to get a job.”

“No!” she said. “You got my note. But how could you? Who can you be? Nanna said—but I don’t believe it! I knew—as soon as I saw you—I felt sure you’d come to help me. Oh, tell me! My cousin James sent you, didn’t he?”

“James Ross?” asked Ross, slowly.

“Yes!” she answered, eagerly. “My cousin James. He did! I know it! Mother always told me to go to him if I needed help. Of course, I know he must be old now. I was afraid—so terribly afraid that he’d left the ship, or that I’d forgotten the name of it. But I was right, after all. I thought mother had said he was purser on the Farragut.”

“What!” cried Ross.

He began to understand now. Years and years ago—the dimmest memory—he had had a cousin James who was purser on one of the Porto Rico boats. He could vaguely remember his coming to their house in Mayaguez; a gloomy man with a black beard; son of his father’s elder brother William. It must have been on the old Farragut, scrapped nearly twenty years ago.

And that cousin James had vanished, too, long ago. William Ross had had three children, and outlived them all. Ross could remember his grandfather telling him that.

“All gone,” the old man had said; “both my sons and their sons. No doubt the Almighty has some reason for sparing you; but it’s beyond me.”

“Your Cousin James?” said Ross, staring at her—because that had been his Cousin James.

“Yes! Yes! Yes!” she answered, impatiently. “I told you. Now tell me how—”

But Ross wanted to understand.

“What was your father’s name?” he demanded.

“Luis Delmano,” she replied. “But what does that matter? I only have a minute—”

“Then why do you call yourself Solway if your name is—”

“Oh!” she cried. “Now I see! You didn’t know the name of my mother’s second husband! Nobody had told you that! Of course! I should have thought of that. Mother told me how horrible her brothers were. When she married daddy, they were so furious. They said they’d never see her or speak to her or mention her name again—and I suppose they didn’t. Nasty, heartless beasts! Their 

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