With the threats of the gray stranger in mind, my uncle now began
without delay to refit the _Shining Light_: this for all the world as
though 'twere a timely and reasonable thing to do. But 'twas neither
timely, for the fish were running beyond expectation off Twist Tickle,
nor reasonable, for the _Shining Light_ had been left to rot and foul
in the water of Old Wives' Cove since my infancy. Whatever the
pretence he made, the labor was planned and undertaken in anxious
haste: there was, indeed, too much pretence--too suave an explanation,
a hand too aimless and unsteady, an eye too blank, too large a flow of
liquor--for a man who suffered no secret perturbation.
"In case o' accident, Dannie," he explained, as though 'twere a thing
of no importance. "Jus' in case o' accident. I wouldn't be upset,"
says he, "an I was you."
"Never you fear," says I.
"No," says he; "you'll stand by, Dannie!"
"That I will," I boasted.
"Ye can't delude _me_," says he. "I knows _you_. I bet ye _you'll_
stand by, whatever comes of it."
'Tis quite beyond me to express my gratification. 'Twas a mysterious
business altogether--this whim to make the _Shining Light_ ready
for sea. I could make nothing of it at all. And why, thinks I, should
the old craft all at once be troubled by all this pother of block and
tackle and hammer and saw? 'Twas beyond me to fathom; but I was
glad to discover, whatever the puzzle, that my uncle's faith in
the lad he had nourished was got real and large. 'Twas not for that
he bred me; but 'twas the only reward--and that a mean, poor one--he
might have. And he was now come near, it seemed, to dependence upon
me; there was that in his voice to show it--a little trembling, a
little hopelessness, a little wistfulness: a little weakening of its
quality of wrathful courage.
"_You'll_ stand by," he had said; and, ay, but it fair saddened me to
feel the appeal of his aging spirit to my growing years! There comes a
time, no doubt, in the relationship of old and young, when the
guardian is all at once changed into the cherished one. 'Tis a
tragical thing--a thing to be resolved, to be made merciful and
benign, only by the acquiescence of the failing spirit. There is then
no interruption--no ripple upon the flowing river of our lives. As for
my uncle, I fancy that he kept watch upon me, in those days, to read
his future, to discover his achievement, in my disposition. Stand by?
Ay, that I would! And being young I sought a deed to do: I wished the
accident might befall to prove me.
"Accident?" cries I. "Never you fear!"
"I'll not fear," says he, "that ye'll not stand by."
"Ay," I complained; "but never you fear at all!"
"I'll not fear," he repeated, with a little twinkle of amusement,
"that ye'll not stand by, as best ye're able."
I felt now my strength--the greatness of my body and the soaring
courage of my soul. This in the innocent way of a lad; and by grace of
your recollection I shall not be blamed for it. Fourteen and something
more? 'Twas a mighty age! What did it lack, thinks I, of power and
wisdom? To be sure I strutted the present most haughtily and eyed the
future with as saucy a flash as lads may give. The thing delighted my
uncle; he would chuckle and clap me on the back and cry, "That's very
good!" until I was wrought into a mood of defiance quite ridiculous.
But still 'tis rather grateful to recall: for what's a lad's boasting
but the honest courage of a man? I would serve my uncle; but 'twas not
all: I would serve Judith. She was now come into our care: I would
serve her.
"They won't nothin' hurt _she_!" thinks I.