Bible literally and to interpret it
accordingly. When his daughter and her husband were drowned in the
terrible City of Belfast disaster, it is an Orham tradition that John
Baxter, dressed in gunny-bags and sitting on an ash-heap, was found by
his friends mourning in what he believed to be the Biblical "sackcloth
and ashes." His little baby granddaughter had been looked out for by
some kind friends in Boston. Only Captain Eri knew that John Baxter's
yearly trip to Boston was made for the purpose of visiting the girl who
was his sole reminder of the things that might have been, but even the
Captain did not know that the money that paid her board and, as she grew
older, for her gowns and schooling, came from the bigoted, stern old
hermit, living alone in the old house at Orham.

In Orham, and in other sections of the Cape as well, there is a sect
called by the ungodly, "The Come-Outers." They were originally seceders
from the Methodist churches who disapproved of modern innovations. They
"come out" once a week to meet at the houses of the members, and theirs
are lively meetings. John Baxter was a "Come-Outer," and ever since
the enterprising Mr. Saunders opened his billiard room, the old man's
tirades of righteous wrath had been directed against this den of
iniquity. Since it became known that "Web" had made application for the
license, it was a regular amusement for the unregenerate to attend the
gatherings of the "Come-Outers" and hear John Baxter call down fire from
Heaven upon the billiard room, its proprietor, and its patrons. Orham
people had begun to say that John Baxter was "billiard-saloon crazy."

And John Baxter was Captain Eri's friend, a friendship that had begun in
school when the declaimer of Patrick Henry's "Liberty or Death" speech
on Examination Day took a fancy to and refused to laugh at the little
chap who tremblingly ventured to assert that he loved "little Pussy, her
coat is so warm." The two had changed places until now it was Captain
Eri who protected and advised.

When the Captain rapped at John Baxter's kitchen door no one answered,
and, after yelling "Ship ahoy!" through the keyhole a number of times,
he was forced to the conclusion that his friend was not at home.

"You lookin' fer Cap'n Baxter?" queried Mrs. Sarah Taylor, who lived
just across the road. "He's gone to Come-Outers' meetin', I guess.
There's one up to Barzilla Small's to-night."

Mr. Barzilla Small lived in that part of the