Sunday was to us all a real day of rest, and we enjoyed every minute of
it, and for once listened to a very long sermon without the fidgets. The
Rectory boys came up for a chat in the afternoon, so we let the dogs out
and went down to the beach and strolled quietly about, neither dogs nor
humans indulging in anything like play--all were too stiff and sore to
think of it.
We were all out again early on Monday morning, but without nets and
taking only sticks; and we spent a short day, with a long lunch, looking
up outlying rabbits in the hedges of the farm at the foot of the Denes;
and here the two lurchers, who during the days at the nets had taken it
easy and refused to face the gorse, had the chief of the work, for
directly a rabbit was started by the other dogs, it made straight off
across the open for the gorse on the Denes, and the lurchers were the
only dogs fast enough to catch them. We finally had to give up work
because the dogs of all sorts were too tired to move, and also because
the weather, that had been fine and calm all the previous week, began to
break, and before we reached shelter there was half a gale sending big
green waves thundering on to the beach and carrying the salt spray far
inland.
That night, after Jack was in bed and asleep, I put on my hat and
went out, called by the noise of the waters. I joined a group of
weather-beaten hard-featured men dressed in thick blue jerseys and
"sou-wester" hats, who stood with their hands tucked deep into their
trouser pockets, watching the sea from behind the shelter of a boat
stranded high up on the beach. I got a civil word of greeting as I came
up, and then we all watched in silence, for by this time the "half gale"
had become a storm, and it was only by shouting we could have made each
other hear. It was a wild weird scene, awe-inspiring, but intensely
attractive--at least _I_ found it so; but then such scenes did not often
come before me, and I daresay my companions, who were well used to being
out on such a night, only felt thankful they were safe on shore, and
thought with anxiety of those of their friends and neighbours who were
out battling with the storm. The moon when I reached the beach was
nearly at the full and high up in the heavens, but it shed a fitful
light, as each few seconds dark clouds and veils of mist flew across its
face. One moment the sea lay before us a dark black mass, only marked
along the beach by a broad strip of breaking, foam-crested waves; and
the next it was a dancing, tossing, roaring sheet of ever-changing
liquid silver; or far away we would see the spray like pearls rising
high in the air before the storm, and at our feet the waves curled up
like huge furious monsters, dashing at the sands and shingle as if bent
on destruction, and then with a swirl sliding back, a mass of foam, to
meet and join the next wave, and with its help again come on to the
attack.
Over and over again I fancied I could hear the shrieks and groans of
people in distress, and I turned for confirmation of my fancies to the
faces of my companions; but all remained unmoved, but bore the quiet
determined look that assured me that, had any unfortunate beings called
for help from the midst of those wild waters, at the risk of those men's
lives it would unhesitatingly have been given. Once for a moment, when a
thin mist swept before the moon and made the light on the waters appear
more like day than night, I clearly saw on the horizon the upper part of
a ship's masts, with some sails bent to their yards, and all heeled over
as if the ship were then about to founder, and I gave a loud
exclamation; but an old sailor put his hand on my shoulder and called in
my ear, "All right, master, all right! We have watched her for a quarter
of an hour trying to make the point of the sands yonder, and she is now
past them and has an open sea. She is as safe as you are now, thank God;
but it was a near shave, and we thought she and all in her were gone."
Often since then in my dreams I have seen that wind-tossed sea, and
heard the roar of the waters and the screams of the storm, and seen
those masts and sails heeling over, and have awoke with a start and
dread fear in my heart.
I had been tired when I came in from work, and I had a snug warm bed
waiting for me, and moreover I reasoned that watching a storm in the
dead of night was no part of a rat-catcher's duty; but I was so
fascinated I could not tear myself away, and I stood with my companions
behind the boat till long after midnight. Then two other figures dressed
like my companions joined us, and it was only when they spoke that I
recognised one as the parson of the parish, and the other as the young
curate who had helped us with the rabbits. Both asked a few questions of
the sailors, who seemed eager to give them information; and then the
rector, turning to me, said: "You will be perished by the cold if you
stand here longer. Come with me, and I will show you a picture of a
different sort, but yet one that I think will interest you." I readily
accepted and followed my friend, who, though far from a young man, bore
the buffeting of the storm manfully; and he led me up through the
village street, and then turning down a short steep lane brought me to a
little cove that was partly sheltered by a spit of rock that jutted out
into the sea. There, such as it was, was the harbour of the village, and
by the fitful light I could see some dozen fishing boats drawn up high
on the beach above the force of the waves; and beyond, a cluster of low,
one-storied cottages and sheds, with small boats, spars, timbers,
windlasses, etc., all denoting the home of fishermen. From this cove,
early that morning, two boats had sailed with their nets for the fishing
grounds out beyond the sands, and it was for these my friends behind the
boat were patiently watching, and it was to say a few words to cheer and
comfort the wives and families of these men that the old rector had now
come.
From a latticed window just in front of us a bright lamp shed its rays
over the cove, and the rector took me straight to the door of this
house, and having knocked and been told to come in, he lifted the latch
and ushered me inside. The room was like hundreds of others along that
coast, the homes of the toilers of the deep, and bore evident signs of
being made by men more used to ships than stone or brick buildings. It
was a good large room, very low, with heavy rafters overhead, which,
with the planks of which the walls were constructed, had doubtless been
taken from boats and ships that had served their time on the sea. The
open fireplace at the end, with its wide chimney, was the only part of
the building not made of old ship timbers and planks, and there was a
strong smell of tar from these and from sundry coils of dark rope that
were stowed away in a far corner. The long table down the middle of the
room was of mahogany and had seen better days in a captain's cabin. The
benches round the walls had served as seats on some big ship's deck; and
there were swinging lamps and racks hung overhead from the rafters, with
rudders, boat-hook, snatch-block, belaying pins, and various things I
did not know the use of; but all were neatly arranged. There was a large
arm-chair made out of a barrel set ready by the side of the hearth, on
which were spread clean flannel clothes to warm and air, in readiness
for the home-coming of the wet and tired husband.
In front of the fire, attending to it and to three or four pots and
kettles that simmered on the hearth, stood a woman about thirty years of
age--just an ordinary fisherman's wife, strong and well shaped, without
beauty of feature, but bright and intelligent looking; and when a smile
lit up her face, it shed such a kindly ray that one felt that the
husband in the little fishing boat on the storm-tossed deep might have
his eyes fixed on the lantern burning in the window, but it would be the
light of the wife's smile that kept his hand steady on the helm and
guided the boat, and made him long to round the point and come to
anchor.
On the other side of the hearth was another arm-chair, also made out of
a barrel, but much smaller; and in this, packed tightly and snugly round
with cushions, half-sat, half-reclined a boy about ten years of age;
but, alas! a pair of crutches leaning in the corner beside him at once
told a sad tale. I know the points and beauties of all sorts of dogs,
and always admire them, but I am not much of a hand at the good points
and beauties of men and women, and as for boys, it is rare I see
anything but mischief written in their faces; but somehow I could not
take my eyes off the boy in the chair. I suppose because it was so
different to an other young face I had ever seen, and so different to
what one might expect to find amid the surroundings of a fisherman's
cottage.
It was a dark, delicate, oval face, like a girl's, with finely cut
features, and a complexion as fair as the petals of an apple blossom;
but it was his great brown eyes and long eyelashes, black as night, that
held the attention, together with a look of deep patient suffering,
mingled with gentleness and love that lit all up, and filled even the
heart of a rough old rat-catcher like me with a feeling of deep pity and
an intense desire to protect and befriend a small creature who looked
too fragile, too beautiful, and too good for this old work-a-day world
of ours, and as if he were only tarrying for a short while before going
to his eternal home, where his features will be beautified by perfect
love, and will lose the look of suffering and pain.
The rector, taking off his "sou'-wester" as he entered, turned to the
woman with a cheery voice, and said, "Well, Mary, how are you and the
boy?--how are you, my man? I happened to be passing" (just as if it were
quite a common thing for a parson to be out on the loose at one a.m. on
a winter's night), "and I thought I would just call in to say that the
men at the boats tell me that the bark of this gale is far worse than
its bite, and that it is a fair, honest, rattling gale that such good
sailors as your husband care nothing for, and that we may expect the
boats in with the daylight, so you may keep the pots boiling. But why
isn't that youngster snug in bed and asleep? Oh! he can't sleep when the
wind howls, and Jack is away! Why, my boy, Jack will laugh at you when
he comes home, and say he don't want such big, tired-looking eyes
watching for him! Well, it will be morning soon, and, please God, Jack
will be here, and will have popped you into bed himself before most of
the world are up and about." At this Mary smiled; and the little boy,
with a low laugh, said: "Jack knows Mary and I are waiting for him. Jack
says he can often see us, and all we are doing, when he is out at sea in
a raging storm, and the night is ever so dark; and he'd feel bad, Jack
would, if I was not up to see him eat his supper; and besides, Mary
could not sit here alone and listen to the wind and sea, and I am never
tired and sleepy when waiting for Jack. Besides, Jack says he must tell
someone all he has done and seen while he gets his supper, and Mary is
too busy after the nets and things, so I sit here, and Jack tells me of
such wonderful things: it is just lovely to hear him."
The rector would not sit down, and soon hurried me off to another
cottage, much such another as the first; but instead of Mary and the
boy, we found a great, tall, gaunt old woman, sitting up before the
fire, waiting for her two grandsons, who were away in the same boat with
Jack; but to the rector's cheery, hopeful words, the woman answered with
a bitter, sharp, complaining tongue: "I don't want no stop-at-home idle
chaps to tell me what a storm is. Danger! who says there's danger?
Danger with a little puff of wind like this? Not but what both of those
boys will be washed ashore one day as their grandfather and father were.
It's in the blood, and trying for a lone woman. Drat the boys! I told
them not to go off with Jack. I could see plain for days that it was
coming on to blow; but oh, no! they know better than me, who have lived
to lose their father in such a storm as this, and to see his boat with
my own eyes go to pieces on the Point as she came in, and not a man
saved, and me left with them boys to keep. God only knows how I did it,
and now they are that masterful they won't pay no attention to me." And
then, as a hurricane of wind dashed at the door and windows and sent the
smoke from the wood fire far out into the room, the poor old thing
started and turned to the night outside with a look of terror; and, as
the storm rushed on, and then there was a lull, she threw her apron over
her head and sobbed for fear and deep anxiety for her grandsons.
The rector comforted her with gentle words and praise of her pluck and
nerves; and as he and I returned to the beach, he told me that the old
woman had once been the prettiest girl for many miles round, that when
her boys were far too young to help her the father had been drowned by
the upsetting of his boat on the Point, and from that day she had
worked and toiled, mending nets and selling fish in fair weather and
foul, often weary and half-starved, but succeeding in the end to keep
her old cottage over her head, and to bring her boys up respectably and
turn them out two of the smartest fishermen along the coast.
As we left the cottage the first tender light of the morning was paling
the eastern sky far out to sea, and hastening on to the Point, we could
just make out a distant sail appearing now and then out of the departing
darkness of the night, and before half an hour was over the rector
declared it to be Jack's boat coming in fast before the wind. All the
village was astir in a minute, old men and young women and children
hurrying to the cove and making ready for the home-coming; and in a few
minutes the boat, with Jack holding the helm and the old woman's boys
sitting crouched low down, dashed past the Point, turned sharp into the
cove, and down in a moment fell the sail and the anchor-chain rattled
out of the bows. There was no cheering or noisy welcome or rejoicing,
for such scenes were the daily incidents in the life of the village; but
everyone lent a helping hand, and in a few minutes Jack and his men were
on shore. The old grandmother was there, but took no notice of her
grandsons, who marched off to the cottage laden with oars, etc., where
the old woman had just preceded them to put out the breakfast.
The rector and I turned to go home, and as I passed the cottage where
Jack lived I glanced in and saw him standing on the hearth, tall,
massive, weather-beaten and rugged, with the lame boy high up in his
arms looking hard in his face, and both man and child had such a happy
contented smile on their faces that it did me good to see, and I think
may have rejoiced even the angels above.
When parting from me at the inn door, the rector said that if I liked to
step up to the rectory that evening after my supper he would find me a
pipe of tobacco, and tell me all that was known of the history of the
little boy who had awakened such an interest in me, for, he added, "it
is a very curious story."