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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.
Then the jaws of the booms whined against the masts, and the sheets creaked, and the sails filled with roaring; and when she slid into a hollow she trampled like a woman tripped in her own silk dress, and came out, her jib wet half-way up, yearning and peering for the tall twin-lights of Thatcher's Island.
Already he had turned his horse's head toward Eastboro, and was driving off. The lawyer stood still, amazedly looking after him. Then he went into the house and spent the next quarter of an hour trying to call the Twin-Lights by telephone. As the northeast wind had finished what the northwest one had begun and the wire was down, his attempt was unsuccessful.
So in my next letter to him I described you as well as I could, mentioned that you were as good or a better swimmer than he, and asked for particulars. He answered that the only fellow he could think of who fitted your description was 'Russ' Brooks Russell, I suppose of New York; though what Russ Brooks was doing as lightkeeper's assistant at Eastboro Twin-Lights he DIDN'T know.
And may I ask what particular being is fortunate enough to employ you?" "I'm keeper down to the lighthouses, if you want to know. But I cal'late you know it already." Bennie D.'s coolness was not proof against this. He started. "The lighthouses?" he repeated. "The what is it they call them? the Twin-Lights?" "Yes. You know it; what's the use of askin' fool questions?"
He gave it up after a time and sat down to discuss the astonishing affair with his wife. He was worried. But his worriment was as nothing compared to Seth's. The lawyer's reference to the Lights had driven even matrimonial troubles from the Atkins mind. The lights! the Twin-Lights! It was long past the time for them to be lit, and there was no one to light them but Brown, a green hand.
At ten minutes before that hour the substitute assistant keeper of Eastboro Twin-Lights tiptoed silently to the bedroom of his superior and peeped in. Seth was snoring peacefully. Brown stealthily withdrew. At three, precisely, he emerged from the boathouse on the wharf, clad in his bathing suit.
He heard a shrill pow-wow of feminine voices. Evidently "New Thought" and the practice of medicine had once more clashed. The argument waxed and waned. Followed the click of a spoon against glass. And then came a gasp, a gurgle, a choking yell; and high upon the salty air enveloping Eastboro Twin-Lights rose the voice of Mr.
Neither the lightkeeper nor his helper ever saw him again, and when Seth next visited the store and solicitously inquired concerning the pup's health, Henry G. merely looked foolish and changed the subject. But the dog's short sojourn at the Twin-Lights had served to solve one mystery, that of Atkins's daily excursions to Pounddug Slough.
The fog shut them in again almost immediately, but that one glance was sufficient to show that all was well at the post he had deserted. The fiery eyes were the lanterns in the Twin-Lights towers. John Brown had been equal to the emergency, and the lamps were lighted. Seth's anxiety was relieved, but that one glimpse made him even more eager for home.
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