Page:Silver Shoal Light.djvu/43

Rh here. I do believe that the Harbor View House would have driven me frantic. Might I stay, truly? For just a little while, a week?"

"Why not?" said Elspeth. "Jim, can't it be arranged?"

"I'll write to the Inspector to-night," Pemberley replied. "He's a good old friend, personal and official; he'll see to it."

"We can sail in to-morrow with the Ailouros," said Elspeth, "and get your trunk."

"I don't deserve this," murmured Joan. "I was such a foolish hasty person."

"As Cap'n 'Bijah would remark," observed Pemberley, puffing at his pipe, "'I allus says: Ye never kin tell of a Friday how the wind's a-goin' to blow next week.'"

As Joan lay in bed listening to the suck and wash of the water about the walls below her window, she reviewed the happenings of the day. It seemed months since she had left town on that tiresome train. How desperate she had felt when all the doors of Quimpaug were shut to her! She was very glad now that they had been shut, for if she had not come of necessity to the Light, she would in all probability have returned to town the next morning. It would