“We go home now--see _mo chun_; get nice hot _tea_,” said the father, in a kind tone, as he clasped the little figure closely to him, and started to row home. Of course Lo Luen did not really feel afraid, with her father so near, and said: “I no ’flaid; but I likee go fast. I cold and hungly--that’s all.”
Her father smiled in the dark as he murmured consolingly, “Yes--that’s all.”
Lo Luen was thinking, as she crouched there, nestled up against _ho chun_, “How pletty those dolls were; I be so happy if I had one--just one, foh my velly own.”
The moonbeams lit up the water in a silvery path, and as Lo Luen looked at this path and thought how very beautiful it was, she noticed something floating in the light and bounding up and down on the waves. It looked like a big lump of seaweed.
“What is that, _ho chun_?” she said, with childish curiosity.
“Oh, I think just a piece of wood or a bunch of kelp; you likee get it, little girl?”
It seemed determined to get away from them, for almost every time they were near enough to touch it a big wave would come, and take it away in the dark, and it would be lost to sight for a while. But soon the light revealed it right within reach. _Ho chun_ put out his hand and grasped it, and putting it on the fish said: “We see when we get home,” and rowed away as fast as he could.
At home the little mother was getting very uneasy. What could keep them so long? “_Cheung kan ye lok_” (it is getting very late), she said. Oh, why had she ever let her go? To think of her _pao chu_ (precious pearl) being out on the big ocean at night. She imagined all sorts of horrible things, and blamed herself. Perhaps she had not set enough food before the joss, nor burned enough incense. She had the tea all nice and hot, and knew if nothing had happened they would be very hungry when they reached home. So she lighted more punks before the god, and had already sung the baby’s little Chinese song:
“My little baby--little boy blue-- Is as sweet as sugar and cinnamon too; Isn’t this precious darling of ours Sweeter than dates and cinnamon flowers?”
He now lay asleep on his couch, and she was all alone.
After what seemed an age to her she heard the sound of a boat being dragged upon the sand, and ran to the door of the hut, and stood there looking out upon the beach. “Lo Luen! Lo Luen!” she called out in the darkness, “_Yap loi le!_” (come in!) and there was a rush of sandalled feet, and in just a moment two cold brown hands were clasped in her warm ones, and a dear little cold nose was pressed against her face. “Lo Luen, precious pearl, you have come back, and the joss is good,” she said.