Part 51 (1/2)

”Where is mother?” asked Elizabeth. ”Have you seen her, Elvira?”

Elvira's thin lips were shut tight.

”Don't ask _me_,” she snapped, viciously. ”She's out trapping, I suppose.”

”Trapping!” Elizabeth stared at her. ”What are you talking about?

Trapping what?”

”I don't know. _I'm_ not layin' traps to catch anything--or any_body_ either.”

She sailed out of the room. Miss Berry turned to Sears.

”Do you know what she means, Cap'n Kendrick?” she asked.

Sears did know, or would have bet heavily on his guess. But he shook his head. Elizabeth was not satisfied.

”Why do you look like that?” she persisted. ”_Do_ you know?”

”Eh?... Oh, no, no; of course not.... I--I think I saw your mother goin'

out of the gate as I came across lots. She--I presume likely she was goin' to the store or somewhere.”

”She didn't tell me she was going. Was she alone?”

”Why--why, no; I think--seems to me Mr. Phillips was with her.”

For the next few minutes the captain devoted his entire attention to the letter he was writing. He did not look up, but he was quite conscious that her eyes were boring him through and through. During the rest of his stay she was curt and cool. When he went she did not bid him good-by.

So the fuse was burning merrily and the inevitable explosion came three days later. The scene was this time not the Fair Harbor office, but the Minot kitchen. Judah was out and the captain was alone, reading the _Item_. The fire in the range was a new one and the kitchen was very warm, so Sears had opened the outer door in order to cool off a bit. It was a beautiful late October forenoon.

The captain was deep in the _Item's_ account of the recent wreck on Peaked Hill Bars. A British bark had gone ash.o.r.e there and the crew had been rescued with difficulty. He was himself dragged, metaphorically speaking, from the undertow by a voice just behind him.

”Well, you're takin' it easy, ain't you, Cap'n Sears?” observed Mrs.

Tidditt. ”I wish _I_ didn't have nothin' to do but set and read the news.”

”Oh, good mornin', Esther,” said the captain. He was not particularly glad to see her. ”What's wrong; anything?”

”Nothin' but my batch of gingerbread, and a quart of mola.s.ses'll save that. Can you spare it? Oh, don't get up. I know where Judah keeps it; I've been here afore.”

She went to the closet, found the mola.s.ses jug, and filled her pitcher.

Then she came back and sat down. She had not been invited to sit, but Esther scorned ceremony.

”No, sir,” she observed, as if carrying on an uninterrupted conversation, ”_I_ can't set and read the newspapers. And I can't go to walk neither, even if 'tis such weather as 'tis to-day. Some folks can, though, and they've gone.”

Sears turned the page of the _Item_. He made no comment. His silence did not in the least disturb his caller.

”Yes, they've gone,” she repeated. ”Right in the middle of the forenoon, too.... Oh, well! when the Admiral of all creation comes to get you to go cruisin' along with him, you go, I suppose. That is, some folks do.

I'd like to see the man _I'd_ make such a fool of myself over.”