“What! Can’t we get to Parrsboro’ in time for the steamer at all?”
“The steamer? O, yes, no doubt about that. But what I’m afeard on is, that we’ll be all night about it.”
“O, well, that can’t be helped. We can stand it. We’ve had worse things than this to stand of late, and this is mere child’s play.”
“Child’s play? Wal, I don’t know about that altogether,” said Bennie. “For my part, I don’t seem to see how goin’ without sleep’s child’s play, as you call it; but still I’m glad all the same that you look on it in this way; I am railly.”
“O, you needn’t give any thought to us. We’re old stagers. We’ve been shipwrecked and we’ve lived on desert islands. We’ve risked our lives a dozen times in a dozen days. Fellows that have been cast ashore on Anticosti and on Sable Island, can’t be frightened at anything that you can mention.”
“After my life on Ile Haute out there,” said Tom, looking at the dim form of Ile Haute, which was even then being enveloped in the gathering fog, “I think this is mere child’s play.”
“And after my adventures in the woods,” said Phil, “I’m ready for anything.”
“Pat and I,” said Bart, “have known all the bitterness of death, and have felt what it is to be buried alive.”
“An meself,” said Pat, “by the same token, have known what it is to bathe in the leper wather, so I have; an what’s fog to that?”
“Well,” said Arthur, “I’ve had my turn off Anticosti in the boat, Tom and I.”