question. Captain Cy had reached the scene of battle.

Then the rescuer's courage seemed to desert her, for she ran back to the cemetery even faster than she had run from it. When the indignant captain, having pursued and chastised the cow until the stick was but a splintered remnant, reached the haven behind the iron fence, he found her soothing the frightened Bos'n who was sobbing and hysterical.

Emily saw her "Uncle Cyrus" coming and rushed into his arms. He picked her up and, holding her with a grip which testified to the nerve strain he had been under, stepped forward to meet the stranger, whose coming had been so opportune.

And she WAS a stranger. The captain knew most of Bayport's inhabitants by this time, or thought he did, but he did not know her. She was a small woman, quietly dressed, and her hair, under a neat black and white hat, was brown. The hat was now a trifle to one side and the hair was the least bit disarranged, an effect not at all unbecoming. She was tucking in the stray wisps as the captain, with Bos'n in his arms, came up.

"Well, ma'am!" puffed Captain Cy. "WELL, ma'am! I must say that was the slickest, pluckiest thing ever I saw anywheres. I don't know what would--I--I declare I don't know how to thank you."

The lady looked at him a moment before replying. Then she began to laugh, a jolly laugh that was pleasant to hear.

"Don't try, please," she said chokingly. "It wasn't anything. Oh, mercy me! I'm all out of breath. You see, I had been warned about that cow when I started to walk this afternoon. So when I saw her chasing your poor little girl here I knew right away what was the matter. It must have been foolish enough to look at. I'm used to dogs and cats, but I haven't had many pet cows. I told her to 'go home' and to 'scat' and all sorts of things. Wonder I didn't tell her to lie down! And the way I shook that ridiculous book at her was--"

She laughed again and the captain and Bos'n joined in the laugh, in spite of the fright they both had experienced.

"That book was dry enough to frighten almost anything," continued the lady. "It was one I took from the table before I left the place where I'm staying, and a duller collection of sermons I never saw. Oh, dear! . . . there! Is my hat any more respectable now?"

"Yes'm. It's about on an even keel, I should say. But I must tell you, ma'am, you done simply great and--"

"Seems to me the people who own that cow must be a poor set to let her make such a nuisance of herself. Did your daughter run away from you?"

"Well, you see, ma'am, she ain't really my daughter. Bos'n here-- that's my nickname for her, ma'am--she and I was out walkin'. I set down in the pines and I guess I must have dozed off. Anyhow, when I woke up she was gone, and the first thing I knew of this scrape was hearin' her hail."

The little woman's manner changed. Her gray eyes flashed indignantly.

"You dozed off?" she repeated. "With a little girl in your charge, and in the very next lot to that cow? Didn't you know the creature chased women and girls?"

"Why, yes; I'd heard of it, but--"

"It wasn't Uncle Cyrus's fault," put in Bos'n eagerly. "It was mine. I went away by myself."

Beyond shifting her gaze to the child the lady paid no attention to this remark.

"What do you think her mother 'll say when she sees that dress?" she asked.

It was Emily's best gown, the finest of the new "rig out" prepared by Miss Taylor. The girl and Captain Cy gazed ruefully at the rents and pitch stains made by the vines and pine trees.

"Well, you see," replied the abashed captain, "the fact is, she ain't got any mother."

"Oh! I beg your pardon. And hers, too, poor dear. Well, if I were you I shouldn't go to sleep next time I took her walking. Good afternoon."

She turned and calmly walked down the path. At the bend she spoke again.

"I should be gentle with her, if I were you," she said. "Her nerves are pretty well upset. Besides, if you'll excuse my saying so, I don't think she is the one that needs scolding."

They thought she had gone, but she turned once more to add a final suggestion.

"I think that dress could be fixed," she said, "if you took it to some one who knew about such things."

She disappeared amidst the graveyard shrubbery. Captain Cy and Bos'n slowly followed her. From the pasture the red and white cow sent after them a broken-spirited "Moo!"

Bos'n was highly indignant. During the homeward walk she sputtered like a damp firecracker.

"The idea of her talking so to you, Uncle Cyrus!" she exclaimed. "It wasn't your fault at all."

The captain smiled one-sidedly.

"I don't know about that, shipmate," he said. "I wouldn't wonder if she was more than half right. But say! she was all business and no frills, wasn't she! Ha, ha! How she did spunk up to that heifer! Who in the dickens do you cal'late she is?"

CHAPTER VIII

THE "COW LADY"

That question was answered the very next day. Bos'n, carefully dressed by Georgianna under the captain's supervision, and weighted down with advice and counsel from the latter, started for the schoolhouse at a quarter to nine. Only a sense of shame kept Captain Cy from walking to school with her. He spent a miserable forenoon. They were quite the longest three hours in his varied experience. The house was dreadfully lonely. He wandered from kitchen to sitting room, worried Georgianna, woke up the cat, and made a complete nuisance of himself. Twelve o'clock found him leaning over the gate and looking eagerly in the direction of the schoolhouse.

Bos'n ran all the way home. She was in a high state of excitement.

"What do you think, Uncle Cyrus?" she cried. "What DO you think? I've found out who the cow lady is!"

"The cow lady? Oh, yes, yes! Have you? Who is she?"

"She's teacher, that's who she is!"

The captain was astonished.

"No!" he exclaimed. "Phoebe Dawes? You don't say so! Well, well!"

"Yes, sir. When I went into school and found her sitting there I was so surprised I didn't know what to do. She knew me, too, and said good morning, and was I all right again and was my dress really as bad as it looked to be? I told her that Georgianna thought she could fix it, and if she couldn't, her sister could. She said that was nice, and then 'twas time for school to begin."

"Did she say anything about me?" inquired Captain Cy when they were seated at the dinner table.

"Oh, yes! I forgot. She must have found out who you are, 'cause she said she was surprised that a man who had made his money out of hides should have been so careless about the creatures that wore 'em."

"Humph! How'd she get along with the young ones in school?"

It appeared that she had gotten along very well with them. Some of the bigger boys in the back seats, cherishing pleasant memories of the "fun" they had under Miss Seabury's easy-going rule, attempted to repeat their performances of the previous term. But the very first "spitball" which spattered upon the blackboard proved a disastrous missile for its thrower.

"She made him clean the board," proclaimed Bos'n, big-eyed and awestruck, "and then he had to stand in the corner. He was Bennie Edwards, and he's most thirteen. Miss Seabury, they said, couldn't do anything with him, but teacher said 'Go,' as quiet as could be and just looked at him, and he went. And he's most as tall as she is. He did look so silly!"

The Edwards youth was not the only one who was made to "look silly" by little Miss Dawes during the first days of her stay in Bayport. She dealt with the unruly members of her classes as bravely as she had faced the Cahoon cow, and the results were just as satisfactory. She was strict, but she was impartial, and Alicia Atkins found, to her great surprise, that the daughter of a congressman was expected to study as faithfully and behave herself as well as freckled-faced Noah Hamlin, whose father peddled fish and whose everyday costume was a checkered "jumper" and patched overalls.

The school committee, that is, the majority of it, was delighted with the new teacher. Lemuel Myrick boasted loudly of his good judgment in voting for her. But Tad Simpson and Darius Ellis and others of the Atkins following still scoffed and hinted at trouble in the future.

"A new broom sweeps fine," quoted Mr. Simpson. "She's doin' all right now, maybe. Anyway, the young ones are behavin' themselves,