d announced that breakfast was ready and that
he must go down at once and eat it while it was hot. She, having
breakfasted some time before, would stay with the patient until the meal
was over. Captain Eri at first flatly declined to listen to any such
arrangement, but the calm insistence of the Nantucket visitor prevailed
as usual. The Captain realized that the capacity for "bossin' things,"
that he had discerned in the letter, was even more apparent in the lady
herself. One thing he did insist upon, however, and this was that Mrs.
Snow should "turn in" as soon as breakfast was over. One of the three
would take the watch in the sick room while the other two washed the
dishes. The nurse was inclined to balk on the dishwashing proposition,
saying that she could do it herself after she had had a wink or two,
but this the Captain wouldn't hear of. He went away, however, with an
unsettled conviction that, although he and his partners might wash
the dishes, Mrs. Snow would wash them again as soon as she had an
opportunity. "She didn't say so, but she sort of looked it," he
explained afterward.

He found his friends seated at the table and feasting on hot biscuits,
eggs, and clear, appetizing coffee. They greeted him joyously.

"Hey, Eri!" hailed Captain Perez. "Ain't this gay? Look at them eggs;
b'iled jest to a T. Ain't much like Jerry's h'af raw kind."

"Humph! You needn't say nothin', Perez," observed Captain Jerry, his
mouth full of biscuit. "When you was cook, you allers b'iled 'em so hard
they'd dent the barn if you'd fired 'em at it. How's John, Eri?"

Captain Eri gave his and the Doctor's opinion of his friend's condition
and then said, "Now, we've got to have some kind of a settlement on this
marryin' question. Last night, when I was up in the room there, it come
acrost me all of a sudden that, from what I'd seen of this Nantucket
woman, she'd be jest the sort of nurse that John needed. So I skipped
out while you fellers was busy with the Doctor, found her at the hotel,
explained things to her, and got her to come down. That's all there is
to that. I ain't made no arrangement with her, and somethin's got to be
done. What do you think of her, jedgin' by what you've seen?"

Captain Perez gave it as his opinion that she was "all right," and
added, "If Jerry here wa'n't so pigheaded all at once, he'd marry her
without waitin' another minute."

Eri nodded. "That's my idee," he said emphatically.

But Captain Jerry