"Not more than two
months, I should say." The consul rubbed his rheumatic leg and sighed,
but said nothing.
The Bradleys returned about ten o'clock, and came in very sheepishly.
The consul had gone off to pay the boatmen who had brought them, and
Albert in his absence assured the sailors that there was not the least
danger of their being sent away. Then he turned into one of the beds,
and Stedman took one in another room, leaving the room he had occupied
heretofore for the consul. As he was saying good-night, Albert
suggested that he had not yet told them how he came to be on a
deserted island; but Stedman only laughed and said that that was a
long story, and that he would tell him all about it in the morning. So
Albert went off to bed without waiting for the consul to return, and
fell asleep, wondering at the strangeness of his new life, and
assuring himself that if the rain only kept up, he would have his
novel finished in a month.
The sun was shining brightly when he awoke, and the palm-trees outside
were nodding gracefully in a warm breeze. From the court came the odor
of strange flowers, and from the window he could see the ocean
brilliantly blue, and with the sun coloring the spray that beat
against the coral reefs on the shore.
"Well, the consul can't complain of this," he said, with a laugh of
satisfaction; and pulling on a bath-robe, he stepped into the next
room to awaken Captain Travis. But the room was quite empty, and the
bed undisturbed.
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