“O, my!” sighed Harry, “that’s worse, ever so much worse, than knowing that your folks are dead; ’cause then you know they can’t come back any more, and so you don’t keep looking out all the time.”
Kate wanted very much to ask Harry about his folks, but she thought she ought not to do it; it might make him feel worse to talk about it; so, not knowing what else to say to divert him, she said, “Let’s play he comes back.”
“But he can’t! so many years, you know,” exclaimed Harry, raising himself energetically from his pillows.
“That makes it better fun, don’t you see?” said Kate; “harder to make out where he has been all this time—most forty years! Dear me, he must be very old now.”
“Yes,” said Harry, “and burned black, maybe.”
“How? You don’t suppose the Snow burned up, do you?”
“O, I mean by the sun,” laughed Harry. “Going to the West Indies, did you say the ship was?”
“Yes,” said Kate, fairly beside herself with excitement. “O, you’re jolly good help, making believe; ever so much better than Frank.”
“What did the Snow carry? Let us be careful and have things all right,” urged Harry, interested because Kate was, and anxious to help her on.
“I’m sure I don’t know. O, molasses and rum, I heard once.”