No, it's all right."

"They seemed to like us--actually."

"Well, they had better--if they knew the truth. Without us they never
would have met."

"They both asked us to come out and see them again, did you notice
that? Let's do it, Blix," Condy suddenly exclaimed; "let's get to know
them!"

"Of course we must. Wouldn't it be fun to call on them--to get
regularly acquainted with them!"

"They might ask us to dinner some time."

"And think of the stories he could tell you!"

They enthused immediately upon this subject, both talking excitedly at
the same time, going over the details of the Captain's yarns, recalling
the incidents to each other.

"Fancy!" exclaimed Condy--"fancy Billy Isham in his pajamas, red and
white stripes, reading Shakespeare from that pulpit on board the ship,
and the other men guying him! Isn't that a SCENE for you? Can't you
just SEE it?

"I wonder if the Captain wasn't making all those things up as he went
along. He don't seem to have any sense of right and wrong at all. He
might have been lying, Condy."

"What difference would that make?"

And so they went along in that fine, clear, Western morning, on the
edge of the Continent, both of them young and strong and vigorous, the
Pacific under their eyes, the great clean Trades blowing in their
faces, the smell of the salt sea coming in long aromatic whiffs to
their nostrils. Young and strong and fresh, their imaginations
thronging with pictures of vigorous action and adventure, buccaneering,
filibustering, and all the swing, the leap, the rush and gallop, the
exuberant, strong life of the great, uncharted world of Romance.

And all unknowingly they were a Romance in themselves. Cynicism, old
age, and the weariness of all things done had no place in the world in
which they walked. They still had their illusions, all the keenness of
their sensations, all the vividness of their impressions. The simple
things of the world, the great, broad, primal emotions of the race
stirred in them. As they swung along, going toward the ocean, their
brains were almost as empty of thought or of reflection as those of two
fine, clean animals. They were all for the immediate sensation; they
did not think--they FELT. The intellect was dormant; they looked at
things, they heard things, they smelled the smell of the sea, and of
the seaweed, of the fat, rank growth of cresses in the salt marshes;
they turned their cheeks to the passing wind, and f