"She WILL be a sailin' vessel when she gets her sticks into her,"
said the Cap'n, fumbling with his neckwear.

"Let me fix that for you," said the lady. And before the Cap'n
could protest she was arranging his tie for him. "You old sea
captains!------" she said, untying the scarf and making the ends
even. "As if anyone could possibly be afraid to sail in anything
one of YOU had charge of!" She gave the necktie a little final
pat. "There, now!"

The Captain's frown was gone past replacement. But he still felt
that he owed something to himself.

"If you was to ask me," he said, turning to Cleggett, "whether
what I'd got to say to you would do later, or whether it wouldn't
do later, I'd answer you it would, or it wouldn't, all accordin'
to whether you wanted to hear it now, or whether you wanted to
hear it later. And as far as SAILIN' her is concerned, Mr.
Cleggett, I'll SAIL her, whether you turn her into a battleship
or into one of these here yachts. I come of a seafarin' fambly."

And then he said to the lady, indicating the tie and bobbing his
head forward with a prim little bow: "Thank ye, ma'am."

"Isn't he a duck!" said the lady, following him with her eyes, as
he went behind the cabin. There the Cap'n chewed, smoked, and
fished, earnestly and simultaneously, for ten minutes.

Indeed, the blonde lady, from the moment when Elmer began to put