TALL sand-hills guard the harbor at Point au Manitou; great golden cones that catch the sunlight, and form the first glimpse of land to the craft on the lakes, as they pass the straits, and sail southward toward Chicago. But if they travel by night, it is Petronel's light by which they guide their course.

Every one called it Petronel's light after the captain was crippled at the wreck of the Lucy B., from Petoskey. The Lucy B. was a big lumber boat, laden with Christmas trees, and she went ashore at the Point one bitter December night. There were Christmas trees along the icy beach for miles, Petronel remembered, and she could remember, as well, how the captain and the lifesavers had tried to bring the crew ashore, while she and her mother watched up at the lighthouse window. They had saved some of them, too. The medal on the captain's breast helped him to bear being a cripple for life, and Petronel was always so very proud and glad when the summer visitors came over to the little garden at the lighthouse, and asked to see the captain and his medal.

night, and I think those long whistles pleased her more than anything that happened in the lonely gray lighthouse far out on the Point.

The only trouble was that, after the wreck, the captain never climbed the long, winding stairs up to the great light-room again. Sometimes Petronel would go up and light the lamp, and sometimes her mother would; but, of course, way off at Washington, the official tender of the light at Point au Manitou was Captain Barty Buteau. Only the people around Manitou Islands and the lakemen knew that the real tender was Petronel. So they would always salute her when they passed. One, and two, and three whistles, the last very long drawn out. That is the way all the steamers, and lumber barges, and tugs saluted Petronel when they passed by day or

Petronel was fifteen when the captain went to his long home beyond the bar. It happened in the winter, nor'when the heavy westers would pile the ice around the light

house like great icebergs. They could hardly have pulled

"ALL THE
STEAMERS.

AND LUMBER
BARGES, AND
TUGS SALUTED

PETRONEL

WHEN THEY
PASSED."

through, and kept the light burning, if it had not been for Hardy, one of the lifesaving crew from the Point. Every day he would take the long walk down the shore from the harbor town, and see that Petronel and her mother were warm and had supplies; so that it was no wonder Petronel felt he was their best friend now that the captain was gone.

"I hope we shall always be good friends,

Hardy," she would tell him. "For I shall stay here at the Point all my life, and take care of the light, and you will be at the station all your life, and be a life-saver. I do not think the north shore could get on without us two."

Hardy did not say much. He would just smile, but surely in all the towns that edge the lakes, never was there such a smile as Hardy's, and his eyes were long and deepest blue, and they would almost shut up when he smiled. It was as if he smiled with his eyes too. Sometime, long ago, there had been a wreck, and Hardy had drifted in, like a little bobbing cork, with a lifebuoy around his fat, little body, and too much of Lake Michigan in his system for solid comfort. The crew down at the Point station had adopted him for their own, and he had grown up with them, thinking that Captain Barty was the most wonderful sailor in the world, and that Petronel was the most faithful tender a light could have.

So it came as a severe shock and surprise to Both when the news circulated around the Point that a new lighthouse tender was to be appointed in place of the captain. It appeared that down at Washington, where these things are arranged, nobody knew that it was Petronel's light, and that she always took care of it, and intended to as long as she lived.

"If you could just see the senator," Hardy told her. "I think he 'd understand. He looks sensible. He's got short whiskers like the captain, and he laughs deep. Rathburn is his name." "Where have you seen him?" Petronel demanded.

"He is at the hotel over Sunday. Why don't you go and talk to him? Why don't you tell him you want the light yourself, and that you and your mother can take care of it always?"

Petronel looked back at the far end of the pier. At the base of the tall gray stone tower was a little house. It leaned up against the tower confidingly, and there was a very small, square garden-plot in front of it, where Petronel's sweetpeas and pansies fought for room with white clover and sorrel. It was all very, very dear to her, gray tower, and little leaning house, and garden-plot. She rose, and unpinned her skirt. “I will see him and tell him," she said soberly. "I will keep the light, Hardy."

But it was so much easier to say than do. She went over to the hotel that night, after she had rowed out to hang the lanterns on the tall piles that marked the harbor channel. She had made up her mind just what she would say to the man who went to Washington; how she would make him understand just what the light meant to her and her mother; how it almost seemed to belong

to them, they loved it so. But at the hotel they told her, very kindly but flatly, that the senator would see no one. He was resting from a nervous breakdown, and could not be disturbed.

The next day was Saturday and a very lively day at the Point. It was already August. The long winding row of summer cottages along the shore were filled with people from Chicago and smaller towns. The porches of the big hotel between the sand-hills looked like flower-beds, with the gaily hued dresses and parasols. Petronel's eyes followed them now, as she sat on the long pier. She liked to watch the summer people, but she never envied them any more than she envied the wild ducks that flew south in the fall. Rather would she have expected them to envy her, Petronel of the Point light.

On Saturday, Hardy always worked all day. cleaning the life-boat and everything at the station, until every speck of metal shone like gold and silver. And up at the light, Petronel would work too, polishing and cleaning everything, for on Sundays there was always a steady flow of summer visitors to inspect both places. But along toward evening, the clouds settled down over the lake, and the wind boomed up the straits like faroff cannon.

Hardy came on a run down the shore in his oilskins when the storm broke. Petronel was just shutting up for the night when she heard him call out.

"They want to know up at the station if you need help with the light? It's going to be a wild one. I'll stay if you want me."

Petronel backed up against the door, the wind whipping her hair across her face. She could hardly hear him in the gale, but she laughed back, and shook her head.

"We 're all right.”

"There's an excursion boat coming in from Mackinac," he shouted, making a speakingtrumpet with his hands. There was something else he said besides, but the wind tore down on them, and carried it away. Petronel could guess, though. If there was an excursion boat bound down the lake, laden with women and children. the Point light must watch for them like a mother's eye, and guide them into the harbor.

"We must be up all night, my Pet," Madame Buteau said, calmly, when she heard of it. "We must keep the light very bright, and well trimmed. It is the beginning of the equinox, and we will have the very bad storm, I fear."

All night they sat in the little kitchen, listening to the crashing of the storm, and the roar of the heavy seas sweeping in over the long piers. Running, racing, pounding, they seemed like thou

kerchiefs were waved at her, while the captain sent out his long salute to the light.

narrow stairs to the light-room, to be sure the big reflectors were working properly, and the great radiant eye was blinking regularly, now red, now white, then red again.

When it was Petronel's turn, her mother would wait for her at the foot of the stairs. It was impossible to catch each other's voices in the noise of the tempest. The thundering of the seas outside was like some mighty cataract, and overhead the real thunder of the sky crashed into it, and blended.

On the way down the stairs, each time, Petronel would stop to look out of the narrow windows, for some sign of the lights on the Queen of the Straits. She knew the steamer, and loved it, as one of her passing friends that kept her company. Twice a week it passed the Point, going up and down the lake from the straits to Manistee and Grand Haven. Petronel always watched for her, the slender, white-hulled boat, the decks crowded with pretty, summer-clad girls. She loved to wave back when all the fluttering hand

she pressed her face to the chill window-pane, watching for the Queen's signals.

"Hurry, cherie," said the mother, anxiously, down at the foot of the stairs; but all at once there came a great peal of thunder, with a swift, terrible flash of lightning, and all the world seemed to be full of fire.

When Petronel uncovered her ears, and stood up again, she called out, but Madame Buteau was already up the stairs.

"Quickly, child, quickly!" she said in a low, steady tone. "See, the light is out. The tower has been struck! Bring me the lamp from the kitchen."

Just for a moment Petronel hesitated. She had seen a new kind of light out of the window, not the broad, beautiful pathway of clear, luminous radiance like the wake of the moon itself, but a vivid, reddish glow that seemed to make her heart stop its beating. Lightning had surely struck the lighthouse, and it was on fire.

And suddenly, out on the dark lake, there came

three long-drawn whistles. The Queen was trying to beat her way to the channel that led to the harbor, and had seen the light go out.

Without a word, Petronel sped down the stairs, through the low, white-washed tunnel that led to the keeper's dwelling. The telephone caught her eye, and she ran to it, and lifted the receiver. It sent thrills of electricity up her arm, and she could hardly hear the answer of the central office, through the strange crackling noises that filled the instrument. But she managed to convey the message that the lighthouse had been struck, and help must be sent at once. Swinging over the long table was the captain's favorite lamp. It had hung in the cabin of his schooner the Huntress for years, on long trips up and down the waterways of the great sister lakes. Petronel had always imagined it to be a very plump. motherly sort of thing, with its low, capacious brass bowl and large, spreading tin shade. The captain had laughingly humored the notion, and they had always called the old lamp "Madame," quite as if it understood.

Petronel lifted it from its hanging frame, and bore it carefully back up the winding staircase to the light

room.

"That is well. Hold the lamp high, Pet," her mother ordered. She was working quietly, steadily, deftly, over the great, flat-wick lamp. Outside, the other light showed up in flares of yellow and red against the

is all of rock, child! It cannot perish. Only the window casements have caught, and this pelting rain will soon put it out. It is only for the light we must fear."

Again the long, appealing whistles called from

night. The big reflectors that moved by clockwork were still shifting back and forth, but there was no light to reflect.

"Mother," Petronel said once. "The tower is

on fire!"

"So much the better. The ship will see the glow," answered Madame Buteau, cheerily. "It

the lake, and before they died away, the captain's lamp was placed safely within the reflectors, and out over the dark channel waters shone the beams, showing the safe course to take, and bringing hope and safety to hundreds.

"It will burn now safely," Madame Buteau said. "Can you see the lights on the steamer, cherie?"