“I’m very glad for you, Lu, and hope it will be one long pleasure from beginning to end,” Eva said; “you couldn’t have a more delightful care-taker than your father, and Max will be good company too. But, oh dear, how I shall miss you!” she concluded with a sigh, putting her arms round Lulu and holding her in a close embrace.
“And I you,” said Lulu. “But when we talk that way at home papa says we should not think about that, but about the joy of reunion when we get home again.”
“Well, Gracie, what progress have you made with that list? Is it ready for papa’s inspection?” the captain asked, as the children clustered about him on the veranda after tea that evening.
“I’ve put down some things, papa, but maybe I can think up some more before long, if I may have a little more time,” she answered, with an arch smile up into his face.
“You can have all the time you want, darling,” he said, caressing her; “but suppose you let me see what you have already set down.”
At that she drew a half-sheet of note-paper from her pocket and put it into his hand.
He glanced over it and a look of amusement stole over his face. “A spade, rake, and hoe! I thought you had garden tools,” he said.
“Yes, papa, but these are to be big ones for Sam Hill to make his mother’s garden with. He says he always has to borrow now, and the neighbors get tired lending to him.”
“Ah, very well, you shall have money to buy them for him. But what do you want with twenty yards of calico and a piece of muslin?”
“Sam needs shirts, and his mother some dresses, papa.”