“None whatever,” Captain Raymond hastened to say.  “I have just given the same answer to another suitor, and there is one consideration which inclines me to prefer you to him; namely, that you are a near neighbor to us at Woodburn; so that in giving up my daughter to you I should feel the parting much less than if she were about to make her home so far North as this.”

“Well, sir, that’s a crumb of comfort, though to be often in her company—­seeing her lovely face and watching her pretty ways—­will make it all the more difficult to refrain from showing my esteem, admiration, love.  In fact, I don’t know how to stand it.  Excuse me, captain, but what harm could there be in telling her my story and trying to win my way to her heart, provided—­I spoke of marriage only as something to be looked for in the far-off future?”

“No, I cannot consent to that,” returned the captain with decision.  “It would only put mischief into her head and rob her of her child-like simplicity.  She is still too young to know her own mind on that subject and might fancy that she had given her heart to one who would, a few years later, be entirely distasteful to her.  But I trust you, Chester, not to breathe a word to her of your—­what shall I call it?—­admiration until you have my consent.”

“It is more than admiration, sir!” exclaimed Chester.  “I love her as I never loved anything before in my life, and it would just about kill me to see her in the possession of another.”

“Then comfort yourself that for years to come no one’s suit will be listened to any more favorably than yours,” returned the father of the girl he so coveted, and with that the interview came to an end.

Their conversation had been held at one end of the deck while the rest of the party sat chatting together at the other.  The captain and Chester joined them now and entered into the talk, which ran principally upon the fact that all the relatives from Pleasant Plains must leave for home the next day.

“How would you all like to go by water?” asked Captain Raymond, as if the thought of such a possibility had just struck him.

“I do not believe the idea has occurred to any of us,” replied Annis, “and since the building of the railroad so few make the journey by water that the boats running on our river are few, small, and I presume not remarkably comfortable.”

“How would this one answer?” he asked.  “It is but thirty-eight miles across the lake; I think we would find your river navigable nearly or quite up to your town, and to reach it from here would not take more than six or eight hours.”

“Then they could all go, as they need not all spend the night, or any part of it, on board,” exclaimed Violet in tones of delight.  “Oh, Cousin Annis, and all of you, do agree to it, and we will have a charming little trip!”

“Indeed, so far as I am concerned nothing could be pleasanter, I am sure,” said Annis, looking highly pleased; “but—­I fear it would be giving you a great deal of trouble, captain.”