-or wherever else
he had it in his mind to go.

Nor was the chest intended to be returned to the store until Cap'n Abe
himself came back from his mysterious journey. The fact that Perry
Baker had shipped it in his own name instead of that of the owner had
brought about this unexpected incident.

Washy Gallup's gossip--his doubt regarding Cap'n Abe's shipping on a
sea voyage--now came home to Louise with force. Washy suggested that
the storekeeper was afraid of the sea; that in all his years at
Cardhaven he had never been known to venture out of the quiet waters of
the bay.

To the girl's mind, too, came the remembrance of that talk she had had
with Cap'n Abe on the evening of her arrival at the store. Was there
something he had said then that explained this mystery?

He had told her of the wreck of the Bravo and the drowning of Captain
Joshua Silt, his father, in sight of his mother's window. She had been
powerfully affected by that awful tragedy; this could not be doubted.

And the son, Cap'n Abe, a posthumous child, might indeed have come into
the world with that horror of the sea which must have filled his poor
mother's soul.

"It would explain why Uncle Abram never became a sailor--the only Silt
for generations who remained ashore. Yet, he spoke that night as
though he loved the sea--or the romance of it, at least," Louise
thought.

"Perhaps, too, his own inability to sail to foreign shores and his
terror of the sea made him so worship Cap'n Amazon's prowess. For they
say he was continually relating stories of his brother's
adventures--even more marvelous tales than Cap'n Amazon himself has
related.

"Such a misfortune as Cap'n Abe's fear of the sea may easily explain
his brother's good-natured scorn of him. Uncle Amazon doesn't say much
about him; but I can see he looks upon Cap'n Abe as a weakling.

"But," sighed the girl in conclusion, "even this does not explain the
mystery of the chest, or where Cap'n Abe can be hiding. I wonder if
Uncle Amazon knows?"

CHAPTER XIX

MUCH ADO

As on previous occasions, Louise Grayling was deterred from putting a
searching question to Cap'n Amazon because of his look and manner. The
little she had seen of Cap'n Abe assured her that she would have felt
no hesitancy in approaching the mild-mannered storekeeper upon any
subject.

But the master mariner seemed to be an entirely different personality.
The way he had overawed the idlers in the store th