“Who’s there?”
“Friends,” said the doctor. “We’ve lost our way, and want to find it.”
“Go round to the back door; this’n won’t open,” said the voice.
At this they turned away to look for the back door, wondering, as they
went, what the occupant of the house supposed a front door was made
for. It seemed to them like stories which they had read of some Dutch
villages, where the people are so excessively neat that the “front door”
and the “best room” are never used except on two great occasions; one
being a marriage, and the other a burial. At all other times the back
door and the back rooms are used.
So to this back door they tried to work their way round the house. As
they went round, the smell of decayed fish came up more strongly, more
overpoweringly, and more impressively than ever. Evidently the people of
the cottage had something to do with fish. They either caught them,
or traded in them, or cured them. Who were they? Was it Pereau--or was
it--what?
Turning the house, the fresh wind came upon them, driving against them
the dense fog clouds, and hiding everything before them from view. But
through that gloom there swept upon their hearing a recurrence of the
solemn boom of the surf which had startled them a few moments before,
when they first paused to look at the cottage. There it came, the sound
of the gathering waters, rising gradually, breaking, and flinging the
roar of the falling waters far away along the shore.
Here they were, then, by the sea; here the surf rolled; here were the
signs of fish. Evidently these people were fishermen, and their life was
on the ocean wave. Suddenly they encountered some large object which was
right in their way. Through the gloom they could see the outline of a
whaling boat, that is, a boat sharp at both ends, which is often used
by fishermen in these waters. This excited no surprise, however. It
only confirmed what had been told them by the booming surf and the odors
wafted from the decaying fish.
On reaching the rear of the house they found the aforsaid back door wide
open, and a man standing in the doorway, with a candle in one hand and
a pipe in the other. The candle flared, and flickered, and sputtered in
the wind and fog; and he was blinking through the darkness, and trying
to catch a glimpse of his visitors.
He was a short, thick-set, red-faced man, with whiskers running
all round in a “sea dog” sort of fashion, checked shirt, and canvas
trousers, which bore numerous marks made by tar. His waistcoat was
unbuttoned, so as to give free play to the organs of his manly chest. He
had no coat, and, for that matter, no boots. In point of fact, he was in
his stocking feet. His grizzled hair and beard showed him to belong
to the elderly class of mankind; but his stout, sturdy frame and bluff
countenance exhibited no decay of strength.
“Lost yer way?” said he, as he caught sight of them. “Wal, come in, any
how. We’ll talk it over. Walk in, all on ye, the whole fifty of ye, for
that matter. Ole Bennie Grigg can find room for ye. Walk in, walk in.”
“But where are we?” asked the doctor. “What place is this?”
“What place? Haw, haw, haw! What! don’t you even know the place? Haw,
haw, haw! Why, this here place is Scott’s Bay!”