has discovered. Would
you believe that he has found a loop in the Gulf Stream--a genuine
loop--that swings in here just outside of the breakers below? It is
true! Everybody on Long Island knows that there is a warm current off
the coast, but nobody imagined it was merely a sort of backwater from
the Gulf Stream that formed a great circular mill-race around the cone
of a subterranean volcano, and rejoined the Gulf Stream off Cape
Albatross. But it is! That is why papa bought a yacht three years ago
and sailed about for two years so mysteriously. Oh, I did want to go
with him so much!'

"'This,' said I, 'is most astonishing.'

"She leaned enthusiastically towards me, her lovely face aglow.

"'Isn't it?' she said; 'and to think that you and papa and I are the
only people in the whole world who know this!'

"To be included in such a triology was very delightful.

"'Papa is writing the whole thing--I mean about the currents. He also
has in preparation sixteen volumes on the thermosaurus. He said this
morning that he was going to ask you to write the story first for some
scientific magazine. He is certain that Professor Bruce Stoddard, of
Columbia, will write the pamphlets necessary. This will give papa time
to attend to the sixteen-volume work, which he expects to finish in
three years.'

"'Let us first,' said I, laughing, 'catch our thermosaurus.'

"'We must not fail,' she said, wistfully.

"'We shall not fail,' I said, 'for I promise to sit on this sand-hill
as long as I live--until a thermosaurus appears--if that is your wish,
Miss Holroyd.'

"Our eyes met for an instant. She did not chide me, either, for not
looking at the ocean. Her eyes were bluer, anyway.

"'I suppose,' she said, bending her head and absently pouring sand
between her fingers--'I suppose you think me a blue-stocking, or
something odious?'

"'Not exactly,' I said. There was an emphasis in my voice that made
her color. After a moment she laid the sunshade down, still open.

"'May I hold it?' I asked.

"She nodded almost imperceptibly.

"The ocean had turned a deep marine blue, verging on purple, that
heralded a scorching afternoon. The wind died away; the odor of cedar
and sweet-bay hung heavy in the air.

"In the sand at our feet an iridescent flower-beetle crawled, its
metallic green-and-blue wings burning like a spark. Great gnats, with
filmy, glittering wings, danced aimlessly above the young golden-rod;
burnished crickets, inqui