'Suppose, my child, that he has sent you this from the far-away world in which he lives. Why should you not pray for your father? He may need your prayers in Tierra del Fuego.'
'What is the good of my saying God bless him when God cannot do it?'
'Why not?'
'He is a bad man; he has left mother and me.'
'Perhaps it was unavoidable. Tierra del Fuego is a long way off.'
'No, it is not that. If he had not cut mother to the heart that she has never recovered, she would have taught me to use his name. But he went away wilfully to be rid of her and me.'
'You think so?'
'I know it.'
'And you have not thought much about him, I suppose?'
'I do not know what he is like. I know nothing about him because mother will not speak about him. But I know he is a heartless, wicked man to desert mother and me.'