"What do you say, dear papa?"
"Nothing, nothing. Kiss me again. Well, love, you had better find this guardian angel of yours, that I may take him by the hand and give him a father's blessing, and make him some little return by carrying him home to England along with my darling."
"I'll call him, papa. Where can he be gone, I wonder?"
She ran out to the terrace, and called:
"Mr. Hazel! Mr. Hazel! I don't see him; but he can't be far off. Mr. Hazel!"
Then she came back and made her father sit down; and she sat at his knee beaming with delight.
"Ah, papa," said he, "it was you who loved me best in England. It was you that came to look for me."
"No," said he, "there are others there that love you as well in their way. Poor Wardlaw! on his sickbed for you, cut down like a flower the moment he heard you were lost in the Proserpine. Ah, and I have broken faith."
"That is a story," said Helen; "you couldn't."
"For a moment, I mean; I promised the dear old man—he furnished the ship, the men, and the money to find you. He says you are as much his daughter as mine."