|
Main
- books.jibble.org
My Books
- IRC Hacks
Misc. Articles
- Meaning of Jibble
- M4 Su Doku
- Computer Scrapbooking
- Setting up Java
- Bootable Java
- Cookies in Java
- Dynamic Graphs
- Social Shakespeare
External Links
- Paul Mutton
- Jibble Photo Gallery
- Jibble Forums
- Google Landmarks
- Jibble Shop
- Free Books
- Intershot Ltd
|
books.jibble.org
Previous Page
| Next Page
Page 36
That was a mighty dressing-down, attended by three or four
blowing grampuses. It lasted till nine o'clock, and Disko was thrice
heard to chuckle as Harvey pitched the split fish into the hold.
"Say, you're haulin' ahead dretful fast," said Dan, when they
ground the knives after the men had turned in. "There's somethin'
of a sea to-night, an' I hain't heard you make no remarks on it."
"Too busy," Harvey replied, testing a blade's edge. "Come to think
of it, she is a high-kicker."
The little schooner was gambolling all around her anchor among
the silver-tipped waves. Backing with a start of affected surprise at
the sight of the strained cable, she pounced on it like a kitten,
while the spray of her descent burst through the hawse-holes with
the report of a gun. Shaking her head, she would say: "Well, I'm
sorry I can't stay any longer with you. I'm going North," and would
sidle off, halting suddenly with a dramatic rattle of her rigging.
"As I was just going to observe," she would begin, as gravely as a
drunken man addressing a lamp-post. The rest of the sentence (she
acted her words in dumb-show, of course) was lost in a fit of the
fidgets, when she behaved like a puppy chewing a string, a clumsy
woman in a side-saddle, a hen with her head cut off, or a cow stung
by a hornet, exactly as the whims of the sea took her.
"See her sayin' her piece. She's Patrick Henry naow," said Dan.
She swung sideways on a roller, and gesticulated with her
jib-boom from port to starboard.
"But-ez-fer me, give me liberty-er give me-death!"
Wop! She sat down in the moon-path on the water, courtesying
with a flourish of pride impressive enough had not the wheel-gear
sniggered mockingly in its box.
Harvey laughed aloud. "Why, it's just as if she was alive," he said.
"She's as stiddy as a haouse an' as dry as a herrin'," said Dan
enthusiastically, as he was slung across the deck in a batter of
spray. "Fends 'em off an' fends 'em off, an' 'Don't ye come anigh
me,' she sez. Look at her--jest look at her! Sakes! You should see
one o' them toothpicks histin' up her anchor on her spike outer
fifteen-fathom water."
"What's a toothpick, Dan?"
"Them new haddockers an' herrin'-boats. Fine's a yacht forward,
with yacht sterns to 'em, an' spike bowsprits, an' a haouse that 'u'd
take our hold. I've heard that Burgess himself he made the models
fer three or four of 'em. Dad's sot agin 'em on account o' their
pitchin' an' joltin', but there's heaps o' money in 'em. Dad can find
fish, but he ain't no ways progressive--he don't go with the march
o' the times. They're chock-full o' labour-savin' jigs an' sech all.
'Ever seed the Elector o' Gloucester? She's a daisy, ef she is a
toothpick."
"What do they cost, Dan?"
"Hills o' dollars. Fifteen thousand, p'haps; more, mebbe. There's
gold-leaf an' everything you kin think of." Then to himself, half
under his breath, "Guess I'd call her Hattie S., too."
CHAPTER V
That was the first of many talks with Dan, who told Harvey why he
would transfer his dory's name to the imaginary Burgess-modelled
haddocker. Harvey heard a good deal about the real Hattie at
Gloucester; saw a lock of her hair--which Dan, finding fair words
of no avail, had "hooked" as she sat in front of him at school that
winter--and a photograph. Hattie was about fourteen years old, with
an awful contempt for boys, and had been trampling on Dan's heart
through the winter. All this was revealed under oath of solemn
secrecy on moonlit decks, in the dead dark, or in choking fog; the
whining wheel behind them, the climbing deck before, and
without, the unresting, clamorous sea. Once, of course, as the boys
came to know each other, there was a fight, which raged from bow
to stern till Penn came up and separated them, but promised not to
tell Disko, who thought fighting on watch rather worse than
sleeping. Harvey was no match for Dan physically, but it says a
great deal for his new training that he took his defeat and did not
try to get even with his conqueror by underhand methods.
Previous Page
| Next Page
|
|