Page:Cornelia Meigs--The island of Appledore.djvu/125

Rh down, with some reluctance and by dint of much persuading, the old sailor sat up and  seemed lively and talkative and almost himself again.

The two did not tell him of the sound they had heard upstairs, but let him talk of their  adventure in the cat-boat, of the destroyer, of  the ungrateful behaviour of the runaway  Josephine. Occasionally his thoughts would wander a little and he would begin telling of some adventure long past; he went back more  than once to the night when he had fallen  asleep on watch and thought that he had seen a ship. He would bring himself back with a jerk and look at them wonderingly as though  he did not quite understand, himself, how his  ideas had become confused. Sally made him comfortable by moving the bench into a corner by the fire, whose warmth felt pleasant  enough, even to the children, since the air in the old, closed-up mill seemed to grow even  more damp and chilly as the night advanced. Billy pulled out the broken arm-chair for Sally, and she sat down in it gratefully, for she  was weary with much trotting back and forth. She answered Captain Saulsby now and again when he paused in his rambling talk, but