"Sweet Polly, may I speak?" Captain Ivor had said.
The voices were different. Ivor's was deep and quiet, with clear enunciation; while that of Captain Peirce was some semitones higher in key, with a rapid and rather indistinct intonation.
The other face, too, came up before Polly's mind—a face generally of still outlines, grave and handsome, with eyes which looked other men straight in the face, and level brows, not quick to frown, though when they did there was no mistake about it, and a smile as quiet as his voice. Captain Peirce was of smaller and slighter make, and his features as well as his tone underwent much more rapid changes. An impulsive man altogether; not bad-looking; and he had a certain fascination of manner too when he chose to exert it. Polly was not oblivious to the fascination while it lasted. Perhaps she liked his unequivocal admiration, and did not dislike to feel her power over him. But that flash of vivid recollection—did it arise from some subtle connection between her mind and Molly's?—brought with it a totally different look from any that Captain Peirce had seen upon her face. Perhaps he might be excused for imagining that the change of expression was due to his own words.
"Sweet Polly, you will not be one of the cruel fair who—"
This was going too far. Polly woke up from her dream. She withdrew one step, and dropped a suggestion of a curtsey.
"Your pardon, sir. My name is Miss Keene, as you are aware."
"Ah! adored one—so hard-hearted to your humble slave!"
"My word, Albert!" and the heavy hand of his uncle, the Admiral, fell with a smart slap upon the Captain's shoulder. "So, you do not fail to make hay while the sun shines! But there's such a thing as poaching in another's preserves, man. Ha, ha, Miss Polly! Well, and what news from abroad of the unfortunate prisoners, eh?"
Captain Peirce wore the look of a thunder-cloud under this interruption. He dared not openly resent it; not only because young men in those times were far more submissive to older men than now, but because, also, had he aroused the Admiral's ire, he would have drawn upon them the attention of the whole room. Admiral Peirce was known to be hasty in temper, and not slow to speak his mind. So he glowered silently, and Polly looked with a smile into the battered face of the old sailor, now on shore for a brief spell.
"Nay, sir, I have not heard for this very long while from any of them, and it is but seldom we may hope to hear. Letters go astray by hundreds. Doubtless they write, as do we—to no purpose."