The day after the fishing boats put out there was a sudden change in
the weather. Little white horses rode in the bay. On land the wind
blew in sharp, fitful gusts. The watermen said that there must be a
fall of snow inland.
Towards evening Mrs. Tregennis grew restless and uneasy. After
fastening up the house for the night she slipped back the bolt, and,
throwing on a shawl, went down to the front and looked out anxiously
over the angry sea.
When she carried in the breakfast the following morning there were
deep shadows under her tired eyes.
"You didn't sleep properly last night, now, did you?" asked Miss
Dorothea; and Mrs. Tregennis admitted that she had been awake for many
hours.
"I didn't only partly undress," she explained. "I felt somehow so
restless and onsettled inside o' me. But 'tis all right now, Miss,"
and Mrs. Tregennis smiled brightly, "for the boats they be sighted I
do hear tell, and they'll be here about eleven o'clock."
Soon after eleven one by one the boats sailed up the harbour. Most of
the fishing families of Draeth were represented on the quay, for there
was much anxiety to find out at once if the first catch since
Christmas had been good.
[Illustration: TOWARDS EVENING MRS. TREGENNIS GREW RESTLESS AND
UNEASY, AND WENT DOWN TO THE FRONT AND LOOKED OUT ANXIOUSLY OVER
THE ANGRY SEA.]
Mrs. Tregennis did not go down. She was too busy to leave home, but
she sang light-heartedly as she went about her work.
"Where's my Daddy to?" asked Tommy, when he came home from school.
"Not come home yet, ma handsome."
"Boats is in," objected Tommy.
"Yes, my man, but I s'pose your Daddy's busy cleanin' up. Run an' find
'en, ma lovely, an' tell 'en to come in quick an' have dinner afore he
goes to bed."
Tommy ran off to the quay and walked alongside, trying to pick out his
Daddy's boat.
"Hallo, Tommy," said Uncle Sam, who was hauling up water in a bucket
over the side of the 'Henrietta.'
"Hallo," replied Tommy, "I be lookin' for my Daddy; where be the
'Light of Home,' Uncle Sam?"
"Dear life, I don't know! Up there 'appen," and Uncle Sam jerked his
thumb in the direction of the bridge.
Tommy sped on. There was Uncle Harry in his boat and Uncle Jim in his.
But no Daddy and no "Light of Home" could Tommy find.
"Uncle Jim, do tell I, where be the 'Light of Home'?"
"Sure I don't know, Thomas, my son. Can't ee find she?"
Tommy shook his head.
"Try down below," and Uncle Jim waved vaguely towards the mouth of the
harbour.
"Been there," Tommy demurred, "an' Uncle Sam 'e said come up 'ere, 'e
did."
Uncle Jim was removing old bait from the boulter; he stopped and
scratched his head.
Tommy's eyes grew large and puzzled.
In a few minutes the word passed round that the "Light of Home" was
missing, and with her were Tom and Jack Tregennis, James Prynne and
Billy Dark.
Tommy walked into the kitchen with a white, strained face. "Mammy," he
said, and again, "Mammy." Then he swallowed hard. "I can't find my
Daddy and the' Light of Home' bain't in."
Mrs. Tregennis was kneeling in front of the fire, making toast. She
rose and turned fiercely on her son. "I'll about half kill ee, Tommy
Tregennis," she said, "if you come here scarin' with such tales as
they. I don't want none of that sort of yarn here. I'll knock ee
flying!"
For a moment they looked into each other's eyes. Then Tommy flung
himself on the floor in a passion of weeping, while Mrs. Tregennis
stood staring in front of her, still holding the toasting-fork in her
hand.
Awkwardly, and as if ashamed, Uncle Sam edged into the kitchen.
"Don't ee take on now, Ellen," he admonished. "'Twill sure to be all
right; it be just----"
"Of course 'twill be all right, an' righter than right," she
interrupted, angrily. "'Tis but that fulish child. Get up, Tommy, and
come an' have your dinner, or you'm be late to school."
Tommy still lay on the floor, his face buried in his arms.
"Get _up_, I tell ee, or I'll shift ee, my son."
Then, as there was still no movement: "If you don't get up to wanst,
Tommy Tregennis, I'll tell your fäather the minute----"
The familiar threat ended abruptly, and Mrs. Tregennis turned away,
put down the toasting-fork and filled the kettle at the sink.
All through that weary Wednesday Draeth waited for the "Light of Home"
and still she did not come. There was a heavy fall of snow inland, the
papers said, and the wind at sea grew more and more boisterous. On
Thursday morning there was snow in Draeth itself, the roofs were
white, and it settled on the fields above the cliffs.
Still there was no sign of the "Light of Home." Glasses swept the
horizon in vain. No sail was in sight!
Dozens of people were on the front looking out seaward the whole day
long. Women wept and little children were terrified.
All this time Mrs. Tregennis never left the house, but went about her
work with tight, colourless lips, and with unseeing eyes. At school
Tommy sat still and frightened, but his Mammy said 'twas better as he
should go.
Mrs. Radford attempted tactless consolation, but Tommy's Ladies
behaved as far as possible in a normal way. Outside they shunned the
shifting throng on the front, because they dreaded hearing the
muttered conjectures. So they sat some little distance apart on the
rocks, straining--like all the rest of Draeth--straining out to sea.
"If I were the parson here," said Miss Margaret, "I should open the
church and ask all those people on the front to come in. I'd just have
one strong, simple prayer and sing 'For those in peril on the sea.' I
shouldn't say anything to them because I should only cry if I did."
Miss Margaret groped for her handkerchief and wiped away the tears
that were trickling down her cheek.
In the whole wide world there seemed to be one thing only that really
mattered, and this was that the "Light of Home" should sail over the
horizon and ride with the tide up the harbour to Draeth.
The remaining hours of the Thursday dragged with incredible slowness.
It was a relief when night came and there could be no more weary
gazing seaward for a few hours at least.
When Mrs. Tregennis brought the tea in the morning there was a new
look in her eyes.
"Well?" asked the ladies, fearfully.
"They've sighted the boat," she said. Then her unnatural composure
gave way; she leaned up against the wall and sobbed.
Miss Margaret jumped out of bed, rescued the tray and put her arms
around her.
"You darling," she said. "You've been just so brave, it's been
wonderful." And she and the Brown Lady cried too, cried until they
laughed, then laughed until they cried again.
Crowds waited on the Frying Pan and on the quay to see the "Light of
Home" come in. Her bows were knocked out with the lashing of the wind
and the sea. But they had got the fish! The men were heavy with sleep,
stunned with exposure, shaking with cold. But they had got the fish!
Bit by bit their story was told. When they had anchored on the Tuesday
afternoon they had, of course, thrown out the boulter with the anchor.
About nine o'clock that night when they wanted to sail along a bit
they found the boulter had parted from the anchor. There was nothing
for it but to make their way to the dan, cast anchor there and wait
patiently until daylight. By this time all the other boats were
sailing home. They secured the boulter all right, but they didn't seem
to have much fish. So they thought to wait a time longer, sailed
farther southwards and anchored again.
Then the wind had come up somethin' awful. As their lugger was not
built for a heavy open sea, they reckoned to make for home. But they
found that the strong spring tide had swept the boulter round so that
it was firmly caught as ever was on some rock or somethin' at the
bottom o' the sea. In workin' another man's gear you'd rather risk
your life than leave the boulter behind! So again there was nothin'
for it but to wait; wait this time until the heavy tide turned and
swept their boulter back again from the obstruction on which it had
caught.
Hours they had had to wait for this, and even then they couldn't get
off. Ill-luck seemed to dog them, for once more the boulter parted;
this time in the middle. How long they were 'eavin' an' pullin' an'
gropin' they couldn't rightly say. For more than twenty-four hours
they had had neither food nor fire. But they had got the fish and the
owner of the boat had his boulter right enough, and that alone was a
matter of twenty poun' an' more.
The catch of the "Light of Home" made a record sale. There, on the
quay, the fish was all arranged in heaps--congers, ray, skate, cod,
ling, hake, even a few turbot and halibut lying royally alone.
"There was certainly 'eaps of fish," the auctioneer remarked, "and
good fish at that."
"'Uman creatures' lives," Jack Chorley was heard to quote.
The auctioneer frowned him down, blew his nose and started.
"Beautiful fish, gentlemen," thus suavely he addressed the buyers.
"Now what offers, gentlemen, for the beautiful 'eaps of skate?"
Eight--nine--ten--; up went the bidding, until the pile of skate
brought fifteen shillings a dozen, and the ray fetched the same high
figure, too. Congers stuck at twelve shillings a hundredweight, but
the hake reached as much as one-and-ten apiece; the turbot rose to
twelve shillings the fish, and one halibut alone brought forty-two
shillings.
On droned the voice of the auctioneer. "'Ow much for this lot,
gentlemen? a shame to let it go for ten shillin', sirs. 'Tis too good
a 'eap to be give for nothin'. Come, gentlemen, come! What offers I
say?"
"'Twarn't on no rock as that boulter parted," said Jim Hex, and
shifted his wad of baccy from the right cheek to the left.
"No more it warn't, Jim," agreed Joe Cox. "Too good a catch for a
rock."
"A wreck for sartin'," and Jim spat over the side of the quay.
"A bit o' what 'peared to be a woman's gound were catched up along wi'
the boulter," corroborated Tregennis, somewhat huskily, from the
shattered bow of the boat.
"Poor soul!" said a woman on the outskirts, who had overheard. There
was a half-sob in her voice.
Jack Chorley looked at her angrily. "Damn!" he said, and vindictively
hit at a fly that was trying to settle on his nose.
As the clock chimed a quarter past four the sale was ending. Slowly
Tommy trailed along the street to his Mammy and his home. Seeing the
crowd on the quay he turned aside to find out its cause.
"Daddy," he shouted, "oh, Daddy!"
Heedless of mooring-ropes and slippery bits of fish he ran and
stumbled, stumbled and ran, towards the "Light of Home."
"Daddy, oh, Daddy!" he sobbed, and reached the edge of the quay.
Tregennis stretched out his arms, lifted him into the lugger and held
him tight. Again there was a woman's sob and the air was tense.
"Have a bib for your tea, my son," said Uncle Jack, and laughed rather
uncertainly as he held up to him a little fish, something between a
pollock and a whiting.
"An' here be two plate-ray to take home to your Mammy," added Billy
Dark, who was young and unmarried, "an' happen you'd best take your
Daddy along too."
Once more the crowd parted and Tommy and his Daddy passed through.
Mrs. Tregennis could not trust herself to go down to the quay, so she
had not seen Tregennis yet, for the fish must come first.
"I expect you'm cold and hungry, Tom," was her greeting when at last
he came holding Tommy by the hand. Her lower lip trembled as she
spoke. "Here be a good meal for ee, an' there be hot bottles in the
bed. So hurry up do ee now, for you do be fair done."
"I tried Miss Margaret's plan o' chewin'," said Tregennis, smiling a
little wearily as he sat down to a bit of somethin' to eat. "An' upon
my sam I believe there be somethin' in it. But in a while there warn't
nothin' left to chew. Not in my mouth I don't mean this time, but not
in the hamper neither. Brave an' empty 'e was I can tell ee; never a
single crumb left, no, not even for a sparrer to pick."
Later in the evening Mrs. Tregennis held in her hand eight pounds nine
shillings and sixpence, Tregennis's share of the record sale.
"What be I to do with this vasty sum?" she asked the ladies, as they
sat by the fire and laughed at nothing at all. "I shall think I be
some size now," she asserted, drawing herself very upright and
tilting her chin. "What'll I do with all this gold?"
"Why not go up to London?" suggested the Blue Lady, "and stay at the
Hotel Cecil. I believe you can live there quite comfortably for five
pounds a day."
"Can ee now, Miss, indeed? I hadn't known of that. Well, th' objects
no money to me, so Tommy, shall you an' me an' Daddy go up to London
for to see the King?"
"Yes," nodded Tommy, his mouth full of bread and butter.
"Then come along o' me," said Mammy, and she put on her hat and coat,
walked up Main Street to the Post Office, and there with pride she
pushed the eight pounds nine shillings and sixpence across the counter
to be added to her small account.