said Maggie, addressing the fire. "Since
when hev you tuk partnership with the Guv'nment and Kernel Preston to
hunt up and take keer of their property?"

"Well, I ain't goin' to hev such wreckage as they pick up and enlist
set adrift on our marshes, Mag," said Jim decidedly.

"What would you hev done had you ketched him?" said Maggie, looking
suddenly into her brother's face.

"Given him a dose of snipe-shot that he'd remember, and be thankful it
wasn't slugs," said Jim promptly. Observing a deeper seriousness in
her attitude, he added, "Why, if it was in war-time he'd get a BALL
from them sodgers on sight."

"Yes; but YOU ain't got no call to interfere," said Maggie.

"Ain't I? Why, he's no better than an outlaw. I ain't sure that he
hasn't been stealin' or killin' somebody over theer."

"Not that man!" said Maggie impulsively.

"Not what man?" said her brother, facing her quickly.

"Why," returned Maggie, repairing her indiscretion with feminine
dexterity, "not ANY man who might have knocked you and me over on the
marshes in the dusk, and grabbed our guns."

"Wish he'd hev tried it," said the brother, with a superior smile, but
a quickly rising color. "Where d'ye suppose I'D hev been all the
while?"

Maggie saw her mistake, and for the first time in her life resolved to
keep a secret from her brother--overnight. "Supper's gettin' cold,"
she said, rising.

They went into the dining-room--an apartment as plainly furnished as
the one they had quitted, but in its shelves, cupboards, and closely
fitting boarding bearing out the general nautical suggestion of the
house--and seated themselves before a small table on which their frugal
meal was spread. In this tete-a-tete position Jim suddenly laid down
his knife and fork and stared at his sister.

"Hello!"

"What's the matter?" said Maggie, starting slightly. "How you do skeer
one."

"Who's been prinkin', eh?"

"My ha'r was in kinks all along o' that hat," said Maggie, with a
return of higher color, "and I had to straighten it. It's a boy's hat,
not a girl's."

"But that necktie and that gown--and all those frills and tuckers?"
continued Jim generalizing, with a rapid twirling of his fingers over
her. "Are you expectin' Judge Martin, or the Expressman this evening?"

Judge Martin was the lawyer of Logport, who had proven her father's
will, and had since raved about his single interview with the
Kingfisher's beautiful daughter; the Expressman w