Part 18 (2/2)

Then all sail was set for merry England.

There was nothing but joy now on board, nothing but jollity and fun.

The men had a ball almost every night, with singing and story-telling to follow.

”I do believe, my dear boy,” said Captain Hardy to Harry one evening, ”that _you_ have brought all the luck on board. Well, now, I'm going to tell you a secret.”

”I don't want you to, you know.”

”Oh, but I want to tell somebody,” said the captain, ”and it may as well be you. It is this: As soon as I get my s.h.i.+p cleared and paid off at Hull, I am going straight back to Lerwick to ask Miss Mitford if she will be my wife.”

”Oh, I'm sure she will be glad to!” Harry said.

”Tell me, boy, what makes you think so?”

”Well, because she told me you were the best man in the service, and the tears were in her eyes when she said so.”

”G.o.d bless you for these words, dear lad. And you'll come and see us sometimes, won't you? I'm going to leave the sea and settle down in a pretty little farm near Hull.”

”That I will, gladly,” said Harry.

In course of time the s.h.i.+p arrived safely in harbour. Her owners were delighted at Captain Hardy's success, and made him a very handsome present.

Some weeks after this, when the _Inuita_ was dismantled and lying in dock, Hardy, with Harry and Harold the mastiff, suddenly appeared at Beaufort Hall.

I leave the reader to imagine the joy that their presence elicited. But it was quite affecting to see how his mother pressed her boy to her breast, while the tears chased each other over her cheeks.

Eily went wild with joy, and when honest Andrew met his friend Harry again, and shook him by the hand, he could not speak, so much was he affected, and he had to take five or six enormous pinches of snuff by way of accounting for the moisture in his eyes.

Captain Hardy was a welcome guest at Beaufort Hall for many days.

”Your dear boy,” he said, ”has had a terribly rough first experience of a life on the ocean wave, but he has braved it well, and that is more than many boys of his age would have done. But I tell you what it is,”

he added, ”Harry Milvaine _will_ be a sailor.”

”I fear so,” said his mother, sadly.

”Ah, my dear lady, there is many a worse profession than that of an honest sailor.”

”But the dangers of the deep are so great, Captain Hardy.”

”Dangers of the deep?” repeated this kindly-hearted sailor. ”Ay, and there are dangers on the dry land as well. Think of your terrible railway smashes, to say nothing, madam, of the tiles and chimney-pots that go flying about on a stormy day.”

Mrs Milvaine could not keep from smiling.

But our wilful, wayward Harry had it all his own way, and three months after this he was treading the decks of a Royal Navy training s.h.i.+p, a bold and brisk-looking naval cadet.

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