"Janet!" he whispered. "One moment, little girl!" She turned a full look upon him. A look of love, of question, of joy! "Not yet. Come!" she repeated, and paused at the foot of the steps for him to join her. On the sheltered side of the tower, in an easy-chair, sat Cap'n Billy. Davy was hovering over him, good-naturedly scolding him for the exertion he had made in getting to the balcony. "The next time, Billy, that ye take it in t' yer head t' come up here, by gum! I'm goin' t' hist ye up from the outside, same as if ye war ile! How are ye, Mr. Thornly?" he cried, turning quickly. "Take a seat on the railin'. 'T ain't what ye might call soft an' yieldin', but there's plenty of it, there bein' no beginnin' or endin'." He laughed and sighed in quite the old way. Billy's sickness had brought back the sigh. Thornly bent over Billy in greeting, and then seated himself where he could look into all three faces. Janet sank upon a stool at Cap'n Billy's feet. "You know why I have waited, Cap'n Billy, for this day?" he said. He could not resort to lesser means, when simple directness would be better understood. Davy plunged his hands into his pockets and clutched the courage that was supposed to lie there along with the pipe and tobacco. Cap'n Billy with quaint dignity put his thin, brown hand upon Janet's bowed head, and answered in kind. "I do that, Mr. Thornly. Out there on the beach arter I come in t' consciousness, I done a heap o' thinkin', an' t'-day I told Davy I knowed ye would come, an' I wanted t' freshen up on the balcony 'fore we talked over the present and--the past!" "Can't we let the past go, Cap'n?" Thornly asked gently. "You know it can never matter to me. The future is all that I want." Billy shook his head. "Them's good heartsome words!" Davy broke in, tugging energetically at his pockets. "An' spoke like a man, by gum! Let well enough alone, Billy. You an' Janet is goin' t' stay right on at the Light, an' we'll start in fresh from now!" When had Davy been a coward before? But Billy's "works" might take to running down again, and that fear quelled Davy's daring. But again Billy shook his head. "'Course the government ain't goin' t' take on an old feller like me," he said, "'specially when he has t' be towed in himself when he's most needed t' lend a hand; an' I ain't above takin' a place in the Light, Davy, when I pull myself up sufficient, but I want once an' fur all t' clar the air 'bout Janet." His troubled eyes looked pleadingly across the sunny bay toward the Station that had been his resting place and home for so long. "The old see mighty clar, Mr. Thornly," he said, turning his gaze to the present. "An' as ye git near port it's amazin' how the big things, the real things, hold yer thoughts an' longin's. I ain't done my whole duty by my little gal, an' the fact shadders my days." "Don't say that, Cap'n Daddy!" Janet pressed closer to him. "You have done your own duty and the duty of the whole world by me!"