Skipper
Ed had so often told when they sat in the big chairs before the fire on
winter evenings. And many other wonderful things were in store for
Bobby.

CHAPTER XXIX

IN STRANGE LANDS

Mr. Winslow and his nephew Edward Norman were sportsmen who, as many
other sportsmen had done before them and have done since, had gone as
passengers with the sealing fleet that they might see the big ice and
secure for themselves trophies of the seal hunt of their own killing.
And so it came about that they met Bobby, and took him under their care.
Indeed, Mr. Winslow felt an unusual interest in the lad from the moment
he met him, for Bobby had an open, frank countenance and a pleasing
manner.

But they would not permit him to talk or tell them much of his story
until they had him on shipboard, and Bobby had eaten and bathed and
changed his ill-smelling skin clothing for a suit that Edward Norman
pressed upon him. And though the clothes were a trifle large, and the
trousers two or three inches longer than was necessary, they set Bobby
off to good advantage and wrought a wonderful change in his appearance.

"You're to stay in the cabin as our guest," said Mr. Winslow when Bobby
was dressed, and would have gone forward to the sailors' quarters. "I
have arranged it with the Captain. I am very much interested in what you
said about Skipper Ed. His name, you said, is Edward Norman. Who is he?"

"Skipper Ed's our nearest neighbor," Bobby explained simply.

"Do you call him 'Skipper' because he is a sea captain? Has he always
lived on the Labrador coast? You see," added Mr. Winslow, "I'm greatly
interested because his name is the same as my nephew's. It is a strange
coincidence, and we should like to learn all about him."

"We've always called him 'Skipper,'" answered Bobby. "He was a sailor
once, but that was long before I came. He's lived at Abel's Bay, I heard
him say, over twenty years. He's told Jimmy and me a lot about Harvard
College, and when he was a boy he lived in a place called Carrington--"

"What! Carrington?" exclaimed Mr. Winslow. "Are you sure?"

"Yes, sir," said Bobby. "He's often told Jimmy and me about his home
there when he was a boy."

The two men looked at each other and they were plainly excited, and in
an intensely expectant voice Mr. Winslow asked:

"Did he ever speak of his family?"

"Yes, sir--of his father and mother and brother and sister," said Bobby.

"Anything else?"

"Why, yes, sir;