CHAPTER XVI

About half-past eleven Mr. Cooke’s vigilance was rewarded by a glimpse of the lighthouse on Far Harbor reef, and almost simultaneously he picked up, to the westward, the ragged outline of the house-tops and spires of the town itself.  But as we neared the reef the harbor appeared as quiet as a Sunday morning:  a few Mackinaws were sailing hither and thither, and the Far Harbor and Beaverton boat was coming out.  My client, in view of the peaceful aspect affairs had assumed, presently consented to relinquish his post, and handed the glasses over to me with an injunction to be watchful.

I promised.  And Mr. Cooke, feeling his way aft with more discretion than grace, finally descended into the cabin, where he was noisily received.  And I was left with Miss Thorn.  While my client had been there in front of us, his lively conversation and naive if profane remarks kept us in continual laughter.  When with him it was utterly impossible to see any other than the ludicrous side of this madcap adventure, albeit he himself was so keenly in earnest as to its performance.  It was with misgiving that I saw him disappear into the hatchway, and my impulse was to follow him.  Our spirits, like those in a thermometer, are never stationary:  mine were continually being sent up or down.  The night before, when I had sat with Miss Thorn beside the fire, they went up; this morning her anxious solicitude for the Celebrity had sent them down again.  She both puzzled and vexed me.  I could not desert my post as lookout, and I remained in somewhat awkward suspense as to what she was going to say, gazing at distant objects through the glasses.  Her remark, when it came, took me by surprise.

“I am afraid,” she said seriously, “that Uncle Fenelon’s principles are not all that they should be.  His morality is something like his tobacco, which doesn’t injure him particularly, but is dangerous to others.”

I was more than willing to meet her on the neutral ground of Uncle Fenelon.

“Do you think his principles contagious?” I asked.

“They have not met with the opposition they deserve,” she replied.  “Uncle Fenelon’s ideas of life are not those of other men,—­yours, for instance.  And his affairs, mental and material, are, happily for him, such that he can generally carry out his notions with small inconvenience.  He is no doubt convinced that he is acting generously in attempting to rescue the Celebrity from a term in prison; what he does not realize is that he is acting ungenerously to other guests who have infinitely more at stake.”

“But our friend from Ohio has done his best to impress this upon him,” I replied, failing to perceive her drift; “and if his words are wasted, surely the thing is hopeless.”

“I am not joking,” said she.  “I was not thinking of Mr. Trevor, but of you.  I like you, Mr. Crocker.  You may not believe it, but I do.”  For the life of me I could think of no fitting reply to this declaration.  Why was that abominable word “like” ever put into the English language?  “Yes, I like you,” she continued meditatively, “in the face of the fact that you persist in disliking me.”