Page:Francis Crawford - Mr Isaacs.djvu/256

 "Not in the least, I assure you. Is it that tangled skein? Let me help you."

"Oh thank you. It is so tiresome, and I am not in the least inclined to be industrious."

I took the wool and set to work. It was very easy, after all; I pulled the loops through, and back again and through from the other side, and I found the ends, and began to wind it up on a piece of paper. It is singular, though, how the unaided wool can tie itself into every kind of a knot—reef, carrick bend, bowline, bowline in a bight, not to mention a variety of hitches and indescribable perversions of entanglement. I was getting on very well, though. I looked up at her face, pale and weary with a sleepless night, but beautiful—ah yes—beautiful beyond compare. She smiled faintly.

"You are very clever with your fingers. Where did you learn it? Have you a sister who makes you wind her wool for you at home?"

"No. I have no sister. I went to sea once upon a time."

"Were you ever in the navy, Mr. Griggs?"

"Oh no. I went before the mast."

"But you would not learn to unravel wool before the mast. I suppose your mother taught you when you were small—if you ever were small."

"I never had a mother that I can remember—I learned to do all those things at sea."

"Forgive me," she said, guessing she had struck