It seemed that AH-NI-GHI´-TO’S happy days were over for a while, for soon after this the big black ship which had sailed for the Snowland early in the summer to bring AH-NI-GHI´-TO’S father news of her and his homeland, returned with the sad tidings that he had been caught by the cruel Jack Frost far up in the Snow country during the cold, dark winter and had his feet frozen. Though his letters told AH-NI-GHI´-TO and her mother that he was quite well now, still they had their doubts, and AH-NI-GHI´-TO said, “Oh, mother, can’t we go to father? I think he must need us to take care of him.” Her mother agreed that when the ship went north again the next June, she and AH-NI-GHI´-TO would go too. AH-NI-GHI´-TO could not see why they must wait so long. Why not go at once? She had quite forgotten that in the far north the long, cold night was now beginning and that all the sea was frozen solid. For four months father would have no sunlight: only the faint light of the stars and once a month the moon. Only when the summer came again with its bright warm sun to thaw the ice and allow the ship to plough her way through, could she go to him.
AH-NI-GHI´-TO was six years old now and was going to real school, but all her spare time she spent in getting ready for her coming visit to father in the Snowland.
She made many picture scrap-books, and paper dolls (with dozens of dresses for them) to give to the little Danish children who had been so kind to her when father’s ship stopped at their villages on the way home with the great Star stone. All her pennies were carefully saved that she might buy other presents for her many little friends. So the winter and spring passed, and at last came the day, July 7, when AH-NI-GHI´-TO bade Grossy and Tante good-bye, promising to surely return in the early Fall and perhaps bring father too.
II
“At last We are on Our Way to see Father”
On the way to join the ship she stopped to say good-bye to Uncle in New York and to dear old Grandma in Portland, Maine. Here too she promised to return in the Fall and if possible to bring father with her.
Her one wish now was to board the ship and get away, and this she really did on July 20 at Sydney, Cape Breton. That night before going to sleep she wrote in her diary.
“July 20, 1900.—Glory, glory, at last mother and I are on our way to see father. I wonder how long it will take us. I can hardly wait.
“We have such tiny rooms here that one of us must stay in bed while the other dresses. Everything is very clean and comfortable and I have a little kitty with which to play, and I think I will like our maid too.