The Project Gutenberg EBook of Cap'n Dan's Daughter, by Joseph C. Lincoln

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Title: Cap'n Dan's Daughter

Author: Joseph C. Lincoln

Release Date: June 6, 2006 [EBook #6718]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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Produced by Don Lainson

CAP'N DAN'S DAUGHTER

By Joseph C. Lincoln

1914

CAP'N DAN'S DAUGHTER

CHAPTER I

The Metropolitan Dry Goods and Variety Store at Trumet Centre was open
for business. Sam Bartlett, the boy whose duty it was to take down
the shutters, sweep out, dust, and wait upon early-bird customers, had
performed the first three of these tasks and gone home for breakfast.
The reason he had not performed the fourth--the waiting upon
customers--was simple enough; there had been no customers to wait upon.
The Metropolitan Dry Goods and Variety Store was open and ready for
business--but, unfortunately, there was no business.

There should have been. This was August, the season of the year when, if
ever, Trumet shopkeepers should be beaming across their counters at the
city visitor, male or female, and telling him or her, that "white duck
hats are all the go this summer," or "there's nothin' better than an
oilskin coat for sailin' cruises or picnics." Outing shirts and yachting
caps, fancy stationery, post cards, and chocolates should be changing
hands at a great rate and the showcase, containing the nicked blue
plates and cracked teapots, the battered candlesticks and tarnished
pewters, "genuine antiques," should be opened at frequent intervals for
the inspection of bargain-seeking mothers and their daughters. July and
August are the Cape Cod harvest months; if the single-entry ledgers of
Trumet's business men do not show good-sized profits during that season
they are not likely to do so the rest of the year.

Captain Daniel Dott, proprietor of the Metropolitan Store, bending over
his own ledger spread on the little desk by the window at the rear of
his establishment, was realizing this fact, realizing it with a sinking
heart and a sense of hopeless discouragement. The summer was almost
over; September was only three days off; in