“You mustn’t mind him,” said Mrs. Henderson as we started home. “It’s his job, and a thankless one.”

“Oh, I don’t blame him! I only don’t want to have to tell Mamma.”

“Well, then, we won’t tell Mamma,” said Mrs. Henderson with a trace of annoyance. “I suppose there’s nothing against a white lie to give you a little peace of mind, Sonie.”

“But she’d want to go to the grave sometime.”

“Not if she thought he was buried at sea, dear.”

“But she wants to go out in the boat herself, Mrs. Henderson!”

“Oh, we could change her mind with a hot toddy, I think. You mustn’t suppose I don’t know your mother,” she said grimly. “And since we’re going off to Maine directly, I’d like to think I left you without too many worries. Let her come down to the wharf, yes, and let her see you get into the boat with Ross. He’ll take you out a little piece and she’ll never know the difference. If she wants the poor lad to be down with the seaweed, let her think that’s where he is.” She was very angry. With an outraged, “I declare!” she fell silent for so long a time that I thought she had not been in earnest. The plan was, I saw, ideal, but I dared not hope it could ever be realized, for I was certain Mr. Henderson would not agree to so romantic an enterprise.

We had reached our cottage before the neighbor woman spoke again. “Sonie, you mustn’t ever think I was being harsh with you a while back there. I was out of sorts with your mother for a minute, thinking as I was how you’re nothing but a child yourself and put up with all these carryings-on. I’ll serve my time for those mean thoughts about poor Mrs. Marburg. I do think it’s best to humor her. We’ll do what I said now. I’ll step across to your place after supper.”

•

That evening, about seven o’clock, my mother and Mrs. Henderson and I were waiting on the beach by the wharf. Although we could not see them, we could hear the dories dip and sway at their sodden moorings. Someone passed behind us and we could hear the hiss of his slicker and dimly we saw his lantern. My mother, wearing her bright winter dress covered with an old, rusty black cape, stood erect beside me. I was surprised to see that she was a little taller than I. Her arm was linked in mine, and through the mist I could see her long fingers on my coat sleeve. Mrs. Henderson stood on the other side of us. None of us spoke, but there was something in my mother’s stance and in the way her hand, seemingly relaxed, was firm on my arm, which told me that she was profoundly excited and a stealthy glance at her parted, upward curving lips, informed me that her excitement did not come from grief. My glance, shifting, met Mrs. Henderson, who had likewise been looking at my mother, and it seemed to me that her eyes, behind her faintly glimmering spectacles, would be cold and unforgiving.