sfaction, and looked
as bright as a rose. The hard-worked little woman smiled back in
sympathy. There was a piece of her best loaf cake in the round wooden
luncheon-box that day, and everything else that she thought her man
would like and that his box would hold, but it seemed meagre to her
generous heart even then. The two women affectionately watched him
away down the field-path that led to the cove where the fish-houses
were.

All the Wilton farmers near the sea took a turn now and then at
fishing. They owned boats together sometimes, but John Packer had
always kept a good boat of his own. To-day he had no real desire to
find a companion or to call for help to launch his craft, but finding
that Joe Banks was busy in his fish-house, he went in to borrow the
light dory and a pair of oars. Joe seemed singularly unfriendly in his
manner, a little cold and strange, and went on with his work without
looking up. Mr. Packer made a great effort to be pleasant; the south
wind gave him even a sense of guilt.

"Don't you want to come, Joe?" he said, according to 'longshore
etiquette; but Joe shook his head, and showed no interest whatever. It
seemed then as if it would be such a good chance to talk over the tree
business with Joe, and to make him understand there had been some
reason in it; but John Packer could mind his own business as well as
any man, and so he picked his way over the slippery stones, pushed off
the dory, stepped in, and was presently well outside on his way to
Fish Rock. He had forgotten to look for any bait until Joe had pushed
a measure of clams along the bench; he remembered it now as he baited
his cod-lines, sitting in the swaying and lifting boat, a mile or two
out from shore. He had but poor luck; the cold had driven the fish
into deeper water, and presently he took the oars to go farther out,
and looking at the land for the first time with a consciousness of
seeing it, he sighted his range, and turned the boat's head. He was
still so near land that beyond the marshes, which looked narrow from
the sea, he could see his own farm and his neighbors' farms on the
hill that sloped gently down; the northern point of higher land that
sheltered the cove and the fish-houses also kept the fury of the sea
winds from these farms, which faced the east and south. The main road
came along the high ridge at their upper edge, and a lane turned off
down to the cove; you could see this road for three or four miles when