human
I tell my daughter-in-law they'll keep the moths away,
gpt
I use camphor, said Miss North,
human
Flora must bring a dust-pan.
gpt
Flora? Alfred Price said.
human
Now, what's my association with that name?
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She was our old cook, Mrs. North explained;
human
Why, yes, I did, the old man said, slowly.
gpt
Yes. I remember Flora. Well, good-bye,--Mrs. North.
human
Good-bye, Alfred. Come again,
gpt
Mother, here's your beef tea,
human
Cy, my boy, come aft and splice the main-brace. Cyrus, what a female! She knocked me higher than Gilroy's kite. And her mother was as sweet a girl as you ever saw! He drew his son into a little, low-browed, dingy room at the end of the hall. Its grimy untidiness matched the old Captain's clothes, but it was his one spot of refuge in his own house; here he could scatter his tobacco ashes almost unrebuked, and play on his harmonicon without seeing Gussie wince and draw in her breath; for Mrs. Cyrus rarely entered the
gpt
human
I worry so about its disorderliness that I won't go in, she used to say, in a resigned way. And the Captain accepted her decision with resignation of his own.
gpt
Crafts of your bottom can't navigate in these waters, he agreed, earnestly; and, indeed, the room was so cluttered with his belongings that voluminous hoop-skirts could not get steerageway.
human
He has so much rubbish, Gussie complained; but it was precious rubbish to the old man. His chest was behind the door; a blow-fish, stuffed and varnished, hung from the ceiling; two colored prints of the
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Barque _Letty M._, 800 tons, decorated the walls; his sextant, polished daily by his big, clumsy hands, hung over the mantel-piece, on which were many dusty treasures--the mahogany spoke of an old steering-wheel; a whale's tooth; two Chinese wrestlers, in ivory; a fan of spreading white coral; a conch-shell, its beautiful red lip serving to hold a loose bunch of cigars. In the chimney-breast was a little door, and the Captain, pulling his son into the room after that call upon Mrs. North, fumbled in his pocket for the key.
human
Here, he said;
gpt
She called him in. I heard her, with my own ears! 'Alfred,' she said, 'come in.' Cyrus, she has designs; oh, I worry so about it! He ought to be protected. He is very old, and, of course, foolish. You ought to check it at once.
human
Gussie, I don't like you to talk that way about my father,
gpt
You'll like it less later on. He'll go and see her to-morrow.
human
Why shouldn't he go and see her to-morrow? Cyrus said, and added a modest bad word; which made Gussie cry. And yet, in spite of what his wife called his
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Cyrus began to be vaguely uncomfortable whenever he saw his father put his pipe in his pocket and go across the street. And as the winter brightened into spring, the Captain went quite often. So, for that matter, did other old friends of Mrs. North's generation, who by-and-by began to smile at one another, and say,
human
Well, Alfred and Letty are great friends!