"I think you must feel we're both ridiculous."

"I don't care whether you are or not," I said. "I like you both."

Saxton looked pleased 'way back in his dark eyes. "That's the boy for my money!" he said. And then we three began to laugh.

"It's all too beautiful to quarrel in," he said, waving an arm around. "To feel sorrowful on such a day, savage or civilized, really is ridiculous."

She couldn't help giving him one last jab,—I make a guess he turned happy too soon to please her. If she didn't like him, she liked somebody who so much resembled him that she wanted to have him around to remind her.

"Mr. Saxton's sorrows are soon healed," she said. "That's a valuable disposition."

"I take that as friendly, because I must," said he, smiling in a way, as with the other things he did, that was beautiful in a fashion of its own. She tried to buck against it, to keep sneering; but something so young and joyful was in his face, she couldn't help smiling back at him. So we walked the deck and talked about everything in the best of humors.

VII

"SAVE ME, ARTHUR!"

The first part of the Matilda's trip slid by, day after day, like a happy dream. We had weather that couldn't be bettered; days of sunlight and pretty sailing breezes; nights picked out of heaven. The moon was in her glory. I like high land better than I do the ocean, but few sights can beat a full moon swelling over the glitter of water. There's also a snugness, a cozy, contented feeling, aboard a small boat, that you can't get elsewhere, except in a prairie camp. I suppose it's the contrast between so much space of sky and land or water, where people are not, and the little spot where they are, that makes your partners rise in value.

Of course, the fact that it was my first cutaway puts a gilt edge on all that time, yet one other thing, a new thing, that made all my life different for me, must get its credit. That was music,—good music. Back home they weren't much in the musical line. I think I can remember when mother used to play the piano some, but her life soon jarred all that out of her. Bar here and there a man with a mouth-organ or a concertina, and a fiddler to do dance-tunes, the only thing that stood for music to me was the singing in father's church. I have since thought that anybody who could stand that once a week was certainly a good Christian. I 

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