"What sent you out so early as this?"
"There's sich a racket up-stairs that I can't sleep; I was awake when you two came through the room. What do you say to a cup of hot coffee?"
"It wouldn't go bad, Uncle Zenas, an' that's a fact, though Sonny an' me have had quite a bite already."
The cook built a fire, and the cheery glow went very far toward restoring to Sidney the courage which had oozed out of his finger ends as the tower trembled under the blows of the tempest.
"You two have been up in the watch-room till you're half frozen," Uncle Zenas said as he shoveled a generous supply of coal into the stove. "It has grown cold mighty sudden, an' I reckon Sonny will need his coat by the time I get it done."
"When will that be?" Captain Eph asked, hoping rather to turn Sidney's attention from the raging of the gale, than because he was eager for information.
"If nothing happens I'll take the last stitch in it by noon. I got on famously with the work while you were ashore."
Then Uncle Zenas, after having filled the coffee pot, brought out the partially finished garment for inspection, and before they were done critising it, Mr. Peters came down-stairs, complaining bitterly of the cold.
"It was lucky we went ashore yesterday," he said as he warmed his hands over the stove. "I reckon it'll be quite a spell before we make any more visits, or have any visitors."
Captain Eph was on the point of replying to this remark when suddenly, even amid the roar of the tempest, could be heard a dull, booming sound, so foreign to anything which the gale brought to their ears that even Sidney ran to the window in alarm.