a care in the world. If the wind blew from the north, he spun to
the left; if it came from the south, he spun to the right. But it
was entirely the wind that was responsible. So, whichever way he
turned, he smiled broadly, happily. His outlook upon the world
was that of one who loved his fellowman. He had many brothers as
like him as twins all over Nantucket and Cape Cod and the North
Shore, smiling from the railings of verandas, from the roofs of
bungalows, from the eaves of summer palaces. Empaled on their
little iron uprights, each sailorman whirled--sometimes
languidly, like a great lady revolving to the slow measures of a
waltz, sometimes so rapidly that he made you quite dizzy, and had
he not been a sailorman with a heart of oak and a head and
stomach of pine, he would have been quite seasick. But the
particular sailorman that Latimer bought for Helen Page and put
on sentry duty carried on his shoulders most grave and unusual
responsibilities. He was the guardian of a buried treasure, the
keeper of the happiness of two young people. It was really asking
a great deal of a care-free, happy-go-lucky weather-vane.

Every summer from Boston Helen Page's people had been coming to
Fair Harbor. They knew it when what now is the polo field was
their cow pasture. And whether at the age of twelve or of twenty
or more, Helen Page ruled Fair Harbor. When she arrived the
"season" opened; when she departed the local trades-people
sighed and began to take account of stock. She was so popular
because she possessed charm, and because she played no favorites.
To the grooms who held the ponies on the sidelines her manner was
just as simple and interested as it was to the gilded youths who
came to win the championship cups and remained to try to win
Helen. She was just as genuinely pleased to make a four at tennis