so high above the water that it made Dolly dizzy to look, out on the yards sun-burned sailors were furling the sails, happy, no doubt, to be home again. Here and there heavy sloops, coasters Hal thought them, were making their way slowly on.
Old Andrew, as he sat at tiller of their boat, cast his eyes up at the sailors on the large ship and sighed.
“Does it make you feel like going to sea again, Andrew?” asked Mr. Brooks.
“Aye, aye, sir,” said the old man. “It’s ten years now since I left the sea, but every now and then the old longing comes back.”
“Why, Andrew,” exclaimed Hal and Dolly both at once, “we never knew that you had been a real sailor! Tell us all about it, away back from the very beginning.”
“The very beginning was pretty bad,” said the old man, “for I ran away from home when