ain was chatting with them
when he heard Kent's voice at his ear.

"Excuse me, Cap'n," he whispered. "I'll see you by and by. I'm going to
chop the ice."

"Eh?... Oh, all right, George. Good luck."

George hurried up the stairs. A minute or two later Captain Sears slowly
limped after him and sought a secluded corner on one of the settees at
the rear of the hall. There was still a full half hour before the rising
of the curtain, and as yet there was but a handful of people present. He
turned his face away from the handful and hoped that he might not be
recognized. He did not feel like talking. His good spirits had left him.
He was blue and despondent and discouraged. And for no reason--that was
the worst of it--no earthly, sensible, worth while reason at all.

Those two children--that is what they were, children--had quarreled and
that was why Elizabeth had asked to ride to the hall with him that
evening. It was not because she cared for his company; of course he knew
that all the time, or would have known it if he permitted himself to
reason. She had gone with him because she had quarreled with George. And
that young idiot's conscience had troubled him and, thanks to his
own--Kendrick's--advice, he had gone to her now to beg pardon and make
up. And they would make up. Children, both of them.

And they ought to make up; they should, of course. He wanted them to do
so. What sort of a yellow dog in the manger would he be if he did not?
He liked them both, and they were young and well--and he was--what that
railway accident had made of him.

The audience poured in, the settees filled, the little boys down in
front kicked the rounds, and pinched each other and giggled. Mr. Asaph
Tidditt importantly strode down the aisle and turned up the wicks of the
kerosene foot-lamps. Mrs. Sophronia Eldridge, Captain Orrin's
sister-in-law, seated herself at the piano and played the accompaniments
while Mrs. Mary Pashy Foster imparted the information that she could not
sing the old songs now. When she had finished, most people were inclined
to believe her. The delegation from the Fair Harbor, led by Mrs. Berry
and Elvira Snowden, arrived in a body. The Universalist minister and his
wife came, and looked remarkably calm for a couple leading a flock of
fellow humans to perdition. Captain Elkanah Wingate and Mrs. Wingate
came last of all and marched majestically to the seats reserved for them
by the obsequious Mr. Tidditt. The hall ligh