He naturally expected his superior to be surprised. As a matter of fact, he was the surprised party. Seth reached out, drew the bungalow housekeeper toward him, and put his arm about her waist. Then he smiled; and the smile was expressive of pride, triumph, and satisfaction absolute.
“ATKINS!” gasped Brooks.
“My name ain't Atkins,” was the astonishing reply; “it's Bascom. And this,” indicating by a tightening of his arm the blushing person at his side, “is the lady I married over five year ago.”
After the stories had been told, after both sides had told theirs and explained and been exclaimed over and congratulated, after the very last question had been asked and answered, Brown—or Brooks—asked one more.
“But this other fellow,” he queried, “this brother-in-law—By George, it is perfectly marvelous, this whole business!—where is he? What has become of him?”
Seth chuckled. “Bennie D.?” he said. “Well, Bennie D. is leavin' Eastboro on the noon train. I paid his fare and give him fifty dollars to boot. He's goin' somewhere, but he ain't sartin where. If you asked me, I should say that, in the end, he'd most likely have to go where he's never been afore, so far's I ever heard—that's to work. Now—seein' as the important business has been talked over and settled—maybe you'll tell me about the lights, and how you got along last night.”
But the lighthouse subject was destined to be postponed for a few minutes. The person in whose care the Lights had been left during the past twenty hours or so looked at the speaker, then at the other persons present, and suddenly began to laugh.
“What are you laughing at?” asked Miss Graham. “Why, Russell, what is it?”
Russell Agnew Brooks, alias “John Brown,” ex-substitute assistant at Eastboro Twin-Lights, sank into a chair, shaking from head to heel.
“It is hysterics,” cried Ruth, hastening to his side. “No wonder, poor dear, considering what he has been through. Hush, Russell! don't, you frighten me. What IS it?”