She turned back from the door and stood, considering. "I had counted it at about that, but I didn't think—if they wait to hear from the people I've referred them to, especially those farthest away, it might be double that time. That would keep me waiting clear into October. And then suppose somebody were ahead of me, and I shouldn't get the place, there'd be all that time lost. It would be tragic to have the little ship I'd waited for so long, drift in a wreck."
"That's why I always hold that it's best to send out more than one," said the Captain. "Launch a whole fleet of 'em, is my advice. What makes life a tragedy for most people is that they put all their hopes on just one thing. They load all they've got on one vessel and then strain their eyes for a lifetime waiting for it to come back with all their hopes realized. But if they'd divide their interests and affections around a bit, and start them off in different directions, there'd never be a danger of total wreck. If one went down, there'd be some other cargo to look forward to."
It was a pet subject of the old man's, and Mary made haste to ward off his usual monologue by saying, "I'll certainly take your advice, Captain Doane. You'll see me down here to-morrow with a whole harbor full of little ships. I'll launch all the applications that my family will allow."
The figure of speech pleased her, and as she walked on to the store a vision of blue sea rose before her. On it she seemed to see a fleet of little boats with white sails swelling in the wind. On each sail was a letter and all together they spelled "Great Expectations."
"It's funny," thought Mary, "how such a picture popped right up in front of me. Now, if Joyce had such a fancy she'd do something with it. It would suggest a title design or a tail piece of some kind. Oh, why wasn't I born with a talent for writing! My head is just full of things sometimes that would make the loveliest stories, but when I try to put them on paper it's like trying to touch the rainbows on a bubble. The touch makes them vanish instantly."
It was some crash towelling that she was to call for at the store.
When she opened the door, the place seemed deserted, but she picked her way, among barrels and boxes, saddles and hams, to the dry-goods department in the rear. Through the open back door she could see two men in the yard, one repairing a chicken-coop, and the other standing with his hands in his pockets, watching the job. The man with the hammer and saw, she knew. He was the manager of the store. The other was a new clerk, who had been installed in her absence. She glanced at him curiously, for one reason because every newcomer counted for so much in the social life of the place, for another because he was so imposingly large. "Even taller than Phil Tremont," she thought, and Phil was her standard of all that a man should measure up to in every way.
Presently, seeing that the chicken-coop would occupy their attention indefinitely unless she made some sign, she tapped on the floor with her heel. It was the new clerk who turned, and taking his hands out of his pockets, strode in to wait on her. She noticed that he had to stoop as he came through the doorway. Then she almost forgot what it was she had come to buy, in her surprise. For it was Pink Upham who rushed up to greet her, still red-faced and awkward and facetious, but such a different Pink that she could understand why the Captain had spoken of him as Pinckney, instead of by his undignified nickname. The year at college had done him good.
While he measured off the crash she was taking his measure with quick, critical glances. It was not his pale, straw-colored hair she objected to, made to look even paler by the contrast of his florid complexion and red four-in-hand with its turquoise scarf-pin. It was the way he combed his hair that she criticized, and the gaudy tie and the combination of colors. But his cordial greeting softened her critical glances somewhat. He was genuinely glad to see her, and it was flattering to be welcomed so heartily.
That night at the supper table she recounted her adventures. "I met Pink Upham at the store to-day, Jack. How old do you suppose he is?"