“It doesn’t exist at all for you. You are not of age, Dolly.”
“I’m old enough to know the things one can learn by heart!” was Dolly’s comment.
When the Diana was leaving St. Thomas at sunset and we were well on our way to St. Croix, Dolly made a half confidence.
“You are not my chaperon, Charlotte, because in my hour of need I simply fastened myself to you like a limpet, or an albatross, or a barnacle, or any other form of nautical vampire that you prefer. Still, I might as well confess that I cabled to Duke, or wirelessed, or did something awfully expensive of that sort at St. Thomas while you were having that interminable talk with the captain, who, by the way, is married and devoted to his wife, they say.”
“That was foolish and extravagant, my child,” I answered. “I don’t know what you said, but I have the most absolute confidence in your indiscretion. I hope you remembered that all messages are censored in war-time?”
“I did, indeed,” she sighed. “I was never so hampered and handicapped in my life, but I think I have outwitted the censors. I wish I were as sure about—mother!”
S.S. Diana, January 26
St. Croix was delightful, with a motor-ride across the island from Frederikstad to Christianstad, where we lunched.
Dolly’s mind is not in a state especially favorable for instruction, but I took a guidebook, and, sitting under a wonderful tamarind tree, read her Alexander Hamilton’s well-known letter describing a West Indian hurricane, written from St. Croix in 1772.