back to my ship for me; though that same ship being slated for a
neighborly berth with the North Atlantic fleet, I didn't feel too
discouraged. I'd be within wireless distance at least. But I did not
want to go without a promise. The night before I couldn't get two
minutes together with her--there being a reception in her father's
quarters to somebody or other--but when I was leaving for the night she
had said yes, she'd come sailing with me in the morning after breakfast.
And I left the hotel at sunrise and went down to the boat-landing to
overhaul the hotel's little twenty-one-footer to make sure everything
would be all ready for our sail after breakfast.

"I went through the post grounds to get sight of her window in passing,
and there she was--all dressed, and looking out across the bay from
their veranda. 'I was just wondering if you, too, would be up early this
morning, Dick,' she said. 'Do you think it is going to storm?' And I
told her no, and if it did, what matter? And without waiting until after
breakfast we went off for our young cruise in the bay.

"I was half hoping it would storm, so I could show her what I could do
with that little boat. But there was no storm or anything like it. There
did come a squall of wind and I let it come, wearing the boat around,
and letting the main-sheet run. And she zizzed. And I let her zizz.
Nothing could happen. She was one of those little craft with a lead keel
that you couldn't capsize, which I explained to Doris, while down on her
side the little thing was tearing a white path in the blue water. But
Doris's people had been always army people, and she hadn't much faith in
floating contraptions. She clung closer to me; and the two of us sitting
together and nothing to do but watch the boat go, why--well, we sat
together and let her go.

"The breeze died down until there wasn't enough of it to be called a
breeze, but that was no matter. We were still sitting close together
and while we sat so, I found courage to tell her what had been flooding
my heart through all those nights and days in Eastern waters. And we
came back to breakfast engaged. And after breakfast--" Wickett
unexpectedly turned to Carlin and said, half shyly: "I suppose you still
think I'm a good deal of a kid to be telling you all this?"

Carlin nodded in serene agreement. "I always thought you were a good
deal of a kid. I hope you always will be. God save me from the man who
isn't still a good deal of