“Why, George!” gasped Whistler, “I didn’t know you folks had a yacht.”
“Father owns a slew of freight ships. It’s on one of his ships that they are all sailing next month for Bahia.”
“That’s in South America,” said Whistler thoughtfully.
“Yes. Father thinks there is going to be the biggest kind of commercial opportunity in Brazil and other South American states after the war. The Germans will be in bad down there. Father is going to establish a branch of his business in Bahia, and stay himself for a year or more—perhaps until the war’s end.”
“You don’t say!”
“Yes, I do, Country!” laughed Belding. “And Lil and mother are going to take your sisters with them.”
“Wha—what’s that you say?” Whistler ejaculated, in blank amazement.
“I guess you haven’t heard from home lately,” Belding said. “Didn’t you know anything about it?”
“Not a word.”
“They’ll sail on the Redbird. That’s one of father’s biggest ships. You see, Doctor Morgan was in New York and came to see us, so Lil wrote me. And he said how much he desired to send your sister Phoebe off on a long sea voyage. So they made it up, right there and then. Your sister Alice is going, too, and my mother will chaperone the crowd. Tell you what, Phil, if it wasn’t for this man’s war, I’d like to drop everything here and go with them. Some sport! What wouldn’t we do to those girls when the Redbird crossed the equator!”