Chapter 4

By day my father was occupied with the men of the place, who were then anxiously fitting out for the fishing season, which had come of a sudden with the news of a fine sign at Battle Harbour. But my mother did not mind, but, rather, smiled, and was content to know that he was about his business--as men must be, whatever may come to pass in the house--and that he was useful to the folk of our harbour, whom she loved. And my dear sister--whose heart and hands God fashioned with kind purpose--gave full measure of tenderness for both; and my mother was grateful for that, as she ever was for my sister's loving kindness to her and to me and to us all.

One night, being overwrought by sorrow, it may be, my father said that he would have the doctor-woman from Wolf Cove to help my mother.

"For," said he, "I been thinkin' a deal about she, o' late, an' they's no tellin' that she wouldn't do you good."

My mother raised her eyebrows. "The doctor-woman!" cried she. "Why, David!"

"Ay," said my father, looking away, "I s'pose 'tis great folly in me t' think it. But they isn't no one else t' turn to."

And that was unanswerable.

"There seems to be no one else," my mother admitted. "But, David--the doctor-woman?"

"They _does_ work cures," my father pursued. "I'm not knowin' _how_ they does; but they does, an' that's all I'm sayin'. Tim Budderly o' the Arm told me--an' 'twas but an hour ago--that she charmed un free o' fits."

"I have heard," my mother mused, "that they work cures. And if----"

"They's no knowin' what she can do," my father broke in, my mother now listening eagerly. "An' I just wish you'd leave me go fetch her. Won't you, lass? Come, now!"

"'Tis no use, David," said my mother. "She couldn't do anything--for me."

"Ay, but," my father persisted, "you're forgettin' that she've worked cures afore this. I'm fair believin'," he added with conviction, "that they's virtue in some o' they charms. Not in many, maybe, but in some. An' she might work a cure on you. I'm not sayin' she will. I'm only sayin' she might."

My mother stared long at the white washed rafters overhead. "Oh," she sighed, plucking at the coverlet, "if only she could!"

"She might," said my father. "They's no tellin' till you've tried."

"'Tis true, David," my mother whispered, still fingering the coverlet. "God works in strange ways--and we've no one else in this land to help us--and, perhaps, He might----"

My father was quick to press his advantage. "Ay," he cried, "'tis very _likely_ she'll cure you."

"David," said my mother, tearing at the coverlet, "let us have her over to see me. She might do me good," she ran on, eagerly. "She might at least tell me what I'm ailing of. She might stop the pain. She might even----"

"Hush!" my father interrupted, softly. "Don't build on it, dear," said he, who had himself, but a moment gone, been so eager and confident. "But we'll try what she can do."

"Ay, dear," my mother whispered, in a voice grown very weak, "we'll try."

* * * * *

Skipper Tommy Lovejoy would have my father leave _him_ fetch the woman from Wolf Cove, nor, to my father's impatient surprise, would hear of any other; and he tipped me a happy wink--which had also a glint of mystery in it--when my father said that he might: whereby I knew that the old fellow was about the business of the book. And three days later, being on the lookout at the window of my mother's room, I beheld the punt come back by way of North Tickle, Skipper Tommy labouring heavily at the oars, and the woman, squatted in the stern, serenely managing the sail to make the best of a capful of wind. I marvelled that the punt should make headway so poor in the quiet water--and that she should be so much by the stern--and that Skipper Tommy should be bent near double--until, by and by, the doctor-woman came waddling up the path, the skipper at her heels: whereupon I marvelled no more, for the reason was quite plain.

"Ecod! lad," the skipper whispered, taking me aside, the while wiping the sweat from his red face with his hand; "but she'll weigh five quintal if a pound! She's e-_nar_-mous! 'Twould break your heart t' pull _that_ cargo from Wolf Cove. But I managed it, lad," with a solemn wink, "for the good o' the cause. Hist! now; but I found out a wonderful lot--about cures!"

Indeed, she was of a bulk most extraordinary; and she was rolling in fat, above and below, though it was springtime! 'Twas a wonder to me, with our folk not yet fattened by the more generous diet of the season, that she had managed to preserve her great double chin through the winter. It may be that this unfathomable circumstance first put me in awe of her; but I am inclined to think, after all, that it was her eyes, which were not like the eyes of our folk, but were brown--dog's eyes, we call them on our coast, for we are a blue-eyed race--and upon occasion flashed like lightning. So much weight did she carry forward, too, that I fancied (and still believe) she would have toppled over had she not long ago learned to outwit nature in the matter of maintaining a balance. And an odd figure she cut, as you may be sure! For she was dressed somewhat in the fashion of men, with a cloth cap, rusty pea-jacket and sea-boots (the last, for some mysterious reason, being slit up the sides, as a brief skirt disclosed); and her grizzled hair was cut short, in the manner of men, but yet with some of the coquetry of women. In truth, as we soon found it was her boast that she was the equal of men, her complaint that the foolish way of the world (which she said had gone all askew) would not let her skipper a schooner, which, as she maintained in a deep bass voice, she was more capable of doing than most men.

"I make no doubt o' that, mum," said Skipper Tommy Lovejoy, to whom, in the kitchen, that night, she propounded her strange philosophy; "but you see, mum, '_tis_ the way o' the world, an' folks just _will_ stick t' their idees, an', mum," he went on, with a propitiating smile, "as you is only a woman, why----"

"_Only_ a woman!" she roared, sitting up with a jerk. "Does you say----"

"Why, ay, mum!" Skipper Tommy put in, mildly. "You _isn't_ a man, is you?"

She sat dumb and transfixed.

"Well, then," said Skipper Tommy, in a mildly argumentative way, "'tis as I says. You must do as the women does, an' not as a man might want to----"

"Mm-a-an!" she mocked, in a way that withered the poor skipper. "No, I isn't a man! Was you hearin' me _say_ I was? Oh, you _wasn't_, wasn't you? An' is you thinkin' I'd _be_ a man an I could? What!" she roared. "You isn't _sure_ about that, isn't you? Oh, my! Isn't you! Well, well! He isn't _sure_," appealing to me, with a shaking under lip. "Oh, my! There's a man--_he's_ a man for you--there's a _man_--puttin' a poor woman t' scorn! Oh, my!" she wailed, bursting into tears, as all women will, when put to the need of it. "Oh, dear!"

Skipper Tommy was vastly concerned for her. "My poor woman," he began, "don't you be cryin', now. Come, now----"

"Oh, his _poor_ woman," she interrupted, bitingly. "_His_ poor woman! Oh, my! An' I s'pose you thinks 'tis the poor woman's place t' work in the splittin' stage an' not on the deck of a fore-an'-after. You does, does you? Ay, 'tis what I _s'posed_!" she said, with scorn. "An' if _you_ married _me_," she continued, transfixing the terrified skipper with a fat forefinger, "I s'pose you'd be wantin' me t' split the fish you cotched. Oh, you would, would you? Oh, my! But I'll have you t' know, Skipper Thomas Lovejoy," with a sudden and alarming change of voice, "that I've the makin's of a better ship's-master than _you_. An' by the Lord Harry! I'm a better _man_," saying which, she leaped from her chair with surprising agility, and began to roll up her sleeves, "an' I'll prove it on your wisage! Come on with you!" she cried, striking a belligerent attitude, her fists waving in a fashion most terrifying. "Come on an you dare!"

Skipper Tommy dodged behind the table in great haste and horror.

"Oh, dear!" cried she. "He won't! Oh, my! _There's_ a man for you. An' I'm but a woman, is I. His poor woman. Oh, _his_ woman! Look you here, Skipper Thomas Lovejoy, you been stickin' wonderful close alongside o' me since you come t' Wolf Cove, an' I'm not quite knowin' what tricks you've in mind. But I'm thinkin' you're like all the men, an' I'll have you t' know this, that if 'tis marriage with me you're thinkin' on----"

But Skipper Tommy gasped and wildly fled.

"Ha!" she snorted, triumphantly. "I was _thinkin_' I was a better man than he!"

"'Tis a shame," said I, "t' scare un so!"

Whereat, without uttering a sound, she laughed until the china clinked and rattled on the shelves, and I thought the pots and pans would come clattering from their places. And then she strutted the floor for all the world like a rooster once I saw in the South.

VIII

THE BLIND and The BLIND

Ah, well! at once she set about the cure of my mother. And she went tripping about the house--and tripping she went, believe me, stout as she was, as lightsome as one of Skipper Tommy's fairies--with a manner so large and confident, a glance so compelling, that 'twas beyond us to doubt her power or slight her commands. First of all she told my mother, repeating it with patience and persuasive insistence, that she would be well in six days, and must believe the words true, else she would never be well, at all. And when my mother had brightened with this new hope, the woman, muttering words without meaning, hung a curious brown object about her neck, which she said had come from a holy place and possessed a strange and powerful virtue for healing. My mother fondled it, with glistening eyes and very tenderly, and, when the doctor-woman had gone out, whispered to me that it was a horse-chestnut, and put her in mind of the days when she dwelt in Boston, a little maid.

"But 'tis not healin' you," I protested, touching a tear which had settled in the deep hollow of her cheek. "'Tis makin' you sad."

"Oh, no!" said she. "'Tis making me very happy."

"But you is cryin'," said I. "An' I'm thinkin' 'tis because you wisht you was in Boston."

"No, no!" she cried, her lip trembling. "I'm not wishing that. I've _never_ wished _that_! I'm glad your father found me and took me where he wished. Oh, I'm glad of that--glad he found and loved me--glad I gave myself to his dear care! Why, were I in Boston, to-day, I would not have my dear, big David, your father, lad, and I would not have your sister, and I would not have----"

"Me?" I put in, archly.

"Ay," she said, with infinite tenderness, "_you,_ Davy, dear!"

For many days, thereafter, the doctor-woman possessed our house, and I've no doubt she was happy in her new estate--at table, at any rate, for there she was garrulent and active, and astoundingly active, with less of garrulence, on feast days, when my father had pork provided. And she had a way with the maids in the kitchen that kept the young men from the door (which my sister never could manage); and I have since been led to think 'twas because she sought to work her will on Skipper Tommy Lovejoy, undisturbed by the clatter and quick eyes of young folk. For Skipper Tommy, to my increasing alarm and to the panic of the twins, who wished for no second mother, still frequented the kitchen, when the day's work was done, and was all the while in a mood so downcast, of a manner so furtive, that it made me sad to talk with him. But by day our kitchen was intolerable with smells--intolerable to him and to us all (save to my sister, who is, and ever has been, brave)--while the doctor-woman hung over the stove, working with things the sight of which my stomach would not brook, but which my mother took in ignorance, hoping they would cure her. God knows what medicines were mixed! I would not name the things I saw. And the doctor-woman would not even have us ask what use she made of them: nor have I since sought to know; 'tis best, I think, forgotten.

But my mother got no better.

"Skipper David," said the doctor-woman, at last, "I'm wantin' four lump-fish."

"Four lump-fish!" my father wondered. "Is you?"

"Oh, my!" she answered, tartly. "Is I? Yes, I is. An' I'll thank you t' get un an' ask no questions. For _I'm_ mindin' _my_ business, an' I'll thank _you_ t' mind _yours_. An' if _you_ thinks _you_ can do the doctorin'----"

"I'm not seekin' t' hinder you," said my father, flushing. "You go on with your work. I'll pay; but----"

"Oh, will you?" she cried, shrilly. "He'll pay, says he. Oh, my! He'll _pay_! Oh, dear!"

"Come, now, woman!" said my father, indignantly. "I've had you come, an' I'll stand by what you does. I'll get the lump-fish; but 'tis the last cure you'll try. If it fails, back you go t' Wolf Cove."

"Oh, my!" said she, taken aback. "Back I goes, does I! An' t' Wolf Cove? Oh, dear!"

My father sent word to the masters of the cod-traps, which were then set off the heads, that such sculpin as got in the nets by chance must be saved for him. He was overwrought, as I have said, by sorrow, overcome, it may be, by the way this woman had. And soon he had for her four green, prickly-skinned, jelly-like, big-bellied lump-fish, which were not appetizing to look upon, though I've heard tell that starving folk, being driven to it, have eaten them. My sister would not be driven from the kitchen, though the woman was vehement in anger, but held to it that she must know the character of the dose my mother was to take. So they worked together--the doctor-woman scowling darkly--until the medicine was ready: which was in the late evening of that day. Then they went to my mother's room to administer the first of it.

"'Tis a new medicine," my mother said, with a smile, when she held the glass in her hand.

"Ay," crooned the doctor-woman, "drink it, now, my dear."

My mother raised the glass to her lips. "And what is it?" she asked, withdrawing the glass with a shudder.

"Tut, tut!" the doctor-woman exclaimed. "'Tis but a soup. 'Twill do you good."

"I'm sure it will," my mother gently said. "But I wonder what it is."

Again she raised the glass with a wry face. But my sister stayed her hand.

"I'll not have you take it," said she, firmly, "without knowin' what it is."

The doctor-woman struck her arm away. "Leave the woman drink it!" she screamed, now in a gust of passion.

"What's--this you're--giving me?" my mother stammered, looking upon the glass in alarm and new disgust.

"'Tis the eyes o' four lump-fish," said my sister.

My mother dropped the glass, so that the contents were spilled over the coverlet, and fell back on the pillows, where she lay white and still.

"Out with you!" said my sister to the doctor-woman. "I'll have no more o' your cures!"

"Oh, my!" shrilled the woman, dropping into her most biting manner. "_She_ won't have no more o' my cures! Oh, dear, she----"

"Out with you!" cried my sister, as she smartly clapped her hands under the woman's nose. "Out o' the house with you!"

"Oh, 'tis _out_ with me, is it? Out o' the _house_ with me! Oh, dear! Out o' the house with _me_! I'll have you t' know----"

My sister ignored the ponderous fist raised against her. She stamped her small foot, her eyes flashing, the blood flushing her cheeks and brow.

"Out you go!" she cried. "_I'm_ not afeared o' you!"

I stood aghast while the doctor-woman backed through the door. Never before had I known my gentle sister to flash and flush with angry passion. Nor have I since.

* * * * *

Next morning, my father paid the woman from Wolf Cove a barrel of flour, with which she was ill content, and traded her two barrels more for the horse-chestnut, which my mother wished to keep lying on her breast, because it comforted her. To Skipper Tommy Lovejoy fell the lot of taking the woman back in the punt; for, as my father said, 'twas he that brought her safely, and, surely, the one who could manage that could be trusted to get her back without accident.

"An' 'tis parlous work, lad," said the skipper, with an anxious shrug, while we waited on the wharf for the woman to come. "I'm very much afeared. Ay," he added, frowning, "I is that!"

"I'm not knowin' why," said I, "for the wind's blowin' fair from the sou'west, an' you'll have a fine time t' Wolf Cove."

"'Tis not that," said he, quietly. "Hist!" jerking his head towards our house, where the woman yet was. "'Tis _she_!"

"I'd not be afeared o' _she_," said I. "'Twas but last night," I added, proudly, "my sister gave her her tea in a mug."

"Oh, ay," said he, "I heared tell o' that. But 'tis not t' the point. Davy, lad," in an undertone which betrayed great agitation, "she've her cap set for a man, an' she's desperate."

"Ay?" said I.

He bent close to my ear. "An' she've her eye on _me_!" he whispered.

"Skipper Tommy," I earnestly pleaded, "don't you go an' do it."

"Well, lad," he answered, pulling at his nose, "the good Lard made me what I is. I'm not complainin' o' the taste He showed. No, no! I would not think o' doin' that. But----"

"He made you kind," I broke in, hotly, "an' such as good folk love."

"I'm not knowin' much about that, Davy. The good Lard made me as He willed. But I'm an obligin' man. I've turned out, Davy, most wonderful obligin'. I'm always doin' what folks wants me to. Such men as me, lad," he went on, precisely indicating the weakness of his tender character, "is made that way. An' if she tells me she's a lone woman, and if she begins t' cry, what is I to do? An' if I has t' pass me word, Davy, t' stop her tears! Eh, lad? Will you tell me, David Roth, _what_ is I t' do?"

"Turn the punt over," said I, quickly. "They's wind enough for that, man! An' 'tis your only chance, Skipper Tommy--'tis the only chance _you_ got--if she begins t' cry."

He was dispirited. "I wisht," he said, sadly, "that the Lard hadn't made me _quite_ so obligin'!"

"'Tis too bad!"

"Ay," he sighed, "'tis too bad I can't trust meself in the company o' folk that's givin' t' weepin'."

"I'll have the twins pray for you," I ventured.

"Do!" he cried, brightening. "'Tis a grand thought! An' do you tell them two dear lads that I'll never give in--no, lad, their father'll never give in t' that woman--till he's just _got_ to."

"But, Skipper Tommy," said I, now much alarmed, so hopeless was his tone, stout as his words were, "tell my father you're not wantin' t' go. Sure, he can send Elisha Turr in your stead."

"Ay," said he, "but I _is_ wantin' t' go. That's it. I'm thinkin' all the time o' the book, lad. I'm wantin' t' make that book a good book. I'm wantin' t' learn more about cures."

"I'm thinkin' _her_ cures isn't worth much," said I.

He patted me on the head. "You is but a lad," said he, indulgent with my youth, "an' your judgment isn't well growed yet. Some o' they cures is bad, no doubt," he added, "an' some is good. I wants no bad cures in my book. I'll not _have_ them there. But does you think I can't _try_ un all on _meself_ afore I has un _put_ in the book?"

* * * * *

When the punt was well through North Tickle, on a free, freshening wind, I sped to the Rat Hole to apprise the twins of their father's unhappy situation, and to beg of them to be constant and importunate in prayer that he might be saved from the perils of that voyage. Then, still running as fast as my legs would go, I returned to our house, where, again, I found the shadow and the mystery, and the hush in all the rooms.

"Davy!"

"Ay, Bessie," I answered. "'Tis I."

"Our mother's wantin' you, dear."

I tiptoed up the stair, and to the bed where my mother lay, and, very softly, I laid my cheek against her lips.

"My sister sent me, mum," I whispered.

"Yes," she sighed. "I'm--just wanting you."

Her arm, languid and light, stole round my waist.

IX

A WRECK on The THIRTY DEVILS

Fog--thick, stifling, clammy! A vast bank of it lay stranded on the rocks of our coast: muffling voices, making men gasp. In a murky cloud it pressed against my mother's windows. Wharves, cottages, harbour water, great hills beyond--the whole world--had vanished. There was nothing left but a patch of smoking rock beneath. It had come--a grey cloud, drifting low and languidly--with a lazy draught of wind from the east, which had dragged it upon the coast, spread it broadcast and expired of the effort to carry it into the wilderness.

"Wonderful thick, b'y!" was the salutation for the day.

"'S mud," was the response.

Down went the barometer--down, down, slowly, uncompromisingly down! 'Twas shocking to the nerves to consult it.

"An' I'm tellin' you this, lads," said a man on my father's wharf, tugging uneasily at his sou'wester, "that afore midnight you'll be needin' t' glue your hair on!"

This feeling of apprehension was everywhere--on the roads, in the stages, in the very air. No man of our harbour put to sea. With the big wind coming, 'twas no place for punt, schooner or steamer. The waters off shore were set with traps for the unwary and the unknowing--the bluffs veiled by mist, the drift ice hidden, the reefs covered up. In a gale of wind from the east there would be no escape.

* * * * *

Through the dragging day my mother had been restless and in pain. In the evening she turned to us.

"I'm tired," she whispered.

Tired? Oh, ay! She was tired--very, very tired! It was near time for her to rest. She was sadly needing that.

"An' will you try t' sleep, now?" my sister asked.

"Ay," she answered, wanly, "I'll sleep a bit, now, if I can. Where's Davy?"

"Sure, mama," said I, in surprise, "I'm sittin' right by the bed!"

"Ah, Davy!" she whispered, happily, stretching out a hand to touch me. "My little son!"

"An' I been sittin' here all the time!" said I.

"All the time?" she said. "But I've been so sick, dear, I haven't noticed much. And 'tis so dark."

"No, mum; 'tis not so very. 'Tis thick, but 'tis not so very dark. 'Tis not lamp-lightin' time yet."

"How strange!" she muttered. "It seems so very dark. Ah, well! Do you go out for a run in the air, dear, while your mother sleeps. I'm thinking I'll be better--when I've had a little sleep."

My sister busied herself with the pillows and coverlet; and she made all soft and neat, that my mother might rest the better for it.

"You're so tender with me, dear," said my mother "Every day I bless God for my dear daughter."

My sister kissed my mother. "Hush!" she said. "Do you go t' sleep, now, little mother. Twill do you good."

"Yes," my mother sighed, "for I'm--so very--tired."

* * * * *

When she had fallen asleep, I slung my lantern over my arm and scampered off to the Rat Hole to yarn with the twins, making what speed I could in the fog and untimely dusk, and happy, for the moment, to be free of the brooding shadow in our house. The day was not yet fled; but the light abroad--a sullen greyness, splashed with angry red in the west, where the mist was thinning--was fading fast and fearfully. And there was an ominous stirring of wind in the east: at intervals, storm puffs came swirling over the hills from the sea; and they ran off inland like mad, leaving the air of a sudden once more stagnant. Fresh and cool they were--grateful enough, indeed, blowing through the thick, dead dusk--but sure warning, too, of great gusts to come. We were to have weather--a gale from the northeast, by all the lore of the coast--and it would be a wild night, with the breakers of Raven Rock and the Thirty Black Devils leaping high and merrily in the morning. As I ran down the last hill, with an eye on the light glowing in the kitchen window of Skipper Tommy Lovejoy's cottage, I made shift to hope that the old man had made harbour from Wolf Cove, but thought it most unlikely.

He had.

"You got home, Skipper Tommy," I cried, shouldering the door shut against a gust of wind, "an' I'm glad o' that! 'Tis goin' t' blow most awful, I'm thinkin'."