“We brought it with us,” replied Elizabeth.
“You fetched a stove in them baskets?”
“Certainly. Come and see it.”
She drew her old friend toward the cockpit. There stood the steaming coffee-pot over an alcohol flame.
“Well, I swan!”
Paper plates were scattered about over the improvised table, chicken piled high on some, sandwiches on others, doughnuts, cream-puffs, and apple tarts on still others. Indeed, not a thing had been left out, so far as the Captain could see.
“If this ain’t the likeliest meal I ever see, then, I’d like to know. I feel right now as if I could eat the whole enduring lot, I’m that hungry,” declared the skipper.
Elizabeth served, moving about as gracefully 133 as a fawn. Mr. McGowan watched her with no attempt to hide his admiration. The one question in his mind all day had been: what did she think of him for his part in the affair at the Inn? He decided that he would take advantage of the first opportunity to prove to her that no other course had been left open for him.
Dinner over, the Captain filled his pipe, and stood in the door of the cabin. He smoked quietly, and watched the ladies put the things away. Miss Pipkin was folding the cloths, and on her the seaman’s gaze came to a rest. Would the old home seem different with her in it?
“Hadn’t we better start?”