the shover was goin' automobilin' to
Florida. To Florida, mind you! In that thing! If it was me I'd buy my
ticket to Tophet direct and save time and money.

"Well, anyhow, this critter Billings, he ain't never smelt salt water
afore, and he don't like the smell. He makes proclamations that Orham is
nothin' but sand, slush, and soft drinks. He won't sail, he can't
swim, he won't fish; but he's hankerin' to shoot somethin', havin' been
brought up in a place where if you don't shoot some of the neighbors
every day or so folks think you're stuck up and dissociable. Then
somebody tells him it's the duckin' season down to Setuckit P'int, and
he says he'll spend his day off, while the boss is away, massycreein'
the coots there. This same somebody whispers that I know so much about
ducks that I quack when I talk, and he comes cruisin' over in the buzz
cart to hire me for guide. And--would you b'lieve it?--it turns out that
he's cal'latin' to make his duckin' v'yage in that very cart. I was for
makin' the trip in a boat, like a sensible man, but he wouldn't hear of
it.

"'Land of love!' says I. 'Go to Setuckit in a automobile?'

"'Why not?' he says. 'The biscuit shooter up at the hotel tells me
there's a smart chance of folks goes there a-horseback. And where a hoss
can travel I reckon the old gal here'--slappin' the thwart of the auto
alongside of him--'can go, too!'

"'But there's the Cut-through,' says I.

"''Tain't nothin' but a creek when the freshet's over, they tell me,'
says he. 'And me and the boss have forded four foot of river in this
very machine.'

"By the 'freshe