"What's that? Read that last over again," he demanded.
"'When they had come within a few boat's lengths,'" read Condy,
"'they were able to read the schooner's name, painted in showy
gilt letters upon her garboard streak.'"
"My God!" gasped the Captain, clasping his head. Then, with a
shout: "Garboard streak! garboard streak? Don't you know that the
garboard streak is the last plank next the keel? You mean counter,
not garboard streak. That regularly graveled me, that did!"
They stayed to dinner with the couple that afternoon, and for half
an hour afterward K. D. B. told them of the wonders of the caves
of Elephantis. One would have believed that she had actually been
at the place. But when she changed the subject to the science of
fortification, Blix could no longer restrain herself.
"But it is really wonderful that you should know all these things!
Where did you find time to study so much?"
"One must have an education," returned K. D. B. primly.
But Condy had caught sight of a half-filled book-shelf against the
opposite wall, and had been suddenly smitten with an inspiration.
On a leaf of his notebook he wrote: "Try her on the G's and H's,"
and found means to show it furtively to Blix. But Blix was
puzzled, and at the earliest opportunity Condy himself said to the
retired costume reader:
"Speaking of fortifications, Mrs. Hoskins, Gibraltar now--that's a
wonderful rock, isn't it?"
"Rock!" she queried.
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