"No more of that, mother!" exclaimed the young man, patience at last ceasing to be a virtue. "Criticise me if you wish to; but I will hear nothing against Miss Grayling."
"Oh, dear! Now I have offended him again!" sobbed the matron.
"You are too utterly selfish for words!" declared Marian.
"You're a regular pig!" added Prue.
"If you get mixed up with an actress, Fordy, I'll have a fine time when
I come out, won't I?" complained Cecile.
"Caesar's ghost!" burst from the lips of the badgered young man. "I wish Betty Gallup had let me drown instead of hauling me inboard this afternoon!"
CHAPTER XVIII
SOMETHING BREAKS
An express wagon, between the shafts of which was a raw-boned gray horse leaning against one shaft as a prop while he dozed, stood before Cap'n Abe's store as Louise and Mr. Judson Bane came up from the shore front. She thanked the actor as he set the heavy baskets on the porch step.
"Those blackfish look so good I long for a fish supper," he said, smiling in open admiration upon her.