look and manner conveyed a totally new idea to Mrs. Bruce.

“I wish you’d both come out with me this afternoon,” he went on. “I’ll show you just what a good, reliable, faithful craft I’ve got. A bit unsteady sometimes, mebbe, but that’s only because she’s smart and sassy; she always comes up to the mark in an emergency, and never goes back on her skipper. She’s fast, too, and—”

“Sailin’!” interrupted Betsy, unable to[14] endure another moment. “I guess if you saw the inside o’ that cottage you wouldn’t talk to me about sailin’. If you’re so fond of peacockin’ with that rug, I won’t deprive you of it. You can leave it on the step when you get through.”

[14]

Mrs. Bruce’s idea received confirmation by Betsy’s manner and her precipitate departure up the garden-path, and she looked at Hiram Salter blankly. Betsy Foster was the prop of her household. She was the property of the Bruce family. Did this man suppose for one moment that just because they had gone to school together, he could remove her from her useful position? What a selfish, impossible thought! Of course the man wasn’t in love with Betsy. Nobody could be in love with such a severely plain creature; and yet that fancy of the new boat and the new name! It argued a plan of wooing which had some poetry in it.

Here was an affair which Mrs. Bruce would certainly stop with a high hand if there were any real threat in it; but fortunately Betsy would consider it as unthinkable as she herself. If ever displeasure was writ large all over a woman it had been evident in Betsy Foster throughout the interview.

[15]

[15]

After a short reflective silence during which, both hands behind him, her companion waved the rug in gentle ripples, and met her gaze with an undisturbed smile, she spoke.

“Do take my advice still, Captain Salter,” she said. “Wipe out the Clever Betsy and go back to the Gentle Annie.”

[16]

[16]

CHAPTER II MISTRESS AND MAID

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