Both were well and likewise Bounder, but Martello Castle and lands were let, and they were living in a small cottage near the sea. "Very happy, though," Madge's letter said, and poverty made her love her father all the more, and he is now proud of you, Kep, so he told her, and we all long so much to see our dear boy again. There was a postscript, as there is in most young ladies' letters. It ran as follows: "P.S.--Old Elspet sends her love, and I haven't married the wealthy Israelite yet."
The last word was strongly underlined. Kep kissed the letter, and there were tears in his eyes as he refolded it.
He would put it under his pillow to-night just to see what he should dream about. Well, I for one cannot laugh at Kep, for often enough when far away at sea I've kept letters from home under my pillow for weeks. It was hours and hours before Kep fell asleep that night, notwithstanding. Madge's letter brought the past back again so vividly. Ah! he had been happier than he knew of.
The splendid old castle, the cliffs and rocks and moorlands wild and wide, and his own little turret chamber high above the rookery in the rustling elms. Was he never to see them more?
Never as a boy, and, ah! boyhood is life's brightest happiest season.
The Breezy had been in commission nearly two and a half years, and there was at least a year to go by yet, and then Kep was to have an appointment.
It could not be as a middy, or anything of that sort, of course, because the laws of the Admiralty are inflexible. The executive officers have all to enter the service between the ages of twelve and thirteen.
Never mind, Kep determined to continue his study of languages, and of everything else, and who could tell what he might not rise to in course of time.
Kep, the reader does not need to be told, was very clever, and moreover he had a first-class idea of himself, and I never blame any boy for that.
At all events one never does get to the top of the tree unless he tries to, and Kep made a vow that night that he was going to try and keep on trying hard as ever he knew how to.