“Boy,” the old man said, “what in tarnal creation are yo’ cruisin’ around for in rough water wi’ yer mast broken and yer rudder gone?”
The lad looked up from the bench outside of the light to which the captain had led him. “Am I that much of a wreck?” he asked, smiling whimsically. Then he confessed: “I believe I had overestimated my strength. Lying there all day I had no way of telling how weak I really was. I used to get so tired of doing nothing and I thought if only I could get back here where the salt air is so exhilarating maybe I’d get strong sooner, but I’d better be taking the train back tonight, I’m thinking.”
Muriel had gone at once to the kitchen and had a roaring fire in the stove and the kettle on to boil when the old man and the lad entered.
How Gene laughed, a little later, when, having been made comfortable in a high-backed wooden rocker, which had been drawn close to the fire, his “storm maiden” again handed him a thick cup filled with a steaming beverage.
“Muriel,” he said, “you and I seem destined to have morning teas together. Do you recall our first one down on the beach when you threatened to shoot me?”
The girl whirled about and put her finger to her lips; then glancing at her grandfather, whose back was toward them, she said in a low voice: “Don’ tell that. I don’ know what possessed me that day. I reckon I was that angered, bein’ as yo’ wouldn’t take orders.”
“I’ll mind you from now on forever after, Muriel, good friend,” the lad began. Then added with sudden seriousness: “I realize from my recent misadventures that I am not possessed of any too sound a judgment.”
A happy day they had, although Gene spent nearly all of it in the rocker near the fire.
As the clock chimed the hour of four, the lad arose as he said: “I ought to be getting back to town. I would better take the evening train if——”
Captain Ezra gently pushed the lad down into the chair. “Tarnation sakes!” he exclaimed. “Do yo’ reckon I’d let a friend of Doctor Lem’s leave this craft with underpinnin’s as shaky as yours are? Not by a long sight! Yo’ oughtn’t to’ve come, but, bein’ as yo’re here yo’re goin’ to stay a spell.”