“Donald,” she said on her second visit, for the one preceding had naturally been limited to the ordinary themes of first acquaintance, “I wish you would tell me a little more about yourself. Mamma says you have been ill a long time in New York with a fever, but that now you are quite over it and are on your way home; and that's all we know.”
“That's all there is,” running one little white hand through his hair as he spoke, in an apparent effort to make himself more presentable.
“Oh, you're all right,” said Marie-Celeste, smiling; “curly hair like yours looks better when it's mussed.”
“Would you like me to come and straighten you up a bit?” called Chris, who had really established himself as Donald's nurse, and sat whittling in his own state-room just across the passage.
“No, Chris, he doesn't need you at all,” Marie-Celeste volunteered; “he looks very fine as he is” (which gracious compliment brought a very becoming color to the little blanched face). “Besides, Chris, he is going to tell me something about himself—aren't you, Donald? Just what you choose, though, you know, because mamma said I must not seem to be inquisitive, and I'm not, Donald, really—just interested, that's all.”
“What kind of things do you want to know?” as though quite willing to be communicative, but at a loss where to begin.
“Why, how you happened to be a bugler, and how you happened to be ill in New York, and where your home is?”
“No home,” said Donald, laconically, and with an unconscious little sigh that went straight to Marie-Celeste's heart; “I was in the Foundling Hospital all my life till I came on the Majestic.
“Ill all your life!” exclaimed Marie-Celeste.
“Oh lands, no! I never was ill a day that I know of till that fever got hold of me.”