nce of this the only man who
applied for the empty berth aboard the _Seamew_ was more than a
little drunk and so dirty that Captain Latham would not let him
come over the rail.

Nor could the young shipmaster give much time to looking up hands.
He had freight ready for his return trip. It must be got aboard,
stowed properly, and advantage taken of the tide and a fair wind to
get back to the Cape. He had not been in the habit of going up into
the city at all of late. If that girl behind the lace counter of
Hoskin & Marl's had expected to see Tunis Latham again, she had been
disappointed. Her warm invitation to him to call on her--possibly to
take her again to lunch--had borne only Dead Sea fruit. He had
accepted her decision regarding the Balls and Cape Cod as final and
irrevocable. At least, he had had no intention of ever going back
and discussing the suggestion again.

The possibility of the real Ida May Bostwick changing her mind and
reconsidering her refusal to communicate with the Balls or visit
Wreckers' Head never once entered Tunis' mind, if it had Sheila
Macklin's. He had seen how scornfully the cheap little shop-girl had
refused the kind offer extended to her by her old relatives. He
could not have imagined her thinking of the old people and their
home and Big Wreck Cove in any different way.

He was quite right in this. Ida May Bostwick never would have looked
upon these several matters differently. The thing was settled. Born
and bred in the city, she could not conceive of any sane girl like
herself deliberately burying herself down on the Cape, to "live on
pollock and potatoes," as she had heard it expressed, and be the
slave of a pair of old fogies.

Not for her! She would not think of it. Indeed, this phase of the
offer Tunis had brought her really made Ida May Bostwick angry. What
did he think she was, anyway? In fact, she was inclined to think
that that seafaring person had almost insulted her. Although she had
deliberately spoken of him as her "Cousin Tunis" to the girls who
were her confidantes in the store and to her landlady, who was
likewise curious about him, Ida May Bostwick was much pleased by the
thought of him.

Then she began to compare Tunis with the young men she knew in
Boston. She knew that the young men she got acquainted with were
either very light minded or downright objectionable. If any of them
contemplated marriage at all, they knew it could not be undertaken
upon the meager