There was a fishing-boat coming into the neighboring cove, as has
already been said, while Ferris and John Packer stood together talking
in the yard. In this fishing-boat were two other men, younger and
lighter-hearted, if it were only for the reason that neither of them
had such a store of petty ill deeds and unkindnesses to remember in
dark moments. They were in an old dory, and there was much ice
clinging to her, inside and out, as if the fishers had been out for
many hours. There were only a few cod lying around in the bottom,
already stiffened in the icy air. The wind was light, and one of the
men was rowing with short, jerky strokes, to help the sail, while the
other held the sheet and steered with a spare oar that had lost most
of its blade. The wind came in flaws, chilling, and mischievous in its
freaks. "I ain't goin' out any more this year," said the younger man,
who rowed, giving a great shudder. "I ain't goin' to perish myself for
a pinch o' fish like this"--pushing them with his heavy boot.
"Generally it's some warmer than we are gittin' it now, 'way into
January. I've got a good chance to go into Otis's shoe-shop; Bill Otis
was tellin' me he didn't know but he should go out West to see his
uncle's folks,--he done well this last season, lobsterin',--an' I can
have his bench if I want it. I do' know but I may make up some
lobster-pots myself, evenin's an' odd times, and take to lobsterin'
another season. I know a few good places that Bill Otis ain't struck;
and then the scarcer lobsters git to be, the more you git for 'em, so
now a poor ketch's 'most better 'n a good one."
"Le' me take the oars," said Joe Banks, without attempting a reply to
such deep economical wisdom.
"You hold that sheet light," grumbled the other man, "or these
gusts'll have us over. An' don't let that old oar o' yourn range about
so. I can't git no hold o' the water." The boat lifted suddenly on a
wave and sank again in the trough, the sail flapped, and a great cold
splash of salt water came aboard, floating the fish to the stern,
against Banks's feet. Chauncey, grumbling heartily, began to bail with
a square-built wooden scoop for which he reached far behind him in the
bow.
"They say the sea holds its heat longer than the land, but I guess
summer's about over out here." He shivered again as he spoke. "Come,
le' 's say this is the last trip, Joe."
Joe looked up at the sky, quite unconcerned. "We may have it warmer
after we git more snow," he said. "I'd like to keep on myself until
after the first o' the year, same's usual. I've got my reasons," he
added. "But don't you go out no more, Chauncey."
"What you goin' to do about them trees o' Packer's?" asked Chauncey
suddenly, and not without effort. The question had been on his mind
all the afternoon. "Old Ferris has laid a bet that he'll git 'em
anyway. I signed the paper they've got down to Fox'l Berry's store to
the Cove. A number has signed it, but I shouldn't want to be the one
to carry it up to Packer. They all want your name, but they've got
some feelin' about how you're situated. Some o' the boys made me
promise to speak to you, bein' 's we're keepin' together."
"You can tell 'em I'll sign it," said Joe Banks, flushing a warm,
bright color under his sea-chilled skin. "I don't know what set him
out to be so poor-behaved. He's a quick-tempered man, Packer is, but
quick over. I never knew him to keep no such a black temper as this."
"They always say that you can't drive a Packer," said Chauncey,
tugging against the uneven waves. "His mother came o' that old
fightin' stock up to Bolton; 't was a different streak from his
father's folks--they was different-hearted an' all pleasant. Ferris
has done the whole mean business. John Packer'd be madder 'n he is now
if he knowed how Ferris is makin' a tool of him. He got a little too
much aboard long ago's Thanksgivin' Day, and bragged to me an' another
fellow when he was balmy how he'd rile up Packer into sellin' them
pines, and then he'd double his money on 'em up to Boston; he said
there wa'n't no such a timber pine as that big one left in the State
that he knows on. Why, 'tis 'most five foot through high's I can
reach."
Chauncey stopped rowing a minute, and held the oars with one hand
while he looked over his shoulder. "I should miss them old trees," he
said; "they always make me think of a married couple. They ain't no
common growth, be they, Joe? Everybody knows 'em. I bet you if
anything happened to one on 'em t' other would go an' die. They say
ellums has mates, an' all them big trees."
Joe Banks had been looking at the pines all the way in; he had steered
by them from point to point. Now he saw them just over Fish Rock,
where the surf was whitening, and over the group of fish-houses, and
began to steer straight inshore. The sea was less rough now, and after
getting well into the shelter of the land he drew in his oar. Chauncey
could pull the rest of the way without it. A sudden change in the wind
filled the three-cornered sail, and they moved faster.
"She'll make it now, herself, if you'll just keep her straight,
Chauncey; no, 't wa'n't nothin' but a flaw, was it? Guess I'd better
help ye;" and he leaned on the oar once more, and took a steady sight
of the familiar harbor marks.
"We're right over one o' my best lobster rocks," said Chauncey,
looking warm-blooded and cheerful again. "I'm satisfied not to be no
further out; it's beginnin' to snow; see them big flakes a-comin'?
I'll tell the boys about your signin' the paper; I do' know's you'd
better resk it, either."
"Why not?" said Joe Banks hastily. "I suppose you refer to me an'
Lizzie Packer; but she wouldn't think no more o' me for leavin' my
name off a proper neighborhood paper, nor her father, neither. You git
them two pines let alone, and I'll take care o' Lizzie. I've got all
the other boats and men to think of besides me, an' I've got some
pride anyway. I ain't goin' to have Bolton folks an' all on 'em down
to the Centre twittin' us, nor twittin' Packer; he'll turn sour toward
everybody the minute he does it. I know Packer; he's rough and ugly,
but he ain't the worst man in town by a good sight. Anybody'd be all
worked up to go through so much talk, and I'm kind o' 'fraid this
minute his word's passed to Ferris to have them trees down. But you
show him the petition; 't will be kind of formal, and if that don't do
no good, I do' know what will. There you git the sail in while I hold
her stiddy, Chauncey."