, with a
humorous look and smile, "You and I seem to be left entirely out of the
calculation, Miss Keith. Shall we compose a fourth party, and see what we
can find to amuse and interest us?"

"Thank you, sir," she replied; "but are you sure I might not prove a
hindrance and burden?"

"Quite sure; and your companionship, if I can secure it, will be
all-sufficient for me."

"Then we will consider the arrangement made, for I should be sorry indeed
to intrude my companionship upon those who do not desire it," she said,
with a sportive look at the captain.

"Cousin Ronald," said the latter gravely, "I think you owe me a vote of
thanks for leaving Cousin Annis to you. I am sure it should be accounted a
very generous thing for me to do."

"Certainly, captain, when you have only Cousin Vi, those two half-grown
daughters, and two sweet children for your share," laughed Annis.

"As many as he can keep together," remarked Walter. "Well, I'm going off
by myself, as I happen to know that my sister Rosie and Evelyn have been
already engaged by other escorts."

"Walter, you deserve to be left at home," said Rosie severely.

"At home?" laughed Walter, "you would have to get me there first."

"You know what I mean; this yacht is home to us while we are living on
it."

"And a very pleasant one it is; a delightful place to rest in when one is
tired; as I realize every evening, coming back to it from the Fair."

"Then we won't try to punish you by condemning you to imprisonment in it,"
said the captain.

"Papa, I should like to go to the Manufactures and Liberal Arts Building
again to-day, unless the rest of our party prefer some other place," said
Grace.

"That would suit me as well as any," said Violet.

"Me also," added Lucilla.

"Then that shall be our destination," returned the captain.

The young men--Harold and Herbert Travilla, Chester and Frank Dinsmore,
and Will Croly--joined the party from the _Dolphin_, as usual, in the
Peristyle; good-mornings were exchanged, then they broke up into smaller
parties and scattered in different directions; Captain Raymond with his
wife and children going first into the great Manufactures and Liberal Arts
Building, where they spent some hours in looking at such of the beautiful
and interesting exhibits as they had not examined in former visits; making
a good many purchases of gifts for each other for friends and relatives
and the servants and caretakers left at home.

Chester