his self-esteem.

"Who is she?" he gasped, when he had watched her out of sight.

"That girl? Do you mean to say you don't know--an' you a-talkin' to
her half the mornin'?" demanded the old man with amazement. "Why, it
never dawned on me to introduce you to her. I thought of course you
knew already who she was. Everybody in town knows Delight Hathaway,
an' loves her, too," he added softly. "She's Zenas Henry's daughter,
the one he brought ashore from the _Michleen_ an' adopted."

"Oh!"

A light began to break in on Bob's understanding.

"It's Zenas Henry's motor-boat we're tinkerin' with now," went on
Willie.

"I see!"

He waited eagerly for further information, but evidently his host
considered he had furnished all the data necessary, for instead of
enlarging on the subject he approached the bench and began to inspect
the model.

"I s'pose, with her bein' here, you didn't get ahead much while I was
gone," he ventured, an inflection of disappointment in his tone.

"No, I didn't."

"I didn't accomplish nothin', either," the little old man went on.
"Jan warn't to home; he'd gone fishin'."

His companion did not reply at once.

"I don't quite get my soundin's on Jan," he at length ruminated aloud.
"Somethin's wrong with him. I feel it in my bones."

"Perhaps not."

"There is, I tell you. I know Janoah Eldridge from crown to heel, an'
it ain't like him to go off fishin' by himself."

"I shouldn't fret about it if I were you," Bob said in an attempt to
comfort the disquieted inventor. "I'm sure he'll turn up all right."

Had the conversation been of a three-master in a gale; of buried
treasure; or of the ultimate salvation of the damned, the speaker would
at that moment have been equally optimistic.

The universe had suddenly become too radiant a place to harbor
calamity. Wilton was a paradise like the first Eden--a garden of
smiles, of dimples, of blushing cheeks--and of silver buckles.

He began to whistle softly to himself; then, sensing that Willie was
still unconvinced by his sanguine prediction, he added:

"And even if Mr. Eldridge shouldn't come back, I guess you and I could
manage without him."

"That's all very well up to a certain point, youngster," was the
retort. "But who's goin' to see me through this job after you've taken
wing?"

He pointed tragically to the beginnings of the model.

"Maybe I shan't take wing," announced Bob, looking absently at the
cluster of withered