"You'd better hurry; she sails at high tide." "Sails!" "Alton told me so, and said that he was going along." "Thank Heaven for that, anyhow, but--I don't understand about the other." Boyd voiced the question that was foremost in his mind. "Did you know Cherry in the 'upper country'?" "Nope." "She said you did." "She said that?" "Yes. She thought you had told me who she was." "Hell! She might have known I'd never crack. It's her own business, and--I've got troubles enough with this cannery on my hands." "I wish you had told me," said Emerson. "Why? There's no use of rehearsing the dog-eared dope. Nobody can live the past over again, and who wants to repeat the present? It's only the future that's worth while. I guess her future is just as good as anybody's." "What she told me came as a shock." "Fingerless" Fraser grunted. "I don't know why. For my part, I can't stand for an ingenue. If ever I get married, Cherry's the sort for me. I'm out of the kindergarten myself, and I'd hate to spend my life cutting paper figures for my wife. No, sir! If I ever seize a frill, I want her to know as much as me; then she won't tear away with the first dark-eyed diamond broker that stops in front of my place to crank up his whizz-buggy. You never heard of a wise woman breaking up her own home, did you? It's the pink-faced dolls from the seminary that fall for Bertie the Beautiful Cloak Model." Fraser whittled himself a toothpick as he went on: "A feller in my line of business don't gather much useful information, but he certainly gets Jerry to the female question in all its dips, angles, and spurs. Cherry Malotte is the squarest girl I ever saw, and while she may have been crowded at the turn, she'll finish true. It takes a thoroughbred to do that, and the guy that gets her will win his Derby. Now, those fillies on the yacht, for instance, warm up fine, but you can't tell how they'll run." "We're not talking of marriage," said Boyd, as he rose. When he had gone out, Fraser ruminated aloud: "Maybe not! I ain't very bright, and we may have been talking about the weather. However, if you're after that wild-flower dame with the cold-storage talk instead of Cherry Malotte, why, I hope you get her. There's no accounting for tastes. I certainly did my best to send you along this morning." Turning to the Jap steward, he remarked, sagely: "My boy, always remember one thing--if you can't boost, don't knock."