h. They're workin' by the job. Can't go
till they're done."

But it was not until Patrice told why the strangers sat so glum and warm
and active in the trees that the Captain and the boss understood.

"Yo' boy," said the Captain, as they went back to the melon-pile, "an'
yo' nevah picked a fig yo'se'f?"

"Not a one," said Bascom, candidly. "The boys came along at first an'
wanted to pick for cracked melons, an' then 'bout the time they was
gettin' tired this schooner hove in sight. After I begun to have
comp'ny, looked like it was best for me to watch the melons."

"And before?" laughed the boss.

"I'd had the misfortune to drop one," Bascom said. "It busted, and I was
lookin' after the pieces."

The boss clapped Bascom on the shoulder. "You're the man I've been
hunting for down here," he declared. "Don't you want to come up and help
me run the farm?"

Bascom looked over at the little _Mystery_, the deep blue of the bay,
and the tree fringe on Deer Island, beyond which lay the Gulf.

"I reckon they'd have to be a mighty long calm," he answered; "wouldn't
they, Cap'n Tony?"

"They suah would," the Captain agreed. "In sailin' weathah me an'
Bascom mostly sails."

They counted the melons as they loaded them on board the _Mystery_,
agreed on a rate of salvage and a price, and arranged for future
dealings as the crop went on. The schooner-men finished their work, and
Bascom paid off the overseers generously; then the _Mystery_ raced the
_Luna May_ to the bridge, and passed through first.

"Well," sighed Bascom, when they had left the figs at the
canning-factory, and their faces were turned toward the welcome reaches
between Potosi and New Orleans, "if it hadn't a-been for that honey of a
tide I'd be up in them dumb ole trees a-studyin' 'bout pickin' dem
figs."

OAKLEIGH.

BY ELLEN DOUGLAS DELAND.

CHAPTER XIV.

It was true, then. Neal had gone.

Cynthia went to her mother's room and told her what Janet had said.

"It is what I feared," cried Mrs. Franklin: "he has left me forever! My
dear and only brother! And where is he? Cynthia, Cynthia, why did he go?
It almost makes me think he may have taken the money."

"Mamma, how can you!" exclaimed Cynthia, indignantly. "Neal never took
it. I--I--oh, I _know_ he didn't take it! Can't you believe me, mamma?"
She was crying.

"Dear child," said Mrs. Franklin, looking at her affectionately, "you
have more faith in him than I have. But this running awa