Between these piers, built in the curve of the beach and nestling under the bluff, was a curious patchwork of a house. Built of odds and ends of lumber, even, in the rear, of driftwood, perched up on piles so that the higher waves might run up under the kitchen floor, small wonder that the youngsters of the shore had dubbed it “the house on stilts.”
Old Captain Fargo (and who was not a “Captain” in those days!) had built it with his own hands, just as he had built every one of the sailboats and rowboats that strewed the beach, and had woven every one of the nets that were wound on reels up there under the bluff.
A surprisingly spacious old house it was, too, with a room for Annie upstairs on the Lake side, looking out on a porch that was just large enough to hold her pots and boxes of geraniums and nasturtiums and forget-me-nots.
Smiley could not see the house yet; it was hidden by the lumber piles on the pier. But his eyes knew where to look, and they lingered there, all the while that his sailor’s sixth sense was watching the set of the sails and the scudding ripples that marked the wind puffs. He wore a clean red shirt to-day and a neckerchief that lay in even folds around his neck. Redolent of soap he was, his face and hands scrubbed until they shone. And still his eyes tried to look through fifty feet of lumber to the little flowering porch, until a sail came in sight around the end of the pier. Then he straightened up, and shifted his grip on the spokes.
The small boat was also blue with a white stripe. At the stern sat a single figure. But though they were still too far apart to distinguish features, Dick knew that the figure was that of a girl – a girl of a fine, healthy carriage, her face tanned an even brown, and a laugh in her black eyes. He knew, even before he brought his glass to bear on her, that she was dressed in a blue sailor suit, with a rolling blue-and-white collar cut V-shape and giving a glimpse of her round brown neck. He knew that her black hair was gathered simply with a ribbon and left to hang about her shoulders, that her arms were bared to the elbow. He could see that she was carrying a few yards more sail than was safe for a catboat in that breeze, and there was a laugh in his own eyes as he shook his head over her recklessness. He knew that it would do no good to speak to her about it; and her father and mother had never been able to look upon her with any but fond, foolish eyes.
Steadily the Merry Anne drew in toward the pier; rapidly the Captain– so Annie called her boat – came bobbing and skimming out to meet her. A few moments more and Dick could wave his hat and shout, “Ahoy, there!” And he heard in reply, as he had known that he should, a merry “Ahoy, there! I ‘ll beat you in!” And then they raced for it, Annie gaining, as she generally could, while the schooner was laboriously coming about, and working in slowly under reduced sail. She ran in close to the pier, came up into the wind, and waited there while the crew were making the schooner fast.
At length the stevedores started unloading the lumber and Dick was free. He leaned on the rail and looked down at Annie who had by this time come alongside; and he saw that she had a bunch of blue-and-white forget-me-nots in her hair.
“Well,” she said, looking up, and driving all power of consecutive thought out of Dick’s head, as she always did when she rested her black eyes full on his, “well, I beat you.”
“Take me aboard, Annie. I’ve got something for you.”
“All right, come down. You can take the sheet.”
Dick pushed off from the schooner’s side and the Captain filled away toward the shore.
“Hold on, Annie, come about. I don’t have to go in yet.”
“Where do you want to go?”
“I don’t care – run out a little way.”
Annie brought her about and Dick watched her with admiring eyes. “Well, now,” he began, as they settled down for a run off the wind, “I didn’t know whether I was going to get here to-day or not.”
“It was pretty bad.”
“You were thinking of me, weren’t you, Annie?”
She smiled and gave her attention to the boat.
“Roche was drunk, and I had to leave him at Manistee.”
“You didn’t come down shorthanded, did you, Dick, – in that storm?”
He nodded.
“But how? You couldn’t have got much sleep.”
“I didn’t get any till this noon.”
“Now, that’s just like you, Dick, always running risks when you don’t have to.”
“But I did have to.”
“I don’t see why.”
“What day’s to-day?”
A mischievous light came into her eyes, but her face was demure. “Wednesday,” she replied.
“Yes, I knew that.”
“Why did you ask me, then?”
“Oh, Annie, Annie! When are you going to stop talking that way?”
Again the boat claimed all her attention. He leaned forward and dropped his voice.
“Don’t you think I’ve waited most long enough, Annie?”
“Now, Dick, be sensible.”
“But haven’t I been sensible? Not a word have I said for two months. And I told you then I would speak on your birthday.”
“So you really remembered my birthday?”
“Remembered it, Annie! What a girl you are! Do you know how long I’ve been waiting? And all the boys laughing? It’s two years this month. It was on your birthday that I saw you first, you know. And it wasn’t a month after that that I spoke to you. How could I help it? Who could have waited longer? And you, with your way of making me think you were really going to say yes, and then just laughing at me.”
“Now, Dick – if you don’t stop and be sensible, I ‘ll take you straight inshore.”
“Oh, you wouldn’t do that, Annie?”
“Yes, I would. I will now. Ready about!” The Captain came rapidly up into the wind, but stopped there with sail flapping; for Dick held the sheet, and his hand had imprisoned hers on the tiller.
“Now, Dick – Dick – ”
“Wait a minute. Don’t be angry with me when I’ve risked the schooner and everybody aboard her just so’s to get down here on your birthday. Promise me you ‘ll hold her in the wind while I get you your present.”
She hesitated, and looked out toward the horizon.
“Promise me that, Annie, and I ‘ll let go your hand.”
“You – you’ve forgotten – what you promised – ”
“I know, I said I’d never take hold of your hand again until you put it in mine – didn’t I?”
She nodded, still looking away.
“And I’ve broken the promise. Do you know why, Annie? It’s because when you look at me the way you do sometimes, I could break every promise I’ve ever made – and every law of Congress if I thought it would just keep you looking at me.”
Not a word from Annie.
“Promise me, Annie, that you ‘ll hold her here?”
Still no word.
“Won’t you just nod, then?”
She hesitated a moment longer, then gave one uncertain little nod. He released her hand, held the sheet between his knees, drew the package from his pocket, and displayed the corals. She was trying bravely not to look around, but her glance wavered, and finally she turned and looked at it with eager eyes. “Oh, Dick, did