As for me, I can stand it first-rate. I have already built
two houses on Cape Cod,--in my head, of course,--and I'll be hanged if I
know which one I am going to live in and which one I am going to put my
mother in."

CHAPTER XLIII

MOK AS A VOCALIST

It would have been very comfortable to the mind of Edna, during her
waiting days in Paris, had she known there was a letter to her from
Captain Horn, in a cottage in the town of Sidmouth, on the south coast of
Devonshire. Had she known this, she would have chartered French trains,
Channel steamers, English trains, flies, anything and everything which
would have taken her the quickest to the little town of Sidmouth. Had she
known that he had written to her the first chance he had had, all her
doubts and perplexities would have vanished in an instant. Had she read
the letter, she might have been pained to find that it was not such a
letter as she would wish to have, and she might have grieved that it
might still be a long time before she could expect to hear from him
again, or to see him, but she would have waited--have waited patiently,
without any doubts or perplexities.

This letter, with a silver coin,--much more than enough to pay any
possible postage,--had been handed by Shirley to the first mate of the
British steamer, in the harbor of Valparaiso, and that officer had given
it to a seaman, who was going on shore, with directions to take it to
the post-office, and pay for the postage out of the silver coin, and
whatever change there might be, he should keep it for his trouble. On the
way to the post-office, this sailor stopped to refresh himself, and
meeting with a fellow-mariner in the place of refreshment, he refreshed
him also. And by the time the two had refreshed themselves to their
satisfaction, there was not much left of the silver coin--not enough to
pay the necessary postage to France.

"But," said the seaman to himself, "it doesn't matter a bit. We are bound
for Liverpool, and I'll take the letter there myself, and then I'll send
it over to Paris for tuppence ha'penny, which I will have then, and
haven't now. And I bet another tuppence that it will go sooner than if I
posted it here, for it may be a month before a mail-steamer leaves the
other side of this beastly continent. Anyway, I'm doing the best I can."

He put the letter in the pocket of his pea-jacket, and the bottom of that
pocket being ripped, the letter went down between the outside cl