"I calc'lated I'd be welcome--for a while at least--to Sarah and her folks. She writ me more'n a year ago she'd make a warm nest for me if I come here. An' whatever! she's makin' it warm enough, for a fac'." "And you really have no fortune at all?" repeated 'Liphalet in wonder. "Not a snitch," returned Cap'n Jonah. "That's the bald truth. Ev'rything I own of value I have right in my pocket here," he slapped the breast of his coat, "an' it ain't makin' me stoop-shouldered none carryin' of it around." CHAPTER IX A SHELL ROAD IDYL "I wouldn't so much care about myself," Cap'n Jonah went on reflectively after a minute. "There's always the Sailors' Snug Harbor, and I've made inquiries about that. I've got money enough right now, if I don't let Sarah Petty take no more away from me, to buy my way into the Harbor, where I'll prob'ly get decent treatment for the rest of my life. "Course, livin' in an institution," sighed the captain, "an' being called an inmate in the yearly reports, ain't prob'ly all it's cracked up to be. But I jest 'bout as soon live with a steam calliope as with Sarah Petty; and Orrin pesters me like an auger going through a pine knot. "It ain't so much myself," repeated Cap'n Jonah, "as 'tis the way they treat that poor gal, Pearly. I can scurcely keep my feelin's to myself sometimes when they are a-houndin' of that poor gal." "Yep. I've heard tell of it," Mr. Truitt said, nodding. "Miss Sue said to me once't she didn't see how the gal stood it." "Sarah Petty claims her services, I believe, and the gal says herself she ain't eighteen. Sarah don't care a mite how bad she treats me; how much less does she care how she makes Pearly feel? Whatever!" "It's a master hard situation," admitted Mr. Truitt frankly. "'Hem! I know what would fix 'em," growled Cap'n Jonah. "If I did have the slew of money they at first thought I might have, I could bully 'em into treatin' the gal half decent, I vow! Now they've gone all through my duds and duffel an' ain't found so much as a pen scratch about a fortune, Sarah and Orrin air 'bout convinced I ain't got much laid by." "By Hannah!" ejaculated 'Liphalet, his eyes widening. "If you could fool 'em--if you could make 'em think you did have a fortune, Cap'n Jonah----" "Whatever!" responded the master mariner. "How could I do that? Nothin' but hard cash would convince Sarah and Orrin Petty, I allow. And hard cash I ain't got." "There ought to be some way to fool 'em," insisted 'Liphalet. "We'd ought to be able to think up something." "Think up what?" growled Cap'n Jonah, shaking his head. "I ain't got the conscience to try to sell them old ile sheers I hold. Though I calc'late Orrin would ha' bit on them when I first come."