“I know. Neither have I. Let the dead past be its own undertaker, so far as we are concerned. I'm honest, Atkins, and tolerably straight. I believe you are; I really do. But we don't care to talk about ourselves, that's all. And, fortunately, kind Providence has brought us together in a place where there's no one else TO talk. I like you, I credit you with good taste; therefore, you must like me.”
“Hey? Ho, ho!” Seth laughed, in spite of himself. “Young man,” he observed, “you ain't cultivated your modesty under glass, have you?”
Brown smiled. “Joking aside,” he said, “I don't see why I shouldn't, in time, make an ideal assistant lightkeeper. Give me a trial, at any rate. I need an employer; you need a helper. Here we both are. Come; it is a bargain, isn't it? Any brass to be scrubbed—boss?”
Of course, had Eastboro Twin-Lights been an important station, the possibility of John Brown's remaining there would have been nonexistent. If it had been winter, or even early spring or fall, a regular assistant would have been appointed at once, and the castaway given his walking papers. If Seth Atkins had not been Seth Atkins, particular friend of the district superintendent, matters might have been different. But the Eastboro lights were unimportant, merely a half-way mark between Orham on the one hand and the powerful Seaboard Heights beacon on the other. It was the beginning of summer, when wrecks almost never occurred. And the superintendent liked Seth, and Seth liked him. So, although Mr. Atkins still scoffed at his guest's becoming a permanent fixture at the lights, and merely consented, after more parley, to see if he couldn't arrange for him to “hang around and help a spell until somebody else was sent,” the conversation with the superintendent over the long distance 'phone resulted more favorably for Brown than that nonchalant young gentleman had a reasonable right to expect.
“The Lord knows who I can send you now, Atkins!” said the superintendent. “I can't think of a man anywhere that can be spared. If you can get on for a day or two longer, I'll try to get a helper down! but where he's coming from I don't see.”
Then Seth sprung the news that he had a “sort of helper” already. “He's a likely young chap enough,” admitted the lightkeeper, whispering the words into the transmitter, in order that the “likely young chap” might not hear; “but he's purty green yet. He wants the reg'lar job and, give me time enough, I cal'late I can break him in. Yes, I'm pretty sure I can. And it's the off season, so there really ain't no danger. In a month he'd be doin' fust-rate.”
“Who is he? Where did he come from?” asked the superintendent.
“Name's Brown. He come from—from off here a ways,” was the strictly truthful answer. “He used to be on a steamboat.”
“All right. If you'll take a share of the responsibility, I'll take the rest. And, as soon as I can, I'll send you a regular man.”
“I can't pay you no steady wages,” Seth explained to his new helper. “Salaries come from the gov'ment, and, until they say so, I ain't got no right to do it. And I can't let you monkey with the lights, except to clean up around and such. If you want to stay a spell, until an assistant's app'inted, I'll undertake to be responsible for your keep. And if you need some new shoes or stockin's or a cap, or the like of that, I'll see you get 'em. Further'n that I can't go yet. It's a pretty poor job for a fellow like you, and if I was you I wouldn't take it.”