"No," replied Minnette; "I prefer solitude. There are few—none, perhaps—who sympathize with me, and in books I find companions."
"Well, I prefer less silent companions, for my part," said Gipsy. "I don't believe in making an old hermit or bookworm of myself for anybody."
"Every one to her taste," was the cold rejoinder.
"When do you expect your father home?" inquired Gipsy.
"To-night."
"Then he'll have a storm to herald his coming," said Gipsy, going to the window and scanning the heavens with a practiced eye.
"A storm—impossible!" said Minnette. "There is not a cloud in the sky."
"Nevertheless, we shall have a storm," said Gipsy. "I read the sky as truly as you do your books; and if he attempts to enter the bay to-night, I'm inclined to think that the first land he makes will be the bottom."
Minnette heard this intelligence with the utmost coolness, saying only:
"Indeed! I did not know you were such a judge of the weather. Well, probably, when they see the storm coming, they will put into some place until it is over."