“Come in, Jack,” cried both of the old gentlemen together.
“Glad to see you my boy,” added John Dunlap. “How did you find your good mother and the rest of our friends in Bedford? I only landed today; came from Port au Prince to see the Commons once more; heard that the ‘Lucy’ and her brave master, my namesake, had arrived a week ahead of me, safe and sound, from East Indian waters.”
So saying he grasped both of the sailor’s hands and shook them with the genuine cordiality of a lad of sixteen.
“Have you seen my granddaughter since your return, Captain Jack?” inquired James Dunlap, as he shook the young man’s hand.
“I was so unfortunate as to call when she was out shopping, and as Mrs. Church, the housekeeper, told me that she was so busy preparing for the approaching wedding that she was engaged all the time, I have hesitated to call again,” replied the sailor, as with a somewhat deeper shade of red in his sun burned face he seated himself between the twins.
“Lucy will not thank Mrs. Church for that speech if it is to deprive her of the pleasure of welcoming her old playmate and cousin back to Boston and home. You must come and dine with us tomorrow,” said Lucy’s grandfather.
“I am much obliged for your kind invitation, sir, but if you will only grant the request I am about to make of the firm, my next visit to my cousin will be to say goodby, as well as to receive a welcome home from a voyage.”
“Why, what do you mean, lad!” exclaimed both of the brothers simultaneously.
Concealment or deception was probably the most difficult of all things for this frank man with the free spirit of the sea fresh in his soul, so that while he answered the color surged up stronger and stronger in his face until the white brow, saved from the sun by his hat, was as red as his close shaven cheeks.