"
She had been gazing at him almost vacantly while he was talking. Now
she smiled beautifully.
"Oh, I am so glad to see you again," she said. "It seems almost as if
you had been away a thousand years."
"That," said Dan, "almost pays me for frightening you. Are you ready
for breakfast? I knocked it together a while ago."
"For which you shall be punished--when we get ashore."
CHAPTER XIV
DAN AND VIRGINIA
After breakfast they drew chairs to the wheel and sat out on deck. It
was a wonderful May morning. Thin clouds hung in the blue, like little
yachts; and the cool, balmy air and the sparkling sunlight brought the
clear, steady call of work to be done, of life to be lived beautifully
and nobly, and strong things to overcome, or to accomplish--the call of
youth.
And they heard the call, these two, and responded to it with the
joyousness of youth, wherein a phrase is a lifetime, and a word,
volumes. They talked of themselves, regarding each other wonderingly
as hidden depths of character were revealed, or a word, or a sentence,
or a sympathetic silence threw light upon a new element of personality.
He spoke of the _Fledgling_. He used to see her through a golden haze.
She was his first command. Yet each day came the old question, What
next? And the answer.
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