his was not to be. That
there was a goodly dash of sentiment in his nature is shown in that,
after ten years, he bought the boat and would have kept her for life,
had she not been wrecked on the Florida Reefs and her bones given to the
barracuda.

In front of Girard's little store on Water Street there was a pump,
patronized by the neighbors.

Girard had been there about three months. He was lonely, cooped up there
on land, sighing for the open sea. Every day he would row across to his
ship and look her over, sweeping the deck, tarring the ropes, greasing
the chains, calculating how soon she could be made ready for sea, should
news of peace come.

The weeks dragged slowly away.

Girard sat on a box and watched the neighbors who came to the pump for
water. Occasionally there would toddle a child with jug or pail, and
then the crooked little storekeeper would come forward and work the
pump-handle.

Among others came Pollie Lumm--plump, pretty, pink and sixteen.

Girard pumped for her, too.

He got into the habit of pumping for her. If he was busy, she would
wait.

Pollie Lumm was a sort of cousin to Sallie Lunn. Neither had intellect
to speak of. Pollie had the cosmic urge, that is all, and the marooned
sea-captain had in him a little--just a little--of the salt of the sea.

Fate is a trickster. Her game is based upon false pretenses--she should
be forbidden the mails.

She sacrifices individuals by the thousand, for the good of the race.
All she cares for is to perpetuate the kind.

Poor sailorman, innocent of petticoats, caught in the esoteric web,
pumping water for Pollie Lumm--Pollie Lumm--plump, pert, pink and
pretty.

And so they were married.

Their wedding-journey was in a scow, across to the bridegroom's ship,
riding at anchor, her cordage creaking in the rising breeze.

Pollie Lumm, the bride of a day, was frightened there alone with a
one-eyed man, when the rats went scurrying through the hold. She wasn't
pink now; her color had turned to ashy yellow and her heart to ashes of
roses. Girard could face the wind of the North, but a crying woman on a
ship at anchor, whose rusty chains groaned to the dismal screech of
tugging cordage, undid him. A lesser man--a devil-may-care fellow--could
have met the issue. Girard, practical, sensible, silent, was no mate for
prettiness, plump and pink. He should have wedded a widow, who could
have passed him a prehensile hawser and taken his soul in tow.

The