Page:Ballantyne--The Battery and the Boiler.djvu/57

 breath or words to express his willingness—if his father did not object.

"Go home at once, then, and ask leave, for the Great Eastern is almost ready for sea, and you will have to hasten your preparations."

Robin stroked no more ts and dotted no more is that day. We fear, indeed, that he even left the invoice on his desk unfinished, with the last i imperfect.

Bursting into his father's house, he found Madge—now become a pretty little slip of feminine thread-paper—seated at the piano agonising over a chord which her hand was too small to compass.

"Madge, Madge, cousin Madge!" he shouted, seizing both the extended little hands and kissing the musical wrinkles from her brow, "why am I like a magnet? You 'll never guess."

"Because you attract everybody to you," said Madge promptly.

"Pooh! not at all. A magnet doesn't attract every body. It has two poles, don't you know, and repels some bodies. No, Madge, it 's because I have been electrified."

"Indeed? and what has electrified you, Robin?"

"The Atlantic Cable, Madge."

"Well, that ought to be able to do it powerfully," returned Madge, with a laugh; "but tell me all about