“Yes,” Mrs. Silburn answered, with tears in her eyes; “I have often thought of that, Kit. And I knew of course that you would think of it. If we can get any reasonable evidence that that may be your father, I think you ought to go. It will take all the money we can borrow on this little place, and leave us badly in debt again, but we must not stop for that. All the money in the world is nothing compared with having your father back again.”
“Oh, we are not as badly off as all that!” Kit said. Never in his life before had he felt so proud of being able to earn money. “You don’t know how easily we sea-faring fellows can get about the world. I think maybe I can get a job for one round voyage on some vessel bound for Australia or New Zealand, even if I have to work only for my passage. Then the only expense will be paying father’s fare home. Captain Griffith would help me to get such a job, I know; and I have another friend now who would help me to it, I am sure. You see I have some more news for you, though I didn’t intend to tell you till to-morrow.”
Then he told of his offer of one hundred dollars a month from the Quebec Steamship Company, and how he had consulted Captain Griffith, and how the Captain had advised him to accept it; and explained that he thought very favorably of it himself, but waited to hear what his mother thought.
“A hundred dollars a month!” Vieve cried, throwing her arms about her brother’s neck and nearly choking him. “You? Just for writing out those paper things on a ship? That’s twelve hundred dollars a year! why, Mr. Wright don’t get more than a thousand, I’m sure, and the parsonage; but then you’ll have a sort of parsonage too—at least the ship to live in.”
“Ah! but Mr. Wright don’t travel about with cardinals!” Kit laughed. “That makes all the difference in the world. What do you think of it, mother? It is an important matter, and you are the one to decide it.”
“No, we have got beyond that, Kit,” Mrs. Silburn answered, as well as her demonstrations of pleasure would allow. “You are the one to decide questions for us, not we for you. As far as I can see I should think you would not hesitate at all about it. But you know all the circumstances better than I do. You must decide for yourself.”
“Then it is already decided, mother,” he said. “I had made up my mind to accept it, provided you did not object. You don’t know how much I love Captain Griffith and the North Cape. The Captain is one man in a thousand; he has been like a father to me. But one hundred dollars a month is a splendid offer, and the Captain himself advises me to take it.”
There was a little feast in the Silburn cottage that evening to celebrate Kit’s improved prospects. That was what it meant when he beckoned Vieve into the hall and slipped some money into her hand, and told her, after making her purchases, to go to Harry Leonard’s and invite him to come over. Not very much of a feast; if she had had a purseful of gold to spend she could not have bought the materials for a banquet in the little shops of Huntington, at such short notice; but what she found in her hurried trip answered every purpose.
“Now don’t you be making eyes at Harry Leonard, miss!” Kit warned her, when she returned with the provisions, and began by unloading a fat chicken and some bunches of Malaga grapes. “I know you used to be very fond of him.”
“At Harry Leonard!” Vieve retorted, assuming her grandest air. “Humph! I guess when I have a beau (which I won’t have), he’ll be nothing short of a cardinal.”