been dying to do this for so long. That--that Miss Parker is the oddest
person!"

The captain grinned. "Thinkin' about that 'diagram' yarn?" he asked.
"'Tis funny when you hear it the first four or five times. Hannah Parker
can get more wrong words in the right places than anybody I ever run
across. She must have swallowed a dictionary some time or 'nother, but
it ain't digested well, I'm afraid."

Thankful laughed, too. "You must find her pretty amusin', Cap'n Bangs,"
she said.

The captain shook his head. "She's a reg'lar dime show," he observed.
Then he added: "Only trouble with that kind of a show is it gets kind of
tiresome when you have to set through it all winter. There! now you can
see your property, Mrs. Barnes, and ten mile either side of it. Look's
some more lifelike and cheerful than it did last night, don't it?"

It most assuredly did. They had reached the summit of a little hill
and before and behind and beneath them was a view of shore and sea that
caused Emily to utter an exclamation of delight.

"Oh!" she cried. "WHAT a view! What a wonderful view!"

Behind them, beyond the knoll upon which stood the little Parker house
which they had just left, at the further side of the stretch of salt
meadow with the creek and bridge, was East Wellmouth village. Along the
white sand of the beach, now garlanded with lines of fresh seaweed
torn up and washed ashore by the gale, were scattered a half dozen
fishhouses, with dories and lobster pots before them, and at the rear