As Edgar stood looking at them he felt lonely, and when they gradually receded from his sight he heaved a sigh, and felt a choking sensation in his throat.
When Robert Foster and Doris reached Elm Lodge again he kissed her fondly, and said in a broken voice:
‘God knows when we shall see him again, Doris. You are all I have left now; you must not leave your father.’
‘Edgar will return some day,’ she said quietly. ‘I will take his place until then. When he comes back you will forget all the sorrow of parting.’
CHAPTER V.
A FURIOUS STORM.
Hundreds of people hurrying to business in Sydney at an early hour in the morning cast anxious eyes at the dull leaden sky, across which heavy clouds rolled, hanging over the harbour and the city. They also gazed in wonderment, and with feelings not devoid of awe, upon a mass of peculiar white clouds banked up in an exactly opposite direction to the harbour. These clouds were of a fleecy whiteness, balloon-shaped, and clung together until they were heaped almost mountains high.
There was a peculiar stillness about the atmosphere—the calm that usually precedes a storm. All day long the clouds hung suspended overhead, and towards the middle of the afternoon it grew much darker. People residing at harbour suburbs hurried home as fast as possible, and were glad when they were ferried safely across the water.
The Watson’s Bay ferry-boat was throwing off from the landing-stage as a well-built man in a pilot’s coat jumped on board.
‘Nearly missed it, Wal,’ said the skipper of the Fairy. ‘The next boat will have a rough passage, I reckon.’
‘Yes; it’s been brewing all day,’ replied Walter Jessop. ‘We shall have a terrible night, I fear. It will be dangerous near the coast to-night. Luckily, there’s no vessel been sighted anywhere handy.’