The other took no notice, but reached for a pad of paper. "Give me yer
address," he grated. "I'll see what I can do for ye, but, I'll say
this, that I'll not be makin' an architect oot of that boy there. You
may go!"
He neither rose from his seat or made any offer to shake hands. Mrs.
McKenzie hesitated for a moment at the door of the room, but David was
absorbed in some letters and did not look up. "Thank you! Good day!"
she said dully, and Donald echoed, "Good day, sir!" He took no notice,
but when they left, he jumped up and locked his office door and sat
for a long time staring out of the grimy window--oblivious to
respectful taps on the closed panels. From a scrutiny of the grey sky,
he turned and stared fixedly at a small photograph on his desk--a
picture of a young boy--and the stern look faded from his face. It was
his own son. For a minute he gazed on the picture with eyes in which a
strange light of almost idolatrous affection glowed, then he turned
and picked up Mrs. McKenzie's card and the bitter, sneering expression
returned as he murmured, "_Aye! I'll look after her brat!_"
The McKenzies were out on the street again when Donald clasped his
mother's hand. "The old beast!" he said. "How I hate him!" The mother
made no answer. She had only been with David for five or ten minutes,
but in that time he had wounded her to the soul and she felt that all
that he said was true.
They went home and tried to forget the memory of that hateful
interview, but a week later came a letter from David McKenzie.
"Dear Madam:"--it ran--"I have considered your case carefully. I will
give your boy the benefit of a free apprenticeship on a new vessel
which will be ready for sea in a month or two. For yourself, I am
enclosing a letter to the manager of the Ross Bay Hydropathic, Ross
Bay, Ayrshire, and if you will present this to him on May 1st, he will
give you a position there as assistant matron. Yours truly, David
McKenzie." There was a postscript which ran:--"I will advise you when
your boy should report here at my office. I will provide him with the
outfit necessary. D. McK."
Janet read the curt offer and for a moment she stared into space.
"Donald to go to sea! The sea that had torn her husband--his
father--ruthlessly from her! And poor Joak's father too! The sea that
yearly made widows of so many Glasgow wives...." She remembered her
dead husband's words, "The sea would kill you, laddie ... and it's a
dog's life at the best of times!" She threw the letter down on the
table. No! she wouldn't accept David's offer. It was the cruelest blow
he had yet dealt her. She would manage somehow, but she'd keep Donald
by her.
"What does he say, mamma?" Donald picked up the letter and read it.
The mother stared at him as he read and she noticed the look in his
eyes with an unknown fear gripping her heart. Ere he had laid the
missive down she knew what was in his mind.
"Mother, dear," he said, slipping his arm around her neck, "I want to
go!"
For a moment she remained silent and her mind ran back to a day two
years ago. McLeish, mate of the _Sarmania_ was talking. "It was a
terrifyin' sea, that yin, madam ... and when I pickit masel' up ... I
found tha whole bridge and wheelhouse gone ... and worst of all,
madam, yer husband was gone! Aye, him an' th' second mate, an' th'
quarter-master, the bos'n an' fower men ... an' fower sae badly mashed
up that I doot if they'll leeve! And that's all there is tae tell,
madam!" She shuddered at the horrible memory of it. The frightful
wall of grey-green sea rising up, curling and roaring. The terrible
crash as it engulfed the ship, and the bare wet decks, twisted iron
work and debris which remained. The others--the human victims--were
carried away in the maw of the monster--whipped from life into death
with a suddenness which was staggering. "No! no! no!" she cried,
clasping her son to her in a frenzy of fear. "You shan't go! He shan't
send you!" But in spite of her objections, she knew that the
irresistible lure of the sea would take her son from her and that the
ties of love and home were powerless against the magic of its
adventure and romance.