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 evenly between us—strengthened Hazel's resolve to strut her stuff and leave the ocean to its proper inhabitants, the fish. However, I came down to the sea to swim, a gift I was very agile at in my beauty-contest-winner days, two or three years ago.

Hazel by no means got hysterical with grief when I told her I was going to leave her flat and do a piece of bathing. She was busy dazzling the handsome lifeguard with her charms. So I waded bravely in, ducked under to get that first horrible chill over with and struck out boldly for the diving float, tethered some distance from the beach.

Then the fun began!

For some time I'd achieved the bulk of my swimming in a bath tub and with a wildly palpitating heart I soon discovered that I'd more than misjudged both my strength and the distance to the float. A treacherous undertow made things more thrilling and regardless of what the record may be, I know I was averaging fifty-five waves swallowed with each frightened gulp. I was satisfied that as a mermaid I was a first-class telephone operator and this was one time I'd have been double willing to change my name—to Annette Kellermann, for instance!

Thoroughly scared and as weak as seven days, I was seriously in need of one standard-sized, regulation full-blooded hero, when a young man filed his application.