Don’t ask me, Mary-’Gusta [he wrote].  For the dear land sakes don’t ask me to come to that place and stay.  I’d do ’most anything for you, and I will do that if you are dead sot on it, but I do hope you ain’t.  I will come up there and see you of course and I’ll even stay to supper if I get asked, but don’t ask me to drop anchor and stay there night and day.  I couldn’t stand it.  My backbone’s sprung backwards now from settin’ up so straight last time I was there.

So Mary had pity upon him and he took a room at the Quincy House where, as he said, he didn’t have to keep his nose dead on the course every minute, but could “lay to and be comf’table” if he wanted to.  He was invited to supper at the Wyeth house, however, and while there Mrs. Wyeth found an opportunity to take him aside and talk with him on a subject which he found interesting and a trifle disquieting.

“Now mind,” said the lady, “I am by no means convinced that the affair is anything but a mere boy and girl friendship, or that it is ever likely to be more than that.  But I did think I ought to tell you about it and that you should meet the young man.  You have met him, you say?”

“Yes, ma’am,” said Shadrach, “I’ve met him.  ’Twan’t much more’n that—­he just came into our store down home, that’s all.  But I did meet him and I must say I thought he was a real likely young feller.”

“I am glad you thought so.  So do I. Has Mary written you of his calls here?”

“Oh, yes, ma’am, she’s written.  She ain’t the kind of girl to keep anything back from us; at least, if she is, she’s changed a heap since she came away to school.  She’s told us about his comin’ here and about you and him and her goin’ to that—­what-d’ye-call-it—­hookey game.  She wrote all about that ’way last February.”

“Yes, we did go to the hockey game.  Samuel, my cousin John Keith’s boy, played in it.  Now, Captain Gould, I have a suggestion to make.  It has been some years since you met Crawford Smith and I think, everything considered, you should meet him again and decide for yourself whether or not you still consider him a proper young person to call upon your niece.  Suppose you dine with us again tomorrow evening and I invite young Smith also.  Then—­”

But the Captain interrupted.  He had a plan of his own for the following evening and another meal at Mrs. Wyeth’s was not a part of it.

“Er—­er—­excuse me, ma’am,” he cut in hastily, “but I had a—­a kind of notion that Mary-’Gusta and me might get our supper at a—­a eatin’-house or somewhere tomorrow night and then maybe we’d take in—­I mean go to a show—­a theater, I should say.  I didn’t know but I’d ask this young Smith feller to go along.  And—­and—­” remembering his politeness, “of course we’d be real glad if you’d come, too,” he added.

But Mrs. Wyeth, although she thanked him and expressed herself as heartily in favor of the supper and theater party, refused to become a member of it.  The Captain bore the shock of the refusal with, to say the least, manful resignation.  He had a huge respect for Mrs. Wyeth, and he liked her because his beloved Mary-’Gusta liked her so well, but his liking was seasoned with awe and her no in this case was a great relief.