Have you ever
been on the Pacific Ocean?'
'Never.'
'Ah, there the mornings are delicious. It is very beautiful here now, but
in summer on the Pacific some of the mornings are so calm and peaceful
and fresh, that it would seem as if the world had been newly made.'
'You have travelled a great deal, Miss Longworth. I envy you.'
'I often think I am a person to be envied, but there may come a shipwreck
one day, and then I shall not be in so enviable a position.'
'I sincerely hope you may never have such an experience.'
'Have you ever been shipwrecked, Mr. Kenyon?'
'Oh no; my travelling experiences are very limited. But to read of a
shipwreck is bad enough.'
'We have had a most delightful voyage so far. Quite like summer. One can
scarcely believe that we left America in the depth of winter, with snow
everywhere and the thermometer ever so far below zero. Have you mended
your deck-chair yet, sufficiently well to trust yourself upon it again?'
'Oh!' said Kenyon, with a laugh, 'you really must not make fun of my
amateur carpentering like that. As I told you, I am a mining engineer,
and if I cannot mend a deck-chair, what would you expect me to do with a
mine?'
'Have you had much to do with mines?' asked the young woman.
'I am just beginning,' replied Kenyon; 'this, in fact, is one of my first
commissions. I have been sent with my friend Wentworth to examine certain
mines on the Ottawa River.'
'The Ottawa River!' cried Edith.
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