Chapter 28 - Page 2

missed the important arteries. But
that would have been a pickle."

"Then there's no need to bother about reading up," Joan said. "And
I'm just dying to hear what it was all about. The Apostle is lying
becalmed inside the point, and her boats are out to wing. She'll
be at anchor in five minutes, and Doctor Welshmere is sure to be on
board. So all we've got to do is to make Tudor comfortable. We'd
better put him in your room under the mosquito-netting, and send a
boat off to tell Dr. Welshmere to bring his instruments."

An hour afterward, Dr. Welshmere left the patient comfortable and
attended to, and went down to the beach to go on board, promising
to come back to dinner. Joan and Sheldon, standing on the veranda,
watched him depart.

"I'll never have it in for the missionaries again since seeing them
here in the Solomons," she said, seating herself in a steamer-
chair.

She looked at Sheldon and began to laugh.

"That's right," he said. "It's the way I feel, playing the fool
and trying to murder a guest."

"But you haven't told me what it was all about."

"You," he answered shortly.

"Me? But you just said it wasn't."

"Oh, it wasn't the kiss." He walked over to the railing and leaned
against it, facing her. "But it was about you all the same, and I
may as well tell you. You remember, I warned you long ago what
would happen when you wanted to become a partner in Berande. Well,
all the beach is gossiping about it; and Tudor persisted in
repeating the gossip to me. So you see it won't do for you to stay
on here under present conditions. It would be better if you went
away."

"But I don't want to go away," she objected with rueful
countenance.

"A chaperone, then--"

"No, nor a chaperone."

"But you surely don't expect me to go around shooting every
slanderer in the Solomons that opens his mouth?" he demanded
gloomily.

"No, nor that either," she answered with quick impulsiveness.
"I'll tell you what we'll do. We'll get married and put a stop to
it all. There!"

He looked at her in amazement, and would have believed that she was
making fun of him had it not been for the warm blood that suddenly
suffused her cheeks.

"Do you mean that?" he asked unsteadily. "Why?"

"To put a stop to all the nasty gossip of the beach. That's a
pretty good reason, isn't it?"

The temptation was strong enough and sudden enough to make him
waver, but all the disgust came back to him that was his when he
lay in the grass fighting gnats and cursing adventure, and he
answered, -

"No; it is worse than no reason at all. I don't care to marry you
as a matter of expedience--"

"You are the