“Shouldn't wonder, Mollie,” replied the Captain, and then he said nothing more, for he was busy with his own thoughts.
“Shouldn't wondering doesn't help matters any,” said his wife at last, impatiently. “What's to be done about 'em, Epher?”
“About what, Mollie?” asked the captain, for he had really forgotten what she was talking about.
“Why! the peaches, to be sure. You must be having one of your absent-minded turns.”
“I was thinking, Mollie,” he answered, “about getting some new blankets and tarpaulins for the crew. That is more like minding my own business than being absent-minded, it strikes me.”
Captain Murray had had charge of the Moorlow Life-saving Station for eight years, and had just accepted a new appointment.
“I guess you'd say I hadn't been minding mine, if I let the fall go by without doing up any peaches. Nobody sets more store by my preserves than you do, Epher Murray, but you'll have few enough to set store by this year, unless you do something pretty quick about 'em.”
