Catherine's mouth shut grimly and her lids drooped over her eyes. "Plan some other career, my son. Your father didn't fight, anyway. Did he say he did?" "Now, Catherine, I just told them about the camp at Brest." Catherine looked at her husband, a long, quiet glance. Then she followed Spencer into the kitchen. "Oh, 'Melia!" The heat from the stove rushed at her. "You built a fire to-night!" "Yes, I did." Amelia, a small, wiry, faded Maine woman, turned from the table. "That oil stove's acting queer, and anyways, it don't seem as if you could fry fish on it." "We might eat them raw, then, instead of sweltering." Catherine pushed her sleeves above her elbows, and reached for a knife. "Now that's a real pretty ketch, ain't it?" Amelia nodded at Spencer, who watched while the flounders were slipped from the cord into the sink. Catherine cleaned the fish. She left Amelia to fry them while she set the table. The heat from the kitchen crept into the long, low dining room. Then Catherine drew Letty, protesting shrilly, into the bedroom, where she undressed and bathed her. When she had slipped the nightie over the small yellow head, she kissed her. "Now you find Daddy, and I'll have Amelia bring your milk out to the porch." She called Marian, who came on a run, peeling her jumper over her head. "Can I put on my white sailor suit to show Daddy, Muvver?" She dragged it from the clothes-press. "Oooh! That's cold water!" She wriggled under Catherine's swift fingers. "There, little eel." Catherine knotted the blue tie. "Run along. Where's Spencer?" "He's washing hisself, I think." Marian smoothed up her blue sock with a little preening motion, and vanished. "Mis' Hammond!" came Amelia's thin call, and Catherine went back to the kitchen. Letty was in bed on the porch, her smeary white duck sitting on the pillow beside her, her deep little voice running on in an unintelligible story of the day. "Supper ready, Catherine?" Father stood in the doorway of the dining room, Marian and Spencer at his heels. "We fishermen are starved. Oh, you aren't dressed yet." "I'm as dressed as I shall be." Catherine pushed her hair back from a moist forehead. "Let's eat." "Well, we like to see you dressed up like a lady once a day, don't we?" Charles grinned at her as he pulled up his chair. Catherine felt her hands twitch in her lap. "Steady," she warned herself. "He's just joking. I've been busy--I should have dressed this afternoon----" "Some flounder!" Charles bit into the golden brown fish. "What you been doing all the time, Catherine, while we went provender hunting?" "Thinking," said Catherine slowly. "That is, I thought in between Letty's demands for more story." "What did you think about, Mother?" Spencer's face lighted with quick curiosity.