"I doubt it, Cap'n," was the answer. "But rest and a hearty meal may bring 'em around all right."
"Very well; then do you care for them while I go to the Lone Aspen."
[Illustration: THE BOY'S ILLUSTRATION. FIG. 25.--Bruce Whistling for Madam Breeze.]
The Lone Aspen stood on the summit of the hill. It was an old tree, with wide spreading branches, and great girth of trunk. The trunk was hollow, and covered with warts. One of these was quite near the roots, and was pierced in the centre with a hole which exposed the hollow within. Bruce stopped at the foot of the tree beneath this opening, and blew a peculiar note upon a whistle which hung by a chain about his neck. There was no answer. He whistled again. Still no response. Along the rough scales and ridges of bark running up and down the trunk, a stairway had been made like the rounds of a ladder. Upon this the Captain climbed towards the opening. He stepped out upon a bulging wart and peeped within the tree. It was empty. Again he blew his whistle. The echoes rolled up and down the hollow trunk and died away far above toward the branches, where a faint streak of light shone through an opening like the one in which the Brownie stood.
"This is strange!" exclaimed the Captain. He turned, and looked up at the Sun through branches of the tree. "Surely, Madam Breeze should be at the Lone Aspen at this time of day! However, I must climb to the window and wait." He sat down on the window ledge, and as he was tired out by long journeys, hard labors and sleepless nights, in spite of himself he fell into a doze.
A sound like the tones of a distant bell awoke him.
"Ha, she has come!" he cried, and jumped to his feet. Madam Breeze was passing with her attendants through the door. Her voice sounded through the hollow trunk as she swept into it. In a moment the Captain felt her breath upon his cheek, and presently stood face to face with her at the window.
She kissed him heartily, brushed the hair back caressingly from his forehead, and addressed him in a sprightly, kindly way. Madam Breeze was an Elf of pleasing appearance; plump to the verge of stoutness, but singularly graceful and airy in all her movements. She was troubled with an asthma which interrupted her speech with frequent attacks of coughing and wheezing, much to her discomfort and the disturbance of her temper. She had an odd fashion of expanding and contracting in size either suddenly or gradually. This occurred oftenest during her attacks of asthma, and to those who first saw this, the sight was a startling one.