Only trouble is, he didn't seem to go quite
deep enough into her antecedents, as the feller said. He bought her
on the strength of her condition and the way she sailed on a trial
trip."
"Well, isn't that all right?" asked his listener. "How would one go
about buying a ship?"
"Huh--ship? Well, a schooner ain't a ship, Miss Bostwick.
Howsomever, buying a schooner is like buying a race horse. You want
to know _his_ pedigree. They said the _Seamew_ had been brought up
from the Gulf to sell. And maybe she was. But she is Yankee built,
every timber and rope of her. She warn't built down South none."
"Shouldn't that make the bargain all the more satisfactory?"
queried the girl, smiling.
"Ordinarily, yes, ma'am. But it looks like they was hidin'
something. It looks like, too, she was built for sailing and
fishing, not to be a cargo boat."
"I think she is beautiful."
"She is sightly, I grant ye," said Horace. "But there's something to
be considered 'sides looks when a man is putting his money into a
craft. As I say, her pedigree oughter be looked up. What was the
schooner before they changed the slant of them masts, painted her
over, and put a new name under her stern?"
"I don't understand you at all, Mr.
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