Splash! The Countess had leaped nimbly into the water and was wading, waist deep, back to the beach before the Mate could intercept her.

At the edge of the water she turned.

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And you would leave J-J-Jordin Knapp so -alone, desolated-even as you left me on the vessel? Mais non! He have stay by me, an' I will remain with him. Think, mes amis, what it would be alone on this terrible islan' at night, with the moaning of the sea!" She burst into a storm of tears.

The Mate turned to her fiercely. "Celeste, do as I tell you! Get in that boat; do you want to make me- Oh, go, for heaven's sake. Can't you see that you're only making it worse?"

The Banker said nothing.

"I say, do be reasonable; why do you want to make it so hard for us, Celeste?" cried the Baronet, with a queer vibration in his voice.

The drooping head came proudly up. The bare, gleaming arms flashed down and outward. She turned and faced them defiantly, her back to the man she would not desert, her bosom rising and falling. Before her stretched salvation and the sea; behind, the green walls of her prison. Her thin, tattered gown hung in rags, while at her feet the glowing sands pressed hot kisses where the frail satin slippers had worn away. The rising trade-wind blew her tawny hair about her face.

"You ask me why I remain? I tell you. It is because that if I go I am the base ingrate. This man have risked his life for me when his blood run quick, an' when his life is low he give me his blood, drop by drop. Day by day he starve himself-an' he think I do not see. Ver' many times he bring me food an' say he have eat plenty, but I know it is only his dinner which he save. When I am cold he cover me with his coat an' shiver; when I am triste he tell me the droll story, an' say how soon I will be home. An' now he have put everything of food an' shelter in the bateau, an'-an' you ask me that I leave himHer voice choked, and she covered her face with her hands.

The Mate dug his foot in the sand, and gnawed the end of his new bristling mustache.

"Is there any other reason, Celeste?" he asked in a voice like the echo of the surf.

She raised her head, and the sunlight shone on her face. The little hands were tightly clasped.

"Ah, yes; there is more. I have known many men in many country, many who have

the wit, the resource, the courage, the heart of gold. But never have I known a man who have them all, as this gran' man; and he has, beside" she turned and covered her face with her hands-" mon cœur!" she sobbed softly.

"Oh, h-!" growled the Banker; "let's go!"

"Good-by, children," called the Baronet. "We'll have a schooner here for you in a fortnight!"

He dug his oar blade in the hard-packed sand, when suddenly a feeble spark of decency flared up from deep in the Banker's sordid soul.

"If Celeste's not coming, we might leave her a ration," he muttered.

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"I say, by Jove! that's so-what? There's some hope for you yet, old man," said the Mate genially to the Banker.

Who's going to chaperon you two until the schooner comes ?" asked the Baronet jocosely.

"This!" said the Mate, in a deep-toned voice. He snapped a cord about his neck and drew forth a heavy golden ring. The blue eyes of the Countess opened wide. "It was my mother's, Celeste. Will you wear it for me-always?" She put her hand in his. "Yes, J-J-Jordin Knapp."

The busy little Jap, who had been swabbing the boat dry, leaped to his feet so quickly that he almost had a capsize. "Eeeee yah!" he squealed, pointing seaward.

The Mate's keen eye was the first to follow the boy's.

"SAIL, O!" he roared in a voice that sounded like a cry of pain. Suddenly he threw his hands above his head.

"They've come for us! The other boat's been picked up! What?-what?" He did a beach dance that would shame a cannibal. The Banker stared out to sea as if uncertain of his part of the play.

Close to the shore the placid waters lay pearly gray, still unawakened in the shadow of the palms. Beyond, the sparkling waves danced sun-kissed and joyous with the life of the growing day. Far on the low horizon a widening band of ultramarine marked the advent of the trade-wind, and over the skyline a pink puff rose steadily over the ocean's brim.

Larger it grew, coursing in the wake of the breeze, and soon the darker speck that marked the hull appeared. On she came, her topsails shot with the flaming crimson of the sunrise,

and soon a snowy streak beneath her forefoot showed each onward rush.

for heroics after all. We'll all go together, and let's try to forget this chapter. I say we call everything that's happened on this blooming island off. Celeste, don't cry, my

T

HE famous driveway skirting the wooded heights that overlook the valley of the Harlem, where New Yorkers assemble on Sunday mornings to witness "brushes" between pedigreed, record-breaking equines, might not be considered a vicinity favorable to the delivery and suitable reception of a sermon. Nor would the lofty bridge on which the Croton water crosses the Harlem to its destination in the faucets of Manhattan Island shape itself at first glance into the semblance of a pulpit. Yet it was on High Bridge, from which I had been regarding the scene on the Speedway below, that I first met Dicky and listened to his conversation.

It is not popular to view the racing from the bridge; the gay world flocks along the walks below, on either side of the magnificent roadway. I preferred to be aloof. There are moods when even a horse-race cannot charm. Sometimes brilliant spectacles do not tempt one to mingle in them, but serve only as a basis for gloomy philosophizings.

Things were not going well with me. Well planned efforts have a way of lurching off and arriving nowhere. It is hard to see others succeed where you have failed. And at that time I had misgivings about the state of mind of a certain Person. I was tired of the whole confounded muddle, and I knew just how a fellow feels when he concludes to stop trying.

The other boys ran on unheeding. From previous observation of the genus sometimes know as "kid," and from the size of the present specimen, I braced myself against a howl that I judged would develop. But I erred. The short legs ceased the vain effort; then two brown eyes gazed sadly up into mine, and Dicky said for this was Dicky-"Jimmy has went off an' left me!"

But it was merely the enormity of Jimmy's depravity that saddened him, not his own forlorn situation, as I soon learned. "How will you get home?" I asked.

He surveyed the long stretch of bridge leading to the Bronx side, where the boys had disappeared, and gravely decided upon a course of action suited to the occasion. "I'll go 'way 'cross the bridge," he said deliberately; "then I'll go down them stairs, all of 'em, an' then-" He hesitated, but resumed manfully, "I guess I c'n see where I live then."

"Suppose you can't see?"

His resourcefulness did not fail. "I'll ask a cop," he said firmly. "The cop'll know where I live."

The noble faith in the omniscience of "the force" might have impressed me, if I had not been occupied with my surprise at this remarkable decision of character and courage. He was much too small to be there alone - he was scarcely more than a baby-and I was pausing, pondering the division of re

"Wait fer me, Jimmy Jim-my!'

A very little chap, in a shabby brown overcoat, was sending this appeal after some larger boys scampering eastward across the bridge at a pace impossible to his short legs.

Dicky himself had dropped the whole subject -myself along with it-and was stuck as close as possible to the bridge railing, through which he was gazing intently upon the scene below.

Suddenly the brown overcoat was violently

agitated, its occupant turned and called shrilly, "Mister, come 'ere-they's a feller fell in the lake!"

Sure enough, there was a fine young fellow struggling in the water, while his capsized shell floated swiftly away. The conflicting currents of the Harlem "lake" must have taken him in an unguarded moment. Fortunately, a rowing costume is also adapted to swimming, and he was making a gallant fight. "See 'im wiggle!" cried Dicky excitedly. The Speedway throng below had also seen, and they began to shout advice and encouragement. A launch was visible, but some distance away. The swimmer began to call at intervals, "Hurry up; hur-ry up!"

An inevitable comparison of his struggle with my own flashed over me. I set my teeth hard at the thought of the possible fate of the brave fellow down there, in view of the thousands powerless to help. A woman near us began to wring her hands, crying out, "Oh, why don't they help him!" But Dicky's hopefulness sustained us in the ordeal. "Don't cry, Missis," he said kindly to the woman. "He's goin' to git out soon. See 'im wiggle!" he added enthusiastically.

And later, when the swimmer's shouts were not so loud, and you clenched the railing and held your breath, it was Dicky who sang out, "They's a boat a-comin'!"

Another shell, propelled by four athletic fellows, swept from under the bridge, and we saw our swimmer, first seizing an oar, and then clinging to the side of the boat, conveyed safely to a landing-place.

It was this accident that secured me the boon of Dicky's acquaintance; in discussing it, the gulfs of age and position were bridged and we met as equals.

"What 'ud you do if you'd fall in the water?" he asked with keen interest. But evidently fearing the effect that the direful suggestion might have upon my possibly delicate susceptibilities, he hastened to say, with a sunny smile, "You won't fall, Mister; the bridge is tight. But s'pose you had fell, what 'ud you do?"

I asked him what he would do. "Oh," he said cheerfully, "I'd wait till some fellers comed with a boat, an' I'd climb right up on the boat."

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"But suppose a boat shouldn't come?" "Then I'd wiggle an' wiggle an' keep on a-wigglin' till a boat did come," he said resolutely.

Having given me this succinct statement of his idea of a man's behavior when in misfortune, he glued himself to the railing again.

Surprise was rapidly deepening in my mind to profound interest and growing respect for the character of my chance acquaintance. I desired to probe farther into this clear mind. His interest in the proceedings below appeared to be inordinate.

"Do you like to see the horses?" I asked. "Yep," he replied politely and even with polish, for he had the manners of an archbishop-or of an archangel. The monosyllable was uttered dispassionately, however. But his next remark revealed the source of his absorbing interest. "Mebby my Pa's down there."

"Ah, your father drives horses there?" "I don't know, but mebby he does." Dicky sighed profoundly, and I saw that there was trouble. He must have judged me to be worthy, for he went on, "Mamma and me don't know where he is. He has went off and left us. Oncet we lived in a flat"—he glanced at me to see if I comprehended the grandeur of this "Mamma's got to work now, an' she cries 'bout Papa's bein' gone."

I perceived that this was not the reaching out of a weak spirit for sympathy; it was merely a dignified statement of facts due to a friend. I said with respect, "That is very hard!"

"But she don't cry always." He was hastening to cheer me up out of my depression! When I was feeling better, he gave me various details of the family affairs. What impressed me most was his own unflagging endeavor to dispel his mother's terrible fear that his father would never return. He spoke of this as a curious example of feminine idiosyncracy. "Mamma's just a poor, weak woman," he said kindly. "She can't help cryin'.'

The spectacle of this rare soul rising up in unflinching fortitude from the paternal defection and the maternal tears so moved me that I took out my field-glass and urged Dicky to try it.

It was his first experience, and his delight was absolutely without limit. But after he had learned how to adjust the glasses, and had looked his fill, he reverted to the subject that engrossed him.

"If my Pa had them glasses down there," he cried, with sparkling eyes, "he c'ud see me up here. And then he'd git right outen the wagon an' come up here!"

"What would he do with the horses?" I asked. It was becoming an absorbing employment to me to suggest difficulties-just to see how this undaunted spirit would meet them. I was conscious, too, of a desire to lay

before him my own affairs and get his advice and the glow of his sunny hopefulness upon them!

He laughed heartily. My lack of resource tickled him. "W'y, don't you know?" he said. "He'd hitch the horses to the legs of the bridge!"

"What makes you think that he is down there?"

"'Cause they's horses there. My Pa's aa-"He said apologetically, "It's a big word." Then he made a manful effort to make me understand. "They's a wagon an' lots of trunks." When I suggested "expressman," he beamed with pleasure. "Yep, 'spressYep, 'spressman! An' if I come here an' come here an' keep on comin' here lots an' lots of times, mebby I'll see my Pa down there, an' then he'll come back to Mamma 'n me." Then he resumed his eager scrutiny of the Speedway. I checked an impulse to uncover my head in the presence of this sublime faith, while I stood aghast at the daring picture of the delinquent parent, in the midst of those elegant turnouts, mounted upon his express wagon, returning to the deserted fireside!

I hadn't the heart to speak for some time. Then, feeling the need of encouragement from Dicky, I asked, "Was your Papa a very good man?"

Dicky turned and surveyed me silently. It was not rebuke in the large eyes. It was a surprised pity for the darkness of my unenlightened outlook. Then he said quietly, "Pa and God is the best men in the world."

This simple confession of faith was too much for me. I took off my hat, making a pretense of smoothing my hair. It was distinctly a stained-glass effect-the sunlight actually seemed to be streaming through a rose window over an organ loft, and I heard for an instant the voices of the choir.

I took Dicky's hand and we sauntered along together conversing. In a thoughtless moment I asked him this question, "What would you do if your father should not come back?" He withdrew his hand and turned his great brown eyes upon me, and I realized my error. "Of course he will come back," I hastened to say. "I only meant suppose he shouldn't."

It took time for him to grasp that this was only abstract speculation, similar to his own suggestion, "S'pose you'd fell down into the water." Then he faced the problem with his usual spirit.

"W'y, I'd grow an' grow, auful fast, and be big like my Pa, and work for Mamma." As we walked on, he became silent. Again he withdrew his hand-there was constraint between us. The matter developed. Suddenly he looked up at me, literally speaking, but in reality he was looking down at me, and I felt it.

"Don't you b'lieve he'll come back?” Then I perceived that this question was not formulated in order to add weight to his own serene trust-it was a test of my sanity, of my moral condition, of my fitness for friendship.

He was at last reassured. His hand was again in mine, and our intimacy was restored. I did myself the honor of escorting Dicky home, and we parted with an appointment to meet again at the Speedway.

"Mebby my Pa 'ull be there!" he said radiantly; then benevolently to me, "An' I'll show him your glasses!" Finally he said, with an inflection and tone that were a benediction, "I like you." And then came the supreme touch, uttered solemnly, "Mebby my Pa 'ull like you, too."

I wended my way back across the bridge, to the elevated, rebuked, chastened, and inspired. That Person-whose sex I do not mention had never behaved quite so badly as had Dicky's erring parent! Yet regard my squalid, shriveling doubts beside Dicky's magnificent faith. And daring thought-why should not I apply Dicky's system to the Person's case, and keep on a-comin' an' comin'

And this diminutive apostle of hope and courage in the midst of his harrowing affairs -I and my difficulties-the relative sizes of Dicky and myself-his attitude-mine! I did not enjoy dwelling upon my late attitude.

I say "late" attitude, and that is right, because it was changed. I had determined now to wiggle an' wiggle an' keep on a wigglin' till a boat did come. Amen and amen.

R