composition; "Mr. Chalk is trying to get her
a new place."

"New place?" said Mrs. Chalk, in a choking voice.

Captain Brisket nodded. "She ain't happy where she is," he explained,
"and Mr. Chalk--out o' pure good-nature and kindness of heart--is trying
to get her another, and I honour him for it."

He looked round triumphantly. Mr. Chalk, sitting open-mouthed,
was regarding him with the fascinated gaze of a rabbit before a
boa-constrictor. Captain Bowers was listening with an appearance of
interest which in more favourable circumstances would have been very
flattering.

"You said," cried Mrs. Chalk--"you said to my husband: 'The fair Emily is
yours.'"

[Illustration: "You said to my husband:'The fair Emily is yours.'"]

"So I did," said Brisket, anxiously--"so I did. And what I say I stick
to. When I said that the--that Emily was his, I meant it. I don't say
things I don't mean. That isn't Bill Brisket's way."

"And you said just now that he was getting her a place," Mrs. Chalk
reminded him, grimly.

"Mr. Chalk understands what I mean," said Captain Brisket, with dignity.
"When I said 'She is yours,' I meant that she is coming here."

"O-oh!" said Mrs. Chalk, breathlessly. "Oh, indeed! Oh, is she?"

"That is, if her mother'll let her come," pursued the enterprising
Brisket, with a look of great artfulness at Mr. Chalk, to call his
attention to the bridge he was building for him; "but the old woman's
been laid up lately and talks about not being able to spare her."

Mrs. Chalk sat back helplessly in her chair and gazed from her husband to
Captain Brisket, and from Captain Brisket back to her husband. Captain
Brisket, red-faced and confident, sat upright on the edge of his chair as
though inviting inspection; Mr. Chalk plucked nervously at his fingers.
Captain Bowers suddenly broke silence.

"What's her tonnage?" he inquired abruptly, turning to Brisket.

"Two hundred and for----"

Captain Brisket stopped dead and, rubbing his nose hard with his
forefinger, gazed thoughtfully at Captain Bowers.

"The _Fair Emily_ is a ship," said the latter to Mrs. Chalk.

"A ship!" cried the bewildered woman. "A ship living with her invalid
mother and coming to my husband to get her a place! Are you trying to
screen him, too?"

"It's a ship," repeated Captain Bowers, sternly, as he sought in vain to
meet the eye of Mr. Chalk; "a craft of two hundred and something tons.
For some reason--best known to h