"Yes, sir!" he ejaculated. "You look to me like one o' the tidiest
craft I ever clapped eyes on. I don't scarcely see how Abe could go
away and leave you. Dunno's he's got an eye for a pretty woman like
me. Bless you! I been a slave to the women all my life."

"Yet never married, Uncle Amazon?" she cried roguishly.

"Tell you how 'twas," he whispered hoarsely, his hand beside his mouth.
"I never could decide betwixt and between 'em. No, sir! They are all
so desir'ble that I couldn't make up my mind. So I stayed single."

"Perhaps you showed wisdom, Uncle Amazon," laughed the girl.
"Still--when you grow old----"

"Oh! there's plenty of sailors' snug harbors," he hastened to say.
"And time enough to worry about that when I _be_ old."

"I thought----Why! you look younger than Cap'n Abe," she said.

"Ain't it a fact? He's let himself run to seed and get old lookin'.
That's from stayin' ashore all his life. It's the feel of a heavin'
deck under his feet that keeps the spring in a man's wishbone. Yes,
sir! Abe's all right--good man and all that--but he's no sailor,"
Cap'n Amazon added, shaking his head.

"Now, here!" he went on briskly, "we ought to have breakfast, hadn't
we? I left that woman Abe has pokin' around here, to dish up; and it's
'most six bells. Feel kind of peckish myself, Louise."

"I'll run to see if the biscuits are done," said the girl; and she