Page 147 - for-the-term-of-his-natural-life

officer commanding is obliged to place himself in charge’—
all right, my dear sir. I’ve no objection in life.’
‘It was Sylvia that I was thinking of,’ said Vickers.
‘Well, then,’ cries the other, as the door of the room in-
side opened, and a little white figure came through into the
broad verandah. ‘Here she is! Ask her yourself. Well, Miss
Sylvia, will you come and shake hands with an old friend?’
The bright-haired baby of the Malabar had become a
bright-haired child of some eleven years old, and as she
stood in her simple white dress in the glow of the lamplight,
even the unaesthetic mind of Mr. Frere was struck by her
extreme beauty. Her bright blue eyes were as bright and as
blue as ever. Her little figure was as upright and as supple
as a willow rod; and her innocent, delicate face was framed
in a nimbus of that fine golden hair—dry and electrical,
each separate thread shining with a lustre of its own—with
which the dreaming painters of the middle ages endowed
and glorified their angels.
‘Come and give me a kiss, Miss Sylvia!’ cries Frere. ‘You
haven’t forgotten me, have you?’
But the child, resting one hand on her father’s knee,
surveyed Mr. Frere from head to foot with the charming
impertinence of childhood, and then, shaking her head, in-
quired: ‘Who is he, papa?’
‘Mr. Frere, darling. Don’t you remember Mr. Frere, who
used to play ball with you on board the ship, and who was
so kind to you when you were getting well? For shame, Syl-
via!’
There was in the chiding accents such an undertone of

1 For the Term of His Natural Life