"There comes the mail boat," interrupted Bartlett firmly.
Billy looked at it and sighed. It was the last of August and Jeroboam
Martin had not come. Had he forgotten her in two short months?
Bartlett laid his hand tenderly on her shoulder. "Forget him, girlie.
He's not worthy of you."
"He said he would come," whispered Billy.
"If he doesn't, dear, you have me. We have stood together through
everything for eighteen years and will stand, still, eh, Billy?"
Billy bent her head and rubbed her cheek against the hand on her
shoulder with a half laugh and a half sob.
With the first sight of the smoke on the horizon, heralding the approach
of the principal event of the day, the arrival of the evening mail, a
crowd had begun to gather, the usual motley crowd of a summer resort on
the coast. Townspeople hung indifferently on the outskirts, while the
summer visitors, in dainty dresses and baggy trousers, sun-burnt,
jovial, indefatigable, pressed to the front. The hum of talk and
laughter grew as the crowd grew, good-natured, meaningless chatter. The
sight of the _Mary Gloucester_, steaming gracefully into port, was
greeted with a gay flutter of handkerchiefs and straw hats, and Billy
and Bartlett, standing where the yacht would dock, were soon the center
of the laughing, merry crowd, ready and eager to welcome home the stout
widow, her unfortunate chaperon and the two "supplements," as a village
wag called the fat Henry and the slim Bertie.
As the yacht drew near, the widow's corpulent form was seen by the rail,
on one side a tall youth, and on the other, two, side by side and
apparently in no very good humor.
"Three, by George," cried Blatts, a prosperous brewer from Milwaukee.
"She left here with two and returns with three. Where did she get him,
Bartlett?"
But Bartlett did not answer, did not hear. The gang-plank had been
lowered and he was watching in numb fascination, the tall youth walking
beside the widow, her ridiculous dog in his arms. It was Jeroboam
Martin in an immaculate white suit of Bertie's. His hat was off and his
hair, after the swim, gleamed soft and yellow. For the sake of the
widow upon whose boat he found himself, he had shaved as well as he
could with Henry's razor, and while his cheeks were smooth enough, he
still wore a small yellow mustache and goatee. Both were brushed until
they shone like his hair and they lent a fascinating and distinctly
foreign air to his long, thin, clever face. In his arms was the little
dog with its enormous bow of sky-blue ribbon.
Bartlett wondered if he were going mad and seeing things that were not
so. At two, or thereabouts, he had seen Martin, dirty, shabby, tired,
and had given him money on which to get drunk. At seven, a yacht, which
had not been in Westhaven for over a week, carefully deposits the youth,
clean, fresh, well-dressed at his very side. Was he mad?
Billy, too, had seen, but did not wonder. She knew he was a tramp, for
he had said he was, but she never thought of him or pictured him other
than well-dressed, well-cared for, gently blase and a bit languid. She
looked at him now over the heads of the intervening crowd and her heart
did not question how he came there, only rushed out to him with the
gladness in her eyes, the joyous smile on her parted lips. He had said
he would come, and there he was. Further she did not question. Their
eyes met over the heads of the people, eager questioning in his, joyful
answer in hers.
Hastily he dropped the pup with the sky-blue bow upon the wharf, among
the plebeian feet there assembled, and reaching Billy's side through the
crowd, grabbed both small hands and stood laughing down at her.
[Illustration: And stood laughing down at her]
"Billy," he whispered, "Oh, you Billy."
There was, there must be some explanation, Bartlett told himself
desperately. It could not be that this was not Martin? Bartlett had
not slept with the youth for nearly a week without being pretty familiar
with the long lank form, the thin, careless face. And it was equally
impossible that the forlorn piece of humanity who had stood that
afternoon in the drawing-room and inquired for Billy was not Martin.
They were one and the same and once more he and Billy had met on equal
footing. To ask the boy again to get drunk was an absurdity.
"I suppose I can give him a job where he won't have much more to do than
draw his pay," thought Bartlett, hopelessly, dazedly.
The Watermelon dropped Billy's hands and turned to her father in
well-bred greeting, but their eyes met and in the Watermelon's was grim
defiance. He had seen Billy again and nothing could part them now. All
his humility and repentance had gone, and in their place was his
old-time arrogance and sublime self-assurance. Fate in the form of a
little white dog had brought him and Billy together again, with the
Watermelon, still clean, still well-dressed, and to all outward
appearances the same as the other gay youths of Billy's acquaintance.
With head up, jaw shut, he scorned to lower himself for any one. He
would prove himself worthy, not unworthy of Billy. Out of his
repentance had grown his manhood. He was no nameless hobo of the great
army of the unemployed. He was Jeroboam Martin, son of the late
Reverend Mr. Martin, in temporary financial embarrassment that could be
soon remedied. He would work for Billy and they would be happy on his
wages. He drew himself up and held out his hand. Bartlett could take
it or not as he pleased. The Watermelon had sought or desired no man's
favor, and Jeroboam Martin would not stoop to do so.
For one second the two stared at each other grimly, square jaws shut,
lips unsmiling, then Bartlett's hand shot forth and he clasped the
Watermelon's.
"Ah, Martin," said he, "how are you, boy?"
And still holding him by the hand, he patted the Watermelon on his arm,
jovially. After all he liked the boy, and right or wrong, wise or
foolish, fate was against any other action, fate in the form of a
half-drowned poodle dog.
The Watermelon rested his arm on Bartlett's shoulder with boyish
affection. "Say, Bartlett," said he in a low voice, "I got drunk,
honest to rights. But it was so blamed hot, I cooled off in the ocean
before I knew what I was about and that sobered me up again. Then I saw
something fall from the yacht and I thought it was a kid from the noise
they were making, not just a pup. I swam out to help and of course they
hauled me on board, and now the widow is planning to marry me."
Bartlett roared. "Say, boy, er--er--maybe you need a loan until I can
see about that job for you."
Once more their eyes met and this time in complete and tender accord.
"You're all right," whispered the Watermelon, his face softening. "And
don't you worry about Billy," he added, "I'll take care of her."