“That’s what I want to see,” he said, as he took in the situation. “You shed no tears while you remembered nothing, Mr. Silburn. This is one of the best symptoms, to have your emotions aroused. Don’t try to push your memory now; it will all come back to you; give it time.”
In the four days that Kit could spend in New Zealand, he saw improvement every day. Gradually it came back to his father that after the Flower City’s boat went to pieces, he was a long time in the water. That when he was about to give up, he was rescued by some ship, he could not remember her name, that carried him around Cape Horn. That that ship was also wrecked and abandoned. Then there was a hazy picture in his mind of a desert island, and terrible suffering from hunger and thirst. All beyond that was still a blank.
Kit was so jealous of anything that took him away from his father, that it was a relief to hear that the Bishop of New Zealand had gone to Australia on business; so it would be useless for him to present his letter from the cardinal. That would have been valuable in case of trouble, but all had been smooth sailing.
Throughout the long voyage home, in which Mr. Silburn was a passenger on the Brindisi, he continued to improve. There was hardly anything now about his adventures that he could not remember, except his long stay in the Wellington Hospital. Every little incident had been discussed over and over. But it was not till the vessel had passed Sandy Hook, and was steaming slowly up New York Bay, that he let Kit know of something that had been worrying him.
“There was a payment due on the house about the time I ought to have been home,” he said. “I’m afraid we are going to have trouble about that.”
It was worth all the hard work to Kit, all the hard saving, to be able to tell his father that the indebtedness had been paid to the last penny.
CHAPTER XX.
LOVE’S YOUNG DREAM IN BARBADOES.
OLD Silas beamed all over as he and Kit tucked the robes around Mr. Silburn in the Huntington stage, once more on runners. It seemed to the young supercargo that the very horses had a pleased look.
“Well, sir, I didn’t expect to see this again!” Silas declared. “Many a time I’ve took Kit up to Hunt’n’ton, this last year or two. Why, Mr. Silburn, the first time he went up with me he didn’t have no overcoat to put on, an’ I had to wrap him in the hoss blanket. But next time he come home, bless you, his clo’es was good as anybody’s. I says to myself, says I, ‘That there boy’s a makin’ his way, he is.’ An’ then he comes with gold braid on his cap; an’ look at him now, will you! But I swan to goodness, I didn’t expect to see him ridin’ up alongside of his father any more. We’d all give you up, Mr. Silburn.”