Frank R. Stockton

“ Dickory!" shouted the woman, "what is that you are bringing home? Is it a great fish?"
"It is a young woman," said the boy, "but she is as wet as a fish."
"Woman!" cried good Dame Charter. "What mean you, Dickory, is she dead?"
"Not dead, Mother Charter," said Kate, who now stood, unassisted, in the light of the lantern, "but in woeful case, and more like to startle you than if I were the biggest fish. I am Mistress Kate Bonnet, just out of the river between here and the town. No, I will not enter your house, I am not fit; I will stand here and tell my tale."
"Dickory!" ”

“ He is of no good on a ship."
On this, Dickory's heart fell further. He had been troubled about the Scotchman, but had tried not to think of him.
"The scoundrels have stolen them both, with the vessel," he said; and as he spoke his soul rose upward at the thought of what he had done for Kate; and as that had been done, what mattered it after all what had happened to other people?
Five minutes afterward a man came running through the town with the news that old Bonnet's daughter, Miss Kate, had also gone away in the ship. She was not at home; she was not in the town. ”

“ The good Major Bonnet has gone off pirating; he thinks he can make more money that way than by attending to his plantation. The townspeople suspected him last night, and now they know what he is."
At this moment Master Dickory jumped upon the baker, and both went down. When Dickory got up, the baker remained where he was, and it was plain enough to everybody that the nerves and muscles of even a vigorous young man were greatly weakened by the confined occupation of a baker. ”