The other floats were equally well done,—­some even better in artistic conception.  Each received uproarious applause as it rolled slowly along the line of march.  Hotels and cottages were all illuminated, and the whole population of Spring Beach was out admiring the Pageant.

“Aren’t you tired, Patty?” asked Farnsworth, gently, as she changed her pose.

“Yes, I am,” she confessed; “but it isn’t the posing,—­it’s the jolting.  I had no idea the ocean was so rickety!”

“Poor little girlie!  I wish I could do something for you.  But we have to go a couple of miles further yet.  Can you stand it!”

“Yes; but I’d rather sit it!”

“Do!  Come and sit on this throne beside me.  There’s plenty of room.”

“Oh, nonsense, I couldn’t.  What would the people think?”

“Do you want to know what they’d think?” returned Farnsworth, promptly.  “They’d think that you were old Neptune’s Queen, and that you meant to sit beside him all the rest of your life.  Let them think that, Patty,—­and, let it be true!  Will you, my apple blossom girl?”

“No, Bill,” said Patty, quietly, and changed her pose so that she did not face him.  His words had startled her.  Above the rumbling of the float, she had heard him clearly, though, of course, they could not be overheard by the laughing, chattering bystanders.

His earnest tones had left no room for doubt of his meaning, and after Patty’s first shock of surprise, she felt a deep regret that he should have spoken thus.  But in an instant her quick wit told her that she must not think about it now.  She must turn a laughing, careless face to the passing audience.

“Nay, nay, Neptune,” she said, facing him again, “I must play my own part.  If a life on the ocean wave is not as easy as I had hoped, yet must I brave it out to the end.”

Farnsworth took his cue.  He knew he ought not to have spoken so seriously at this time, but it was really involuntary.  He had fallen deeply in love with the Eastern girl, and his Western whole-heartedness made it difficult for him to conceal his feelings.  He flashed a warm, sunny smile at her and said heartily: 

“All right, Sea Sprite!  I know your pluck and perseverance.  You’ll get there, with bells on!  Take the easiest pose you can, and hang on to that foam-crested wave near you.  It sways a bit, but it’s firmly anchored.  I looked out for that, before I trusted you to this ramshackle old hay wagon!”

Patty smiled back, really helped by his hearty sympathy and strong, ringing voice.

“I hate to be so,—­so unable to stand things!” she exclaimed, pouting a little.

“You’re no Sandow girl,” he replied; “but—­one can’t expect an apple blossom to be as strong as a—­a cabbage!”

“Nor as strong as a great big Westerner,” she returned, looking admiringly at the stalwart Neptune, and thereby pleasing him greatly, for Big Bill was honestly proud of his pounds and inches.