Mary arranged with the owner, a Bayport man, to lease this house and land at a small rental for three years.  In the lease was included consent to the making of necessary alterations and repairs and the privilege of purchasing, at a price therein named, at the end of the three years, should the tenant wish to do so.

Then with the aid of soap and water, white paint and whitewash, attractive but inexpensive wall papers, and odds and ends of quaint old furniture, of which the parlor and best bedroom of the Gould-Hamilton home supplied the larger quantity, she proceeded to make over the interior of the little building.  To every bit of nautical bric-a-brac, pictures of old sailing ships and sea curios she gave especial prominence.  Then the lawn was mowed, the tangled shrubbery untangled and clipped and pruned; cheap but pretty lattices made to look like the shrouds of a ship, over which climbing roses were supposed—­some day—­to twine, were placed against the walls, and rustic tables set about under the trees and the grape arbor with ship lanterns hung above them.  The driveway down to the lane was rolled and hardened, and a sign, painted by Joshua Bemis, the local “House, Boat and Sign Painter, Tinsmith and Glazier”—­see Mr. Bemis’s advertisement in the Advocate—­was hung on a frame by the gateway.

Captain Shad’s remarks when he first saw that sign may be worth quoting.  Mary had not consulted him concerning it; she deemed it best not to do so.  When it was in place, however, she led him out to inspect.  Shadrach adjusted his spectacles and read as follows: 

The for’ard lookout
tea and gifts
dainty things to eat
pretty things to buy
all’s well!

There was the picture of a full-rigged ship, with every stitch set alow and aloft, sailing through a sea of thick green and white paint toward a kind of green wall with green feather dusters growing out of it.

Shadrach subjected this work of art to a long and searching stare.  At last he spoke.

“Carryin’ every rag she can h’ist,” he observed; “nobody at the wheel, land dead ahead and breakers under the bows.  Looks to me as if ’twas liable to be a short v’yage and a lively one.  But the for’ard lookout says all’s well and he ought to know; he’s had more experience aboard gift-shop ships, I presume likely, than I have.  What’s those bristly things stickin’ up along shore there—­eel grass or tea grounds?”

For the first few weeks after the tea-room was really “off the ways” the optimistic declaration of the For’ard Lookout seemed scarcely warranted by the facts.  Mary was inclined to think that all was by no means well.  In fitting out the new venture she had been as economical as she dared, but she had been obliged to spend money and to take on a fresh assortment of debts.  Then, too, she had engaged the services of a good cook and two waitresses, so there was a weekly expense bill to consider.  And the number of motor cars which turned in at the new driveway was disappointingly small.