"If you don't come," pursued the perfectly sober captain, "you can hand the snuff to Andy Roby, or to Josh Jones, or to 'most any of the boys. They'll be up this way pretty near every day, I shouldn't wonder." Zebedee took the hint and the dime. He was no "slow coach" if he was longshore bred. He got the chance of carrying another heavy basket of clothes out to the lines for Sheila, who rewarded him with a smile, and then he nodded to the old man as he left. "I'll bring that snuff myself, Cap'n Ira," he assured him. "Don't it beat all?" queried the captain, shaking his head reflectively, as he resumed his seat. "Don't it beat all? For old folks, Prue, we do certainly seem to be popular." "Oh, you hesh!" exclaimed his wife. But Sheila giggled delightedly. The way Cap'n Ira handled the several visitors who thereafter came to Wreckers' Head continued to amuse the girl immensely. Nor did the visits cease. The Ball homestead was no longer a lonely habitation. Somebody was forever "just stopping by," as the expression ran; and the path from the port was trodden brown and sere as autumn drew on apace. CHAPTER XIV THE HARVEST HOME FESTIVAL It was not that Sheila Macklin had no graver moments. There were nights when, in spite of her healthful weariness of body, arising from the work of the household, she lay awake for long hours of restless, anxious thought. And sometimes her pillow was wet with tears. Yet she was not of a lachrymose disposition. She could not invent imaginary troubles or build in her mind gibbets on which remorse and sorrow might hang in chains. Indeed, how could she be sorrowful? Why should she feel remorse? She had taken another girl's name and claim of parentage, and she filled a place which the other girl might have had. But the rightful owner of the name had scorned this refuge. The real Ida May Bostwick had no appreciation of what the Balls had to offer, and she had been unwilling even to open communication with her relatives down on the Cape. Besides, Tunis Latham always cheered the girl who was playing an imposter's part with the declaration that she had done just right--that without her presence on Wreckers' Head Cap'n Ira and his wife would be in a very bad way, indeed. She could see that this was so. Her coming to them had been as great a blessing in their lives as it had been in her own. She fully realized that Cap'n Ira and his wife would not have admitted her to their home and to their hearts had she come in her own person and identity. This was not so much because of their strict morality as because of their strict Puritanism. For a puritan may not be moral always, but he must be just. And justice of that character is seldom tempered by mercy. What they might have forgiven the real Ida May they could scarcely be expected to forgive a stranger.