"Yes, mother is tremendously industrious in lamplighters," remarked Dolly. "Her only grief is that she cannot send them to the Indian missions. You can send _almost_ everything to the Indian missions; but somehow lamplighters fill no void." "Do you mean the new mission we are to have here--the Indians at the fort?" asked Walter Willoughby. "They are having a big dance to-night." Ruth looked up. "Should you like to see it?" he went on, instantly taking advantage of an opportunity to please her. "Nothing easier. We could watch it quite comfortably, you know, from the ramparts." "I should like it ever so much! Let us go at once, before it is over!" exclaimed Ruth, eagerly. "Ruth! Ruth!" said her mother. "After travelling all day, Mr. Chase may be tired." "Not at all, ma'am," said Chase. "I don't take much stock in Indians myself," he went on, to his wife. "Do you really want to go?" "Oh yes, Horace. Please." "And the commodore will go with _me_," said Mrs. Kip, turning her soft eyes towards Etheridge, who went down before the glance like a house of cards. "But we must take Evangeline Taylor home first," said Mrs. Kip. "We'll go round by way of Andalusia, commodore. It would never do to let her see an Indian dance at _her_ age," she added, affectionately, lifting her hand high to pat her daughter's aerial cheek. "It would make her tremble like a babe." "Oh, _did_ you hear her 'baddish'!" said Dolly, as, a few minutes later, they went up the steps that led to the sea-wall, Chase and Walter Willoughby, Ruth and herself. "And did you hear her 'boat-drive'? She has become so densely confused by hearing Achilles Larue inveigh against the use of 'ride' for 'drive' that now she thinks everything must be drive." Chase and Walter Willoughby smiled; but not unkindly. There are some things which the Dolly Franklins of the world are incapable, with all their cleverness, of comprehending; one of them is the attraction of a sweet fool. The sea-wall of St. Augustine stretches, with its smooth granite coping, along the entire front of the old town, nearly a mile in length. On the land side its top is but four or five feet above the roadway; towards the water it presents a high, dark, wet surface, against which comes the wash of the ocean, or rather of the inlet; for the harbor is protected by a long, low island lying outside. It is this island, called Anastasia, that has the ocean beach. The walk on top of the wall is just wide enough for two. Walter Willoughby led the way with Dolly, and Chase and his wife followed, a short distance behind.