"Them movin' picture people are hoppin' about The Beaches like sandpipers," observed Cap'n Amazon at the breakfast table. "And I opine they air pretty average useless, too. They were hurrahin' around all day yest'day while you was out fishin'. Want to take a picture of Abe's old store here. Dunno what to do about it."
Louise was too much disturbed by her discoveries of overnight to give much attention to this subject.
"It's Abe's store, you see," went on Cap'n Amazon. "Dunno how he'd feel 'bout havin' it took in a picture and showed all over the country. It needs a coat o' paint hi-mighty bad. Ought to be fixed up some 'fore havin' its picture took—don't ye think so, Niece Louise?"
The girl awoke to the matter sufficiently to advise him:
"The lack of paint will not show in the picture, Uncle Amazon. And I suppose they want the store for a location just because it is weather-beaten and old-fashioned."
"I want to know! Well, now, if I was in the photograftin' business, seems t' me I'd pick out the nice-lookin' places to make pictures of. I knowed a feller once that made a business of takin' photografts in furin' parts. He sailed with me when I was master of the Blue Sparrow—clipper built she was, an' a spankin' fine craft. We——"
"Oh, Uncle Amazon!" Louise cried, rising from, the table suddenly, "you'll have to excuse me. I—I forgot something upstairs. Yes—I've finished my breakfast. Betty can clear off."
She fairly ran away from the table. It seemed to her as though she could not sit and listen to another of his preposterous stories. It would be on the tip of her tongue to declare her disbelief in his accuracy. How and where he had gained access to Cap'n Abe's store of nautical romances she could not imagine; but she was convinced that many, if not all, of his supposedly personal adventures were entirely fictitious in so far as his own part in them was concerned.
She put on her hat and went out of the back door in order to escape further intercourse with Cap'n Amazon for the present. On the shore she found the spot below the Bozewell bungalow a busy scene. This was a perfect day for "the sun worshipers," as somebody has dubbed motion picture people. Director Anscomb was evidently planning to secure several scenes and the entire company was on hand.
Louise saw that there were a number of spectators besides herself—some from the town, but mostly young folk from the cottages along The Beaches.