But if

'May I serve you in any way? It was distressing," he said, with stiff, gentle sympathy. "If you will take my arm"I'll be all right, in a moment. you are walking downtown anywayShe drew herself up, and after a moment's hesitation, fell into step beside him. Neither spoke again till they had gone some distance. Finally the girl began to talk, after a shy, decorous fashion, as if she felt that the conventionalities demanded speech. Prescott did not hear her. Another woman's voice rang in his ears, pitiless, piercing, like clamorous bells. "What a-pity!" "What a-pity!"

"A day like to-day isn't so bad," he heard at last. And slowly it came to him that the girl, in a childish outburst of mingled weariness and frankness, drawn on, perhaps, by some absent remark from him, was telling him something of her eager young affairs. "At first I loathed every bit of it; I hated the sight of my note-book, even. But now it's all different. You get to feel what a splendid game it all is, even the low, sordid side; you get to know how wonderful people are. After what I've seen just this one year I feel as if I could never be bored again; I have so much to remember."

"Yes?" said Prescott dully.

"And yet it's terrible sometimes. And, oh, you get so tired! This morning I went through that Children's Hospital, you know-the one they say has been so mismanaged; I was to see what I could see, and report on it. I saw-all I dared!" There was a quivering pause. "Then this afternoon I had a concert and a lecture and three interviews; pleasant people, and gracious enough, in a way; but somehow they just drained the life out of me. Luckily I had that exhibit last. The pictures pulled me through."

"Pulled you through ?" echoed the man stupidly. Her random words burned like dropping acid; he could have cried out under the slow agony.

"They always do." The girl drew a deep breath, as if she drank after long thirst. "When you come down to it, isn't that the ultimate gift? The power to give? The power to help people out, to lend them. a hand up the last step"-her voice shook suddenly "to keep the souls alive in them? That is why those talents are laid upon us,

isn't it? Not just because we can make things that are beautiful to look at-but to give courage—to sustain

"I don't know," she went on more quietly after a while. "If I had my choice out of all the great things, the mighty privileges, I should choose the right to know that I had written one story, painted one picture, that had comforted somebody who needed it. Something that had given a lift on a hard road, as those pictures, that little sunset, even, did for me to-day.

"This is my corner," she added suddenly, with a quick, shamefaced turn of voice and manner to dignified reserve. "No, it is only a step. Please do not go out of your way for me. Thank you. Good-night!" Prescott walked on alone, through the thickening storm. He turned up his own street mechanically, and into the shabby entrance. The hallway seemed of a sudden singularly light; a hot mist blurred and glimmered before his eyes.

Selina, his wife, met him at the head of the narrow stairs, with a rustle of silks and a clash of jet. Her gaunt, high-featured face dimmed with disappointment as he stepped past her and laid the portfolio on the table; her thin sparkling hands were tremulous with discontent.

"How did the exhibit go to-day, Bartram? Did you sell any more? Were there many people in ?"

"I don't know," said Prescott absently. He unclasped the case and spread the pictures out; beneath the soft lamplight they glowed like fathomless gems before his eyes. The autumn marsh; the dawn; the far sunset.

"You don't know whether you sold any, even? Why, Bartram

"One to Ellis, and two to Tom Winters," said Prescott, recollecting with an effort. "Tom paid very well for them, too. Iyes, I believe those were all that went this time."

"It hardly seems worth while to exhibit nowadays," said his wife, fretfully. "People, won't come unless you fairly beg them and even then they never buy. I do wish you wouldn't try it again, Bartram. I'm sure it doesn't pay."

Prescott hardly seemed to hear.

"You can't always judge of a matter like this from the standpoint of gain, Selina," he said at last. He stood looking down at

H, but Dannie Keating was the happy man that night! Under the light of the winter stars he drew her to him, and, with her head all but resting on his shoulder and

his arm about her waist, they came down the shady side of the street together, and cared no more for the whistling wind than for whatever curious eyes might, from behind drawn blinds, be peeping. "If anybody's rubbering they're all sore," said Dannie when she protested, and again broke the night air with-he simply couldn't help it

"O sweetheart mine, I love thee,
And in all the sky above-see!

No heart like thine, no love like mine-
O sweetheart, but I love thee!"

Oh, but the blood was running riot within him. "Don't I love you, Katie? Don't I? And don't you? And don't we both?" and in the shadow of the steps of her home he drew her yet closer to him and kissed her-kissed her—a thousand times he kissed her before she could draw a free breath again.

"And in the morning, Katie, I'll be putting out. You won't see me, it'll be so early. And it'll be the last trip in that old packet, though maybe I oughtn't say that of her that's earned a good bit of money for me-earned enough to pay for the new one, Katie-the new one that'll be ready for me the next trip in. And then, Katie dear, we'll see-as good as anything of her length and beam out the port. And have you picked a name for her yet? Yes? The Dannie Keating, indeed! No, no, I've a ten times better one-and you'd never guess, I'll bet. And she'll be a vessel! Every cent that you saved for me, dear, went into her."

"You saved it yourself, Dannie."

"I saved? Lord bless you, Katie, how much would ever I save if I hadn't turned it over to you as fast as I made it? How much did I save before I met you? A whole lot, warn't it now? Why, girl, the very oilskins I used to wear would be drawn

against my next trip. But it don't matter which of us- - every cent the pair of us have saved has gone into her. And she'll be a vessel, and then, if any man sailing out of this port thinks to make me take my mains'l in

"Hush, Dannie, don't begin by being reckless. And I wish you weren't going out in the Pantheon again. She's so old, Dannie, and not the vessel for a winter trip to Georges."

"Well, there is better. But she's been a good vessel to me, dear, and that means to you, too. And only one more trip and then the fast and the saucy-the handsome Katie Morrison."

He parted from her after that, and from the shadow of the doorway she looked after him—her heart jumping and herself all but running after him. Up the street she watched him swing, so straight and strong. Oh, but the shoulders of him! and the spring to his every stride! Then she breathed a prayer for him and went upstairs and to her bed.

But she could not sleep. All night long she tossed, whatever it was possessed her; and in the dawn she got up to watch by the window until he could come by on his way to the vessel.

He would come by, she knew. He never yet failed to go that half dozen streets out of his way so that he might look up at her window. Oh, the times that she watched from behind the curtains-before she knew him well, that was-and he never suspecting!

And he came at last. It was but five o'clock then, and dark—a winter morning. But she needed no light. Long before she could make out his figure she knew his footfall. How lightly he trod for so big a man -to his toes at every stride, as a strong man should. No doubt or hesitation there --a man to go winter fishing that, and enjoy every whistling breath of it. And he was singing now!

"O sweetheart dear, I love thee!"

When a man sings a love-song at five

"Don't go yet-just a minute more, dear."

He patted her cheek and dried her eyes, and when she wouldn't stop sobbing, he unbuttoned his coat and made her rest her head on his breast. Her ear against the blue flannel shirt, she could feel his heart. And it was a heart-like all of himself, full of strength. A cold winter's morning it was, but here all afire. He was right-it would be a storm indeed when he went under. And yet—she could not help it—she broke into sobbing again.

"What's it now?”

"Oh Dannie, last night after I left you I

"Old? So she is. Not the vessel the Katie 'll be-not by a dozen ratings. But Lord, Katie, I've been through too many blows in her for you to be worrying now, dear."

"I know it, Dannie, and yet I wish you weren't going this trip."

"Well, I wish I warn't myself. I'd like nothing better than to be staying this month home and watching the new one buildingto overhaul every plank and bolt and thread of oakum that's put in her. All day long watch her building and every night come and tell you how she is getting on, the pair of us side by side before the fire. That'd beat winter fishing on Georges-fighting your way out of the shoal water when it comes a no'the-easter and chopping ice off her to keep her afloat when it comes a no'wester. Yes, dear, it cert'nly would be a comfort-home here with you and watching the Katie building. But we can't both have comfort, dear. You to home and me to sea we'll have to be for many years yet, dear. I'll go out this trip as I went out a hundred of others before. When I'm back-why, 'twill be worth the trip, dear-that coming back to you."

"I'll be at the dock this time, Dannie." "Then the old Pantheon won't be too close to the slip before somebody'll be making a flying leap for the cap-log. There, there, dear, this one trip, and then it'll be Mrs. Dannie Keating and a month ashore hah, what! There's the girl. But God bless you, dear, and keep you till I'm home again." "Good luck, Dannie. There, but Oh Dannie?"

"Yes?"

had been given up for lost. Did you know?" "I've heard, dear.” "And you never told me. the danger is small

You tell me

'And 'tis small, dear. Sea room and sound gear, and a good vessel will live forever. Of course, accidents will happensometimes something parting at the wrong time, or being run down by a steamer in the fog-which was what happened, I don't doubt, to the Tempest."

"Well, whether she was run down by a steamer or caught in the shoals or foundered in the heavy seas, isn't it all the same to the wives and children of the Tempest's crew? Think of young Captain Rush's wife. What an awful thing for her, Dannie!"

"I know, dear, I know. But hush now that's the girl. And don't worry for me. Though they come masthead high and toss us like we're a pine chip, I've only to think of you, Katie, here in the doorway looking down the street after me-and last look for me before I turn the corner. Only to think of that and I'll laugh-laugh out loud at them. 'Come on, you green-backed devils,' I'll say. 'Come on! You'd overpower us, would you? Higher yet, high as the clouds if you want, and the Pantheon she'll ride you down.' And she will, too, Katie

the old Pantheon's a wonder hove-to. Yes, Katie, only last trip I hollered like that to 'em one night and

"Oh, but you mustn't, Dannie-it's like boasting."

"Boasting? No, but seamanship, girl seamanship. -seamanship. It's knowing, not guessing-knowing how to handle her. Just sail enough and wheel enough and your wake setting so's to break the backs of them