"Nothing could be pleasanter to me, dearest," he said, giving her his arm and beginning a leisurely promenade. "And you have left Max at the Academy again?" she said interrogatively. "How manly he grows, the dear fellow! and so handsome; he's a son to be proud of, Levis." "So his father thinks," returned the captain, with a low, happy little laugh. "My dear boy is one of God's good gifts to me." "And how evidently he admires and loves his father--as he well may, I think. He grows more and more like you in looks, too, Levis. I can imagine that at his age you were just what he is now." "No, my dear; if I am not much mistaken he is both a handsomer and a better lad than his father was at the same age." "Doubtless not half so conceited and vain as his father was then or is now," she returned, with her low, sweet silvery laugh. "There must have been a vast improvement, however, before I had the happiness of making his acquaintance." "Max's?" he queried with mock gravity. "The acquaintance of Max's father, sir," she replied demurely. "I have known the captain now for five years, and can truly say I have never seen him show such vanity and conceit as you are pleased to charge him with, or at least to say were once among his attributes; and I will not have him slandered, even by you." "Very well, then, let us change the subject of discourse." "Agreed. How soon do we leave Annapolis to pursue our homeward way?" "A little after midnight, if that plan suits my wife's wishes." "Entirely. But you are not going to remain on deck till then?" "Probably. I feel no inclination for sleep at present, and the air outside here is, as you remarked a moment since, delightful." "Especially when enjoyed in such good company, I presume?" "Yes, that makes a vast difference, of course, yet I can hardly ask you to stay very long with me; cannot have the cruelty to rob my heart's best treasure--my young and lovely wife--of her beauty sleep." "What a gallant speech!" she laughed; "it surely deserves the reward of at least another half hour of her delectable society. Ah, my best and dearest of husbands," she added in a more serious tone, "there is nothing else in the world I so keenly enjoy as these rare times when I can have you all to myself." "Yet I cannot believe they are ever more enjoyable to you than to me, my love," he returned; "sweet as your society was to me in the days of our courtship, it is, I think, even sweeter now. And I hope mine is not less enjoyable to you." "Indeed, no," she said earnestly; "you seem to grow dearer and more lovable every day that we live together; a blessing far, far beyond my deserts. Oh, I can never cease to marvel that I have won so great a prize in the matrimonial lottery."