“Stop! What’s to become of the young girl—pretty Agnes Seabright? How did he leave his bit of property?”
“To-night, comrades—to-night, at the ‘Neptune and Pan,’ I will meet you. You shall have a supper, and drink to the memory of the outward-bound while I tell you all about it. I must go now!” impatiently exclaimed the captain, shaking off the pertinacious, and hastening away up the straggling street of the hamlet.
Hugh Hutton, like all his fathers, was far above the usual height of men—indeed, all his characteristics were not only marked, but extravagant; thus he was very tall, broad-shouldered and deep-chested, very muscular and thin, with a very dark complexion, with black hair and eyes, and very high, commanding features. Honest, brave, and frank even to rashness, generous even to extravagance, unselfish to the degree that the worldly-wise would call fatuity; yet he had never known a mother’s care, a sister’s companionship, and his indifference to home joys was as profound as his ignorance of love and of woman. Brought up on a ship’s deck by a rough sailor father, he learned to love the ocean and wild liberty with a profound and passionate enthusiasm.
But now he had a little girl left to him. He must make a home for her, take care of her, and make her happy if he could. This was a very novel duty indeed, and set him very keenly to thinking. The first natural, strange, sweet fancies that had been awakened by the idea of this lovely living legacy had fallen asleep again, and left him to his normal, free, glad, but hard, unloving nature. And now the thought of pretty Agnes Seabright fretted him like a fetter.
He pursued his walk up through the village, up over the hills rising one beyond the other, until he came to the arm of the forest stretching around the base of that tallest distant hill, upon which stood the white-fronted mansion house of Mount Calm. He pursued his walk on through this arm of the forest, ascending the hill until he came to a small cleared space, in which was a little cot inclosed within a narrow garden and nearly hidden with trees. He opened the small gate and passed up the narrow walk between rows of marigolds, crimson, white, and yellow chrysanthemums, scarlet verbena and other bright fall flowers, to the little door at which he rapped.
CHAPTER VIII.
THE BRIDE OF THE ISLES.
A beautiful and happy girl,
With step as soft as summer air,
And fresh young lips and brow of pearl
Shadowed by many a careless curl