CHAPTER IX.
FREEDOM.
"_O, a bargeman's is the life for me, Though there's nothin' to be seen but scener-ee!_"-- OLD SONG.
A pale shaft of daylight slanted through the cabin doorway.

It touched Tilda's eyelids, and she opened them at once, stared, and relaxed her embrace.
"Awake ?" asked Mrs.Mortimer's voice from the shadow above the locker.
"Well, I'm glad of that, because I want to get to the stove.

Sardines," said Mrs.Mortimer, "you can take out with a fork; but, packed as we are, when one moves the rest must follow suit.

Is the boy stirring too ?" "No," answered Tilda, peering down on him.

But as she slipped her arm from under his neck, he came out of dreamland with a quick sob and a shudder very pitiful to hear and to feel.