"Moderation," sweetly chimed in the voice of Captain Leezur—"moderation in all things, even as low down as passnips."
The man who had been in California had been constantly drawing near me, but Captain Judah, anticipating him, was already at my side.
"You're a stranger," said he: "perhaps you never heard any of Angie Fay—Angie Fay Kobbe's poetry?"
He had a rosy face: in spite of former long sea-wear, not blowzed, but delicately tinted; he snuffled when he talked in a way which I could only define as classical; and it was admitted that his nosegay vest and blue coat, as far as tender refinement went, far surpassed anything in the room.
"That's Angie Fay Kobbe, my wife, at the organ. Ten years ago, when I was still cruising, I found and rescued her from a southern cyclone!"
I murmured astonishment, though in truth something of a cyclonic atmosphere still hovered about Mrs. Kobbe, not only in her method of performance on the organ, but in her sparkling features, young and beautiful, her wide-flowing curled hair.
"How old does she seem to you to be, sir?"
"She looks to me," I said, with honesty, "to be eighteen or twenty—twenty-five at the most."
"Sir, she is forty!" said Captain Judah proudly. Angie Fay shot him a bewitching glance through the open door.
"She is not only a skilled performer on the keys, as you see, but she is a wide-idead thinker. If it would not detain you, sir, against previous inclination to the ball-room, I should like to read you some of her poetry."