The night before they left Queen’s Ferry, Polly was feeling subdued, as in fact she always did, after the fight was won on anything she started. It was a beautifully clear June night. She stepped out on the broad veranda, and hesitated. The high, white pillars seemed so tall and strange in the bright moonlight, and the shadows seemed almost like living things, so black and clearly outlined they lay all about. Out in the garden, humming birds darted about the dewy flowers. She could catch the delicate whirr of their wings. Tan, the Admiral’s big tawny-haired setter, lay stretched out before the door, asleep. She had to step over him on her way out to the Admiral’s chair.
“The world just seems all moonshine and roses to-night, grandfather dear,” she said, sitting down on the cushioned seat that swung from two heavy chains. “Aren’t they sweet?”
“Mighty sweet,” agreed the Admiral. “When you are in Wyoming, will you think of your poor, lonely old grandfather sitting here by himself?”
“In peace and quiet, with nobody to bother him?” Polly finished up. “Yes, sir, I will. And I’ll miss you so much.”
The Admiral leaned forward, his hand on her brown braids.
“Fifteen in November, isn’t that right? Your aunts seem to think Glenwood’s no place for you, Polly, with an old codger like myself. Betty wrote in to-day, and declared if I did not let you live under her wing, or one of the other aunts’, I must get a governess for you. What do you think of that?”
Polly regarded him thoughtfully.
“They don’t understand how happy we are, do they, dear?” she said softly. “We never bother each other, do we? And I mind every word you say—”
“Yes, you do,” interposed the Admiral, gruffly. “You’d persuade a Nantucket skipper that he was off his course.”
“But wouldn’t you miss me terribly if I ever had to leave Glenwood?” Polly rested her head against his knee, her lips pressed to the dear old hand that had never shown her anything save kindness and sympathy in all her life.