willin' to go
so far."

Thankful shook her head. "I'm glad you said, 'PROFESSIN' Christian.'"
she observed. "Well," drawing a long breath, "then I suppose I've got
to say yes or no. . . . And I'll say yes," she added firmly. "And we'll
call it settled."

They parted before the hotel. She was to return to South Middleboro that
afternoon. Mr. Cobb was to prepare the papers and forward them for her
signature, after which, upon receipt of them duly signed, he would send
her the fifteen hundred dollar check.

Solomon climbed into the buggy. "Well, good-by," he said. "I hope you'll
do fust-rate. The interest'll be paid regular, of course. I'm real
pleased to meet you--er--Cousin Thankful. Be sure you sign them papers
in the right place. Good-by. Oh--er--er--sometimes I'll be droppin'
in to see you after you get your boardin'-house goin'. I come to East
Wellmouth once in a while. Yes--yes--I'll come and see you. You can tell
me more about Captain Abner, you know. I'd--I'd like to hear what he
said to you about me. Good-by."

That afternoon, once more in the depot-wagon, which had been refitted
with its fourth wheel, Thankful, on her way to the Wellmouth railway
station, passed her "property." The old house, its weather-beaten
shingles a cold gray in the half-light of the mist-shrouded, sinking
sun, looked lonely and deserted. A chill wind came from the sea and the
surf at the foot of the bluff moaned and splashed and sighed.

Thankful sighed also.

"What's the matter?" asked Winnie S.

"Oh, nothin' much. I wish I was a prophet, that's all. I'd like to be
able to look ahead a year."

Winnie S. whistled. "Judas priest!" he said. "So'd I. But if I'd see
myself drivin' this everlastin' rig-out I'd wished I hadn't looked. I
don't know's I'd want to see ahead as fur's that, after all."

Thankful sighed again. "I don't know as I do, either," she admitted.

CHAPTER VII

March, so to speak, blew itself out; April came and went; May was here.
And on the seventeenth of May the repairs on the "Cap'n Abner place"
were completed. The last carpenter had gone, leaving his shavings and
chips behind him. The last painter had spilled his last splash of paint
on the sprouting grass beneath the spotless white window sills. The last
paper-hanger had departed. Winnie S. was loading into what he called a
"truck wagon" the excelsior and bagging in which the final consignment
of new furniture had been wrapped during its journey fr