about
with hearty words on the tip of his tongue and a laugh in his gray
eyes--merry the day long, whatever the fortune of it. The children ran
out of the cottages to greet him as he passed by, and a multitude of
surly, ill-conditioned dogs, which yielded the road to no one else,
accepted him as a distinguished intimate. But still, and often--late in
the night--my sister and I lay awake listening to the disquieting fall
of his feet as he paced his bedroom floor. And sometimes I crept to his
door--and hearkened--and came away, sad that I had gone.

* * * * *

When--autumn being come with raw winds and darkened days--the doctor
said that he must go an errand south to St. John's and the Canadian
cities before winter settled upon our coast, I was beset by melancholy
fears that he would not return, but, enamoured anew of the glories of
those storied harbours, would abandon us, though we had come to love
him, with all our hearts. Skipper Tommy Lovejoy joined with my sister to
persuade me out of these drear fancies: which (said they) were
ill-conceived; for the doctor must depart a little while, else our plans
for the new sloop and little hospital (and our defense against Jagger)
would go all awry. Perceiving, then, that I would not be convinced, the
doctor took me walking on the bald old Watchman, and there shamed me for
mistrusting him: saying, afterwards, that though it might puzzle our
harbour and utterly confound his greater world, which must now be
informed, he had in truth cast his lot with us, for good and all,
counting his fortune a happy one, thus to come at last to a little
corner of the world where good impulses, elsewhere scrawny and
disregarded, now flourished lustily in his heart. Then with delight I
said that I would fly the big flag in welcome when the returning
mail-boat came puffing through the Gate. And scampering down the
Watchman went the doctor and I, hand in hand, mistrust fled, to the very
threshold of my father's house, where my sister waited, smiling to know
that all went well again.

Past ten o'clock of a dismal night we sat waiting for the
mail-boat--unstrung by anxious expectation: made wretched by the sadness
of the parting.

"There she blows, zur!" cried Skipper Tommy, jumping up. "We'd best get
aboard smartly, zur, for she'll never come through the Gate this dirty
night."

The doctor rose, and looked, for a strained, silent moment, upon my dear
sister, but