“Poor Ted!” sighed Mrs Gilmour somewhat sadly. “Poor old Ted!”
“Not ‘poor,’ ma’am,” said the Captain reverently, taking off his hat and looking upwards as he had done before when calling the children’s attention to Him who taught the insects. “He’s ‘rich’ Ted, now; and better off in his snug moorings aloft than you and I here below!”
“Yes, I know that, but it is hard to be content,” replied the other, appearing lost in thought for some moments; until presently, recovering herself, she looked at her watch, when, seeing what time it was, she said they must start back for home at once. “Come along, children, time’s up!”
“O-o-o-oh!” exclaimed Bob and Nellie in great consternation. “Why, we’ve only just come!”
“O-o-o-oh!” mimicked their aunt, amused at their woebegone faces. “Do you know that we’ve been down here nearly four hours! If we stop much longer, you’ll be ‘oh-ing’ for your dinner, when it will be too late to get any, and how would you like that?”
“Humph! I thought I was feeling a bit peckish,” said the Captain, wheeling about and preparing to head the return procession home, accepting Mrs Gilmour’s remarks as a command. “Come on, children, we’ve got our sailing directions; so let us up anchor at once, for you’ll have plenty of the beach before you see the last of it. I tell you what, though, I’ll do for you if you are good.”
“What, Captain?” cried Bob and Nellie, hanging on to his coat-tails as he stumped over the shingle by the side of their aunt, the faces of all now set homeward. “What?”
“Ah, you must wait till to-morrow!” was all that they could get out of him, however, in spite of their wheedlings and coaxings as they crossed the Common, with Dick and Rover following behind; the latter being too hungry even to bark, and only able to give a faint wag of his tail now and then when especially addressed by name. “Wait till to-morrow!”