By God!--'t was true! A Doane without a vessel. A native who had let himself be crowded out by ignorant upstarts from a filthy dot in the sea! A man who hadn't got his bearings in the turn things had taken. Of a family who had built up a place for other folks to grow fat in. _Sure_ he was the government goat. By just being alive he kept his family from all the fancy things they might have if he was dead. Could you be more of a _goat_ than that? Agnes Cadara and Myrtie came up the street together. He had a feeling that Myrtie was _set up_ because she was walking along with Agnes Cadara. Time had been when Agnes Cadara had hung around in order to go with Myrtie! Suddenly he thought of how his wife had said maybe Agnes Cadara could wear Myrtie's shoes. He looked at Agnes Cadara's feet--at Myrtie's. Why, Myrtie looked like a kid from an orphan asylum walking along with the daughter of the big man of the town! He got up and started toward town. He wouldn't stand it! He'd show 'em! He'd buy Myrtie---- Why, he'd buy Myrtie----! He put his hand in his pocket. Change from a dollar. The rest of the week's pay had gone to Lou Hibbard for groceries. Well, he could hang it up at Wilkinson's. He'd buy Myrtie----! He came to a millinery store. There was a lot of black ribbon strewn around in the window. He stood and looked at it. Then he laughed. Just the thing! "Cheer up, Myrt," said he, when he got back home and presented it to her. "You can mourn a _little_. For that matter, you've got a _little_ to mourn about." Myrtie took it doubtfully--then wound it round her throat. She _liked_ it, and this made her father laugh. He laughed a long time--it was as if he didn't want to be left without the sound of his laughing. "There's nothing so silly as to laugh when there's nothing to laugh at," his wife said finally. "Oh, I don't know about that," said Joe Doane. "And while it's very nice to make the children presents, in our circumstances it would be better to give them useful presents." "But what's so useful as mourning?" demanded Doane. "Think of all Myrtie has got to mourn _about_. Poor, poor Myrtie--she's _got_ a father!" You can say a thing until you think it's so. You can say a thing until you make other people think it's so. He joked about standing between them and a fireless cooker until he could see them _thinking_ about it. All the time he hated his old job at the cold storage. A Doane had no business to be ashore _freezing_ fish. It was the business of a Doane to go out to sea and come home with a full vessel.