John stood looking at me blankly.

"You savee, John?" said I, showing him one of the canvasbacks, and he

remarked mildly, "All litee." If anything, his lunch was better than

his breakfast, and when I saw him take Jimmy's funny little turtle

from him and examine it with appraising eye, I felt fairly well

convinced that we should not suffer at the dinner hour.

But though a certain gaiety now came to others of the party as we sat

about our midday meal, warm now and well fed, and although the boys

excitedly made plans about putting up the tent and furnishing it and

going into camp for the winter, I could not share their eagerness.

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There was one other reticent figure at our fireside. Helena sat

silent, the head of Partial in her lap. I felt resentment that she

should steal from me even my dog. At last, having nothing better to

do, I picked up my gun, and slipping on my coat, started down the

beach, telling the boys that I was going alone, perhaps too far for

them to follow, with the purpose of making some sort of an exploration

of the island.

Moody and depressed, not in the least well satisfied with life, even

with matters thus so far more fortunate than we had so recently had

reason to expect, I walked along the hard sand, sometimes looking at

the long lines of wild fowl streaming in above the fresh-water lagoon,

but in reality thinking but little of these. I did not at first hear

the light step which came behind me on the sand.




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