e I catch you walkin' on that there pier-edge, or _hear_ of you
doin' of it, I'll give you a lickin'.'

"Tommy Brass has never walked on that pier-edge since," concluded Mrs
Bright, "but I'm sorry to say that ever since that day Lilly Brass has
refused to have a word to say to Billy, and when asked why, she says,
`'cause he sowsed an' whacked my brudder Tommy!'"

Thus did Mrs Bright entertain her visitor with comment and anecdote
about Billy until she felt at last constrained to leave without having
recovered courage to broach again the subject which had brought her to
the fisherman's home.

That same afternoon Mrs Bright paid a friendly visit to the wife of her
husband's mate.

"I can't think whatever Miss Ruth Dotropy is so curious about me for,
she's bin at me again," said Mrs Bright to Mrs Davidson, who was busy
with her needle on some part of the costume of her "blessed babby,"
which lay, like an angel, in its little crib behind the door.

"P'r'aps it's all along of her bein' so interested in you," replied
pretty Mrs Davidson. "She asks me many odd questions at times about
myself, and my dear Joe, and the babby--though I admit she don't inquire
much about my past life."

"Well, that's not surprising," said Mrs Bright with a laugh, as she sat
down on a stool to have a chat. "You see, Maggie, you haven't got much
of a past life to inquire about, and Joe is such a good man that you've
no call to be suspecting anything; but it wasn't always so with my dear
David. I wouldn't say it even to you, Maggie, if it wasn't that
everybody in Yarmouth knows it--my David drinks hard sometimes, and
although I know he's as true as gold to me, an' never broke the laws of
the land, everybody won't believe that, you know, and the dear man
_might_ fall under suspicion."

"But you don't suppose, if he did," said Mrs Davidson, with a look of
surprise, "that Miss Ruth would go about actin' the part of a detective,
do you?"

"Well, no, I don't," replied her friend, looking somewhat puzzled. "All
the same it _is_ mysterious why she should go on as she's bin doin',
asking me what my maiden name was, and who my relations were, and if I
ever had any brothers, and when and where I first met wi' David. But
whatever her reasons may be I'm resolved that she'll get nothing more
out of me."

"Of course," returned Maggie, "you must do as you think right in that
matter. All I can say is, I would tell Miss Ruth all that was in _my_
min