"Wish he'd hev tried it," said the brother, with a superior smile, but a quickly rising color. "Where d'ye suppose I'D hev been all the while?" Maggie saw her mistake, and for the first time in her life resolved to keep a secret from her brother--overnight. "Supper's gettin' cold," she said, rising. They went into the dining-room--an apartment as plainly furnished as the one they had quitted, but in its shelves, cupboards, and closely fitting boarding bearing out the general nautical suggestion of the house--and seated themselves before a small table on which their frugal meal was spread. In this tete-a-tete position Jim suddenly laid down his knife and fork and stared at his sister. "Hello!" "What's the matter?" said Maggie, starting slightly. "How you do skeer one." "Who's been prinkin', eh?" "My ha'r was in kinks all along o' that hat," said Maggie, with a return of higher color, "and I had to straighten it. It's a boy's hat, not a girl's." "But that necktie and that gown--and all those frills and tuckers?" continued Jim generalizing, with a rapid twirling of his fingers over her. "Are you expectin' Judge Martin, or the Expressman this evening?" Judge Martin was the lawyer of Logport, who had proven her father's will, and had since raved about his single interview with the Kingfisher's beautiful daughter; the Expressman was a young fellow who was popularly supposed to have left his heart while delivering another valuable package on Maggie in person, and had "never been the same man since." It was a well-worn fraternal pleasantry that had done duty many a winter's evening, as a happy combination of moral admonition and cheerfulness. Maggie usually paid it the tribute of a quick little laugh and a sisterly pinch, but that evening those marks of approbation were withheld. "Jim dear," said she, when their Spartan repast was concluded and they were reestablished before the living-room fire. "What was it the Redwood Mill Kempany offered you for that piece near Dead Man's Slough?" Jim took his pipe from his lips long enough to say, "Ten thousand dollars," and put it back again. "And what do ye kalkilate all our property, letting alone this yer house, and the driftwood front, is worth all together?" "Includin' wot the Gov'nment owes us?--for that's all ours, ye know?" said Jim quickly. "No--leavin' that out--jest for greens, you know," suggested Maggie. "Well nigh onter a hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars, I reckon, by and large." "That's a heap o' money, Jim! I reckon old Kernel Preston wouldn't raise that in a hundred years," continued Maggie, warming her knees by the fire. "In five million years," said Jim, promptly sweeping away further discussion. After a pause he added, "You and me, Mag, kin see anybody's pile, and go 'em fifty thousand better."