"Very!" said Katy; but she didn't look sorry at all.
"There's one comfort," Clover remarked valiantly, as she walked back to
the house with her arm round Rose's waist. "She's coming back in
December, when the ship sails, and as likely as not she will stay a year,
or perhaps two. That's what I like about the navy. You can eat your cake,
and have it too. Husbands go off for good long times, and leave their
wives behind them. I think it's delightful!"
"I wonder if Katy will think it quite so delightful," remarked Rose.
"Girls are not always so anxious to ship their husbands off for what you
call 'good long times.'"
"I think she ought. It seems to me perfectly unnatural that any one should
want to leave her own family and go away for always. I like Ned dearly,
but except for this blessed arrangement about going to sea, I don't see
how Katy could."
"Clover, you are a goose. You'll be wiser one of these days, see if you
aren't," was Rose's only reply.
CHAPTER IV.
TWO LONG YEARS IN ONE SHORT CHAPTER.
Katy's absence left a sad blank in the household. Every one missed her,
but nobody so much as Clover, who all her life long had been her
room-mate, confidante, and intimate friend.
It was a great help that Rose was there for the first three lonely days.
Dulness and sadness were impossible with that vivacious little person at
hand; and so long as she stayed, Clover had small leisure to be mournful.
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