n so hard it wouldn't have happened.
It's all your fault."

"If you don't mind leaning on me a bit," said Tucker, "we might get
along."

Chrissie took his arm petulantly, and they started on their return
journey, at the rate of about four hours a mile, with little cries and
gasps at every other yard.

"It's no use," said Chrissie as she relinquished his arm, and, limping
to the side of the road, sat down. The boatswain pricked up his ears
hopefully at the sound of approaching wheels.

"What's the matter with the young lady?" inquired a groom who was
driving a little trap, as he pulled up and regarded with interest a
grimace of extraordinary intensity on the young lady's face.

"Broke her ankle, I think," said the boatswain glibly. "Which way are
you going?"

"Well, I'm going to Barborough," said the groom; "but my guvnor's rather
pertickler."

"I'll make it all right with you," said the boatswain.

The groom hesitated a minute, and then made way for Chrissie as the
boatswain assisted her to get up beside him; then Tucker, with a grin of
satisfaction at getting a seat once more, clambered up behind, and they
started.

"Have a rug, mate," said the groom, handing the reins to Chrissie and
passing it over; "put it round your knees and tuck the ends under you."

"Ay, ay, mate," said the boatswain as he obeyed the instructions.

"Are you sure you are quite comfortable?" said the groom affectionately.

"Quite," said the other.

The groom said no more, but in a quiet business-like fashion placed his
hands on the seaman's broad back, and shot him out into the road. Then
he snatched up the reins and drove off at a gallop.

Without the faintest hope of winning, Mr. Tucker, who realised clearly,
appearances notwithstanding, that he had fallen into a trap, rose after
a hurried rest and started on his fifth race that morning. The prize
was only a second-rate groom with plated buttons, who was waving cheery
farewells to him with a dingy top hat; but the boatswain would have
sooner had it than a silver tea-service.

He ran as he had never ran before in his life, but all to no purpose,
the trap stopping calmly a little further on to take up another
passenger, in whose favour the groom retired to the back seat; then,
with a final wave of the hand to him, they took a road to the left and
drove rapidly out of sight. The boatswain's watch was over.

LOW WATER

It was a calm, clear evening in late summer as the