“Never mind about me, Joseph Stagg,” she rejoined rather tartly. “Never mind about me!”
Carolyn May insisted on going to the Parlow house herself after school that afternoon to enquire about her “sailor man.” She just had to know personally how he was getting on!
The steady stream of timber sleds from Adams’ camp, and others, had beaten down the drifts again, so Aunty Rose made no objection to the little girl and the dog’s making this call.
Mr. Parlow peered at them through the window of the carpenter’s shop and waved his hand; but Carolyn May went right into the house. When she had been kissed by Miss Amanda, and Prince had lain down by the kitchen range, the little girl demanded:
“And do tell me how my sailor man is, Miss Mandy. He got such a bump on the head!”
“Yes; the man’s wound is really serious. I’m keeping him in bed. But you can go up to see him. He’s talked a lot about you, Carolyn May.”
“Is that so?” eagerly cried the little girl. “And I’m just as cur’ous about him as I can be.”
“Why are you so curious about him?” asked Miss Amanda.
“Because he’s a sailor and has been away across the ocean—right to the place my papa and mamma were going to when the Dunraven was sunk. Don’t you see? They were going to Naples. That’s in Italy. And this sailor man told Mr. Parlow, Miss Amanda, that he has been to Naples. So he must have been through that Mediterranean Ocean, or sea, or whatever it is—right where my papa and mamma were lost.”
The sailor lay in the warm bedroom over the kitchen. In bed, with his head bound up as though it were in a huge nightcap, he looked oddly like a gnome, for he was banked up with pillows, and wore one of Mr. Parlow’s flannelette nightshirts, which was too small for him. In spite of his odd habiliments, his was a cheerful face—red, with few wrinkles, save about his eyes, and a scattering brush of grey bristles along his jaw, for he needed a shave.