“And let me tell you, she’s one rare little kid,” he declared, out of Mr. Stagg’s hearing. “How she come to be related to that hard-as-nails Joe Stagg is a puzzler.”
The hardware dealer might deserve this title in ordinary times, but this was one occasion when he plainly displayed emotion.
Hannah’s Car’lyn, the little child he had learned to love, was somewhere on the ice in the driving storm. He would have rushed blindly out on the rotten ice, barehanded and alone, had the others not halted him.
“Hold on! We want a peavy or two—them’s the best tools,” said one of the men.
“And a couple of lanterns,” said another.
Joseph Stagg stood on the dock and shouted at the top of his voice:
“Prince! Prince! Prince!”
The wind must have carried his voice a long way out across the cove, but there was no reply.
Then, suddenly, the clear silver tone of a bell rang out. Its pitch carried through the storm startlingly clear.
“Hullo! what’s the chapel bell tolling for?” demanded the man who had suggested the lanterns.