The Cape Girardeau Democrat. (Cape Girardeau, Mo.) 1876-1909, 1894-12-15
~d'm! Funnyl" said Richard.

1AS
anew, this time in earnest.
Richard! See! We're On the rocks"
Richard looked, and at once realized
that the tide was sweeping them on
the headland in spite of the wind. He
lost his head then, and began pulling
aimlessly at ropes. muttering the
while: You're all right, you're all
right. Don't get alarmed"
There's some one in a boat there
hailing you" said Dolly, pale with ex-
element, and pointing to a light
cocklesheil of a dingey, with a lug
sail, which was approaching them on
the lee bow. Richard listened.
You'll be ashore if you don't mind"
came a thin, far-off shout.
There, there, 1 told you!" Mrs.
Markheim almost sobbed.
Richard called back some unintel-
ligible reply.
Help! Helpr' shouted his aunt,
with more sense. The little boat rap
idly approached them, dancing lightly
over the waves like an animated cork.
Its occupant proved to be a girl. She
was dressed in blue serge with a Tam
o'Shanter hat. SkiIlfully steering her
dingey alongside the kestrel, she low
cred the sail with a run. threw Rich
ard a line, and was on board in a
twinkling. Richard raised his hat,
feeling eXquisitely foolish, and STAN
mered that the yacht would persist in
hanging in the wind. They were not
seventy yards from the rocks now.
'Oh, do something" gasped Mrs
Markheim. You seem to know-er-
about these things.
The girl put up the helm and sharp
ly told Richard to keep it there. He
said to himself that he would sooner
have gone down with all on board'
than be rescued in this way by n girl.
And on his own yacht, too! Now she
ooh the helm from him, and Richard
saw hat in some miraculous q the
Kestrel was moving again, the sails all
drawing, and the dingey towing
astern. They were saved.
This is a story of two meetings, and
that was the first.
To say the least, it was ignominious
for Richard, and very informal all
round. Mrs. Markheim, overlooking
with gratitude, renewed again and
again the thanksgiving of herself and
her daughter and begged to have their
~savior's name. "Fenella M~arston,"
came the shy answer, and Richard,
full of discontinue and speeches.
ness as he was, had wit enough left to
admire in secret such a pref
ty name as Fenella. 1t appeared that
Fenella lived with her father in a lone
house among the hills between Port
Erin and Peel, and, "she must
go al once" she said, when the poor,
fiuttering Kestrel had once more
reached the shelter of the quay wall.
A year passed, and Richard was
again yachting at Port Erin. this time
alone. Mrs. Markheim had graciously
asked him to join herself and Dolly at |
Fecamp, but for some inexplicable
reason he had declined the invitation,
much to every ones surprise, for
every one. including Dolly, imagined
that he was in love with Dolly. For
his own part, he was not quite certain
on hat point, and he determined to
spend Il week or two in solitude at
Port Erin, with his darling Kestrel.
by the way, he could now han
die with some skill, in order that he
commune with himself and ex-
plore the deep recesses of his feelings
the adorable Dolly. Adorable
she certainly was-that he admitted.
Roo t,tiful irSt n fSn,ap t1p rn+,,;-r |
bookishly clever and full of sympathy
for his literary ambitions, she seemed
just the woman to make him happy
though married. But - but-but-
well, it is impossible to conceal the
fact hat Fenella was continually in
the background of Richards thoughts.
Although the memory of her was con-
nected with the one miserable Incl
lent of a brilliant career, he liked to
call up the picture, as she moved rap
idly about his yacht. engaged in saw
ing it and him and Dolly and Dolly's
mamma from a watery grave.
One day he had sailed the Kestrel to
Peel. Tide and wind initiated against
him getting her back before nightfall,
and he determined to walk home to
Port Erin, ten miles over the noun
tains, and return for the yacht on the
morrow. The route from Peel, pro-
vided one avoids the carriage roads, is
as wild and weird as a person could
wish. After leaving the quaint old
town and the quaint old towns new,
vast hotel, one begins to climb almost
Immediately, and all the way the
cloud-wrapped top of South Barrule
appears and disappears like a ~revolv-
ing light. 1t was late in the after
noon when Richard started, and he
found the hill paths, at no time con-
gested with the traffic, now quite de-
serted. -Four miles from Peel n of
those drifting, binding nists, for
which the Isle of Man is famous, sud-
denly o~bliterated the landscape, and
when it happily cleared away, after
about a quarter of an hour, Richard
was well lost. He sat down on q
bowlder to study a small pocket map,
but to no purpose. Then he jumped
up for he heard q nan whistling.
Presently the whistler appeared in
sight. but she was a woman, a woman
in a serge frock and a Tam O'Shanter
hat, and carrying a bag. She was
walking rapidly, and when she caught
sight of Richard she suddenly ceased
making music and involuntarily slack