“That I have,” I boasted; “an’ I’ll help you make that book.”

“’Tis the same,” cried Skipper Tommy, slapping his thigh “as if ’twas writ already!”

After a long time, my mother spoke. “You’re always wanting to do some good thing, Skipper Tommy, are you not?” said she.

“Well,” he admitted, his face falling, “I thinks and wonders a deal, ’tis true, but somehow I don’t seem t’——”

“Ay?” my father asked.

“Get—nowhere—much!”

Very true: but, even then, there was a man on the way to help him.


IV