Captain Lyle (speaks). “Well, Ethel dear, and you, Effie, you are both very silent. Are you breaking your hearts because we have had to give up Grayling House for a time, and come to live in this tiny cottage by the sea?”
Mrs Lyle, looking up from her sewing, and smiling kindly but somewhat sadly: “No, Arnold, I was thinking about our dear boy.”
Effie, dropping her book in her lap. “So was I, mother. I was thinking of Leonard and—and poor Douglas. It is now the second summer since they went away. It is wearing through, too. See how the roses fall and scatter their petals when you touch them. Oh! do you think, papa, they will ever, ever come again?”
Captain Lyle, smiling. “Yes, love, I do. Here, come and sit by me. That is right. Now you know the country they went away to is a very, very strange one.”
Effie. “A very, very terrible one.”
Captain Lyle. “No, I think not, dear, else those who have been there would not always wish to return to it. It is wild and lonely, and silent and cold, Effie, and there are no letter-carriers about, you know, not even a pigeon-post, so Leonard can’t very well write. The fact is, they’ve got frozen in, and it may be even another summer yet before we see them.”
Effie. “Another summer? Oh, papa!”
Captain Lyle. “Yes, dear, because he and honest Douglas are in the regions of thick-ribbed ice, you know; and once it embraces a ship, it is difficult to get clear. But cheer up, lass; I won’t have you fretting, there! Now, promise me you—ha! here comes dear old Fitzroy, swinging away on his wooden leg. Good-afternoon, my friend; there is need of you here. My wife and daughter are doing nothing but fretting.”
Captain Fitzroy. “Oh! come, Effie, come, Mrs Lyle. Look at me; I don’t fret. The boys will return as sure as the sun will rise to-morrow.”