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Benijah Ellis's little, tumble-down blacksmith shop was located in the main street of Eastboro, if that hit-or-miss town can be said to possess a main street. Atkins drove up to its door, before which he found Benijah and a group of loungers inspecting an automobile, the body of which had been removed in order that the engine and running gear might be the easier reached.
For the first hundred yards he sauntered, then the saunter became a brisk walk, and when he reached the edge of the grove he was hurrying almost at a dog trot. Sometimes he carried a burden with him, a brown paper parcel brought from Eastboro, a hammer, a saw, or a coil of rope.
He did not, of course, permit him to take the night watch in the lights, but he did trust him to the extent of leaving him alone for a whole afternoon while he drove the old horse, attached to the antique "open wagon" both steed and vehicle a part of the government property over to Eastboro to purchase tobacco and newspapers at the store.
He strode along, his head down, scarcely speaking to acquaintances whom he met, until he reached the railway station, where he sat down on the baggage truck to mentally review, over and over again, the scene with Emeline and the dreadful collapse of his newborn hopes and plans. As he sat there, the door of the station opened and a man emerged, a man evidently not a native of Eastboro.
The knothole, however, commanded a view, not of the lighthouse buildings, but of the cove and the bungalow. The bungalow! Ruth Graham! Suddenly, and with a shock, flashed to his mind the thought that his imprisonment, if at all prolonged, was likely to be, not a joke, but the most serious catastrophe of his life. For Ruth Graham was going to leave the bungalow and Eastboro that very day.
Seth Atkins, keeper of the Eastboro Twin-Lights, yawned, stretched, and glanced through the seaward windows of the octagon-shaped, glass-enclosed room at the top of the north tower, where he had spent the night just passed. Then he rose from his chair and extinguished the blaze in the great lantern beside him.
He seemed much surprised to find the keeper of Eastboro Twin-Lights standing on his front step. "Why, hello, Atkins!" he cried. "What in the world are you doing over here? a night like this!" "Has has Mrs. Bascom been here? Is she here now?" panted Seth anxiously. "Mrs. Bascom? Who is Mrs. Bascom?" "She she's a friend of mine.
It was a bad night, a night during which no lightkeeper should be absent from his post. And where was Seth? Seth's drive to Eastboro was a dismal journey. Joshua pounded along over the wet sand or through ruts filled with water, and not once during the trip was he ordered to "Giddap" or "Show some signs of life."
The equipage had been hired at the Eastboro livery stable. Joshua was undergoing repairs and enjoying a much-needed rest at the blacksmith shop in the village. As they drew near the lights, Seth sighed contentedly. "Well, Emeline," he observed, "here we be, safe and sound. Home again! Yes, sir, by jiminy crimps, HOME! And you ain't goin' to Boston to-day, neither." Mrs.
Dear! dear! this, when you come to think of it, is the queerest thing altogether that ever was in the world, I guess. Us two had all creation to roam 'round in, and we landed at Eastboro Twin-Lights. It seems almost as if Providence done it, for some purpose or other." "Yes; or the other critter, for HIS purposes. How did you ever come to be keeper of a light, Seth?" "Why why I don't know.
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