“Sure, ain’t you coming back, Miss?” cried the woman, whose cheeks became ashy pale with terror.
“I have told you I am going for a few days; and, Molly, till I do come, be more attentive than ever to my uncle; he may miss me, and he is not well just now, and be sure you look to him. Keep the key, too, of this room of mine, unless my uncle asks for it.”
“Oh, you’re not coming back to us—you’ll never come back!” cried the poor creature, in an agony of sorrow. And she fell at Kate’s feet and grasped her dress, as though to detain her.
“There, there, this is all childishness, Molly. You will displease me if you go on so. Was that thunder I heard?”
As she asked, a knock came to the door, and the captain of the boat’s crew, Tim Hennesy, put in his head. “If you are bent on goin’, Miss, the tide is on the turn, and there’s no time to lose.”
“You’re a hard man to ask her, Tim Hennesy,” said the woman, rising, and speaking with a fiery vehemence: “You’re a hard man, after losing your own brother at sea, to take her out in weather like this.”
Kate gave a hurried look over the room, and then, as if not trusting her control over her feelings, she went quietly out, and hastened down to the shore.
There was, indeed, no lime to be lost, and all the efforts of the sailors were barely enough to save the small boat that lay next the pier from being crushed against the rocks with each breaking wave.