"Then he will be here to-morrow. But do you know where he is gone?"
"He went to seek work in one of the more distant villages. Perhaps some of the farmers may employ him; he thought he might be able to gain something by aiding in the labor of harvesting. Although we have been so very economical in the use of the food which our kind neighbors gave the morning upon which we were driven from our home, it is already exhausted. If our father should fail in his efforts to get work, we must die of hunger, Kitty."
"What do you say? Die of hunger! How horrible! It would have been better, then, that we had been torn to pieces at once by the furious bloodhounds which the angry landlord threatened to set upon us, than to linger on through such a frightful death.—But, Molly, do you hear nothing? nothing at all?"
"No, little sister; nothing but the raging of the storm and the surging of the waves as they break upon the coast. You are always so nervous and excitable when our father is away; but be quiet, for another Father, far more powerful, and still more kind than our dear one, is always with us, and watches over us with tender eyes. He will never forsake us; he will deliver us in the time of need; but we must do all we can to help ourselves. In the hour of our greatest necessity, he stands closest to us. He will not suffer us to perish utterly."
"Talk on; talk on, dear Molly," said Kitty, pleadingly; "if I can only hear your voice, I don't feel so much afraid, it is so soft and sweet! It is so much like our dear mother's, that I often fancy it she who is speaking to me.—But you surely hear something now, sister!"
"I hear nothing but the long cries of the sea-gulls, as they flutter o'er the waves, and their sharp, shrill tones tell us that we will have more wind and rain."
"It is very strange that you do not hear anything; for it has seemed to me four or five times as if I heard the death-sobs of some one in the last agony, and a despairing cry for help has at intervals rung in my ears! Are you crying, sister? Or what is that hot drop which has just fallen upon my hand?"
"It is only a drop of blood; I have stuck my finger with this fine needle. Your anxiety has excited me also, and it seems to me now as if I too heard long sighs and groans near us. It may, indeed, be possible that some unhappy creature requires our aid. I will at least look out and see if I can discover from whence the sounds come. Remain sitting quite still here, Kitty; your little frock is finished, and as soon as I come back I will put it on you, darling."
Molly stepped out in front of the cave. She looked eagerly round in every direction, but she saw nothing save the desolate cliffs, whose naked sides had bid defiance to the storms of centuries, and piles of rocks overgrown with moss, like the gravestones used in the times of the heathens. From one point, where the formation of the hills allowed the distant scene to be visible through the aperture, she saw far in the distance the foaming, tossing waves of the white, wide ocean.