“Any position she would fill would gain by her presence,” said the doctor gravely.  “Have they been gone long?” he asked, changing the subject.  He never discussed Jane Cobden with his mother if he could help it.

“Oh, yes, some time.  Lucy must have kept on home, for I saw Miss Jane going toward the beach alone.”

“Are you sure, mother?” There was a note of anxiety in his voice.

“Yes, certainly.  She had that red cloak of hers with her and that miserable little dog; that’s how I know.  She must be going to stay late.  You look tired, my son; have you had a hard day?” added she, kissing him on the cheek.

“Yes, perhaps I am a little tired, but I’ll be all right.  Have you looked at the slate lately?  I’ll go myself,” and he turned and entered his office.

On the slate lay the rose.  He picked it up and held it to his nose in a preoccupied way.

“One of mother’s,” he said listlessly, laying it back among his papers.  “She so seldom does that sort of thing.  Funny that she should have given it to me to-day; and after Miss Jane’s visit, too.”  Then he shut the office door, threw himself into his chair, and buried his face in his hands.  He was still there when his mother called him to supper.

When Lucy reached home it was nearly dark.  She came alone, leaving Bart at the entrance to the village.  At her suggestion they had avoided the main road and had crossed the marsh by the foot-path, the dog bounding on ahead and springing at the nurse, who stood in the gate awaiting Lucy’s return.

“Why, he’s as dry as a bone!” Martha cried, stroking Meg’s rough hair with her plump hand.  “He didn’t get much of a bath, did he?”

“No, I couldn’t get him into the water.  Every time I got my hand on him he’d dart away again.”

“Anybody on the beach, darlin’?”

“Not a soul except Meg and the sandsnipe.”

CHAPTER V

CAPTAIN NAT’S DECISION

When Martha, with Meg at her heels, passed Ann Gossaway’s cottage the next morning on her way to the post-office—­her daily custom—­the dressmaker, who was sitting in the window, one eye on her needle and the other on the street, craned her head clear of the calico curtain framing the sash and beckoned to her.

This perch of Ann Gossaway’s was the eyrie from which she swept the village street, bordered with a double row of wide-spreading elms and fringed with sloping grassy banks spaced at short intervals by hitching-posts and horse-blocks.  Her own cottage stood somewhat nearer the flagged street path than the others, and as the garden fences were low and her lookout flanked by two windows, one on each end of her corner, she could not only note what went on about the fronts of her neighbors’ houses, but much of what took place in their back yards.  From this angle, too, she could see quite easily, and without