Doctor Luke of the Labrador. Duncan Norman

better with the rest! But He done wonderful well with this one. When you’re so old as me, lad, you’ll know that though the Lard made few flowers He put a deal o’ time an’ labour on the harbours; an’ when you’re beatin’ up t’ the Gate, lad, in a gale o’ wind—an’ when you thinks o’ the quiet place t’other side o’ Frothy Point—you’ll know the Lard done well by all the folk o’ this world when He made safe harbours instead o’ wastin’ His time on flowers. Ay, lad, ’tis a wonderful well built world; an’ you’ll know it—then!”

      We turned homeward—down the long road over the shoulder of the Watchman; for the evening was drawing near.

      “They’s times,” said Skipper Tommy, giving his nose a puzzled tweak, “when I wonders how He done it. ’Tis fair beyond me! I wonders a deal, now, mum,” turning to my mother, his face lighting with interest, “about they stars. Now, mum,” smiling wistfully, “I wonders … I wonders … how He stuck un up there in the sky. Ah,” with a long sigh, “I’d sure like t’ know that! An’ wouldn’t you, mum? Ecod! but I would like t’ know that! ’Twould be worth while, I’m thinkin’. I’m wishin’ I could find out. But, hut!” he cried, with a laugh which yet rang strangely sad in my ears, “ ’tis none o’ my business. ’Twould be a queer thing, indeed, if men went pryin’ into the Lard’s secrets. He’d fix un, I ’low—He’d snarl un all up—He’d let un think theirselves wise an’ guess theirselves mad! That’s what He’d do. But, now,” falling again into a wistful, dreaming whisper, “I wonders … wonders … how He does stick them stars up there. I’m thinkin’ I’ll try t’ think that out—some day—so people could know, an’ wouldn’t have t’ wonder no more. I—wonders—if I could!”

      We walked on in silence—down the last slope, and along the rocky path to Trader’s Cove; and never a word was spoken. When we came to the turn to our house we bade the skipper good-evening.

      “Don’t you be forgettin’,” he said, tipping up my face with a finger under my chin, “that you’ll soon be thinkin’ more o’ harbours than o’ flowers.”

      I laughed.

      “But, ecod!” he broke out, violently rubbing his nose, until I was fairly concerned for it, so red did it turn, “that was a wonderful good idea about the flour!”

      My mother looked at him sharply; then her eyes twinkled, and she hid a smile behind her hand.

      “’Twould be a good thing t’ have it grow,” the old man continued. “ ’Twould be far better than—than—well, now—makin’ it the way they does. Ecod!” he concluded, letting his glance fall in bewilderment on the ground, “I wonders how they does make flour. I wonders … wonders … where they gets the stuff an’—an’—how they makes it!”

      He went off, wondering still; and my mother and I went slowly home, and sat in the broad window of our house, which overlooked the harbour and fronted the flaring western sky; and then first she told me of the kind green world beyond.

III

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IN THE HAVEN of HER ARMS

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      There was a day not far distant—my father had told my mother with a touch of impatience that it must come for all sons—when Skipper Tommy took me with one of the twin lads in the punt to the Hook-an’-Line grounds to jig, for the traps were doing poorly with the fish, the summer was wasting and there was nothing for it but to take to hook and line: which my father’s dealers heartily did, being anxious to add what fish they could to the catch, though in this slower way. And it was my first time beyond the Gate—and the sea seemed very vast and strange and sullen when we put out at dawn—and when the long day was near done the wind blew gray and angry from the north and spread a thickening mist over the far-off Watchman—and before night closed, all that Skipper Tommy had said of harbours and flowers came true in my heart.

      “We’ll be havin’ t’ beat up t’ the Gate,” said he, as he hauled in the grapnel.

      “With all the wind she can carry,” added little Jacky, bending to lift the mast into the socket.

      In truth, yes—as it seemed to my unknowing mind: she had all the wind she could carry. The wind fretted the black sea until it broke all roundabout; and the punt heeled to the gusts and endlessly flung her bows up to the big waves; and the spray swept over us like driving rain, and was bitter cold; and the mist fell thick and swift upon the coast beyond. Jacky, forward with the jib-sheet in his capable little fist and the bail bucket handy, scowled darkly at the gale, being alert as a cat, the while; and the skipper, his mild smile unchanged by all the tumult, kept a hand on the mainsheet and tiller, and a keen, quiet eye on the canvas and on the vanishing rocks whither we were bound. And forth and back she went, back and forth, again and again, without end—beating up to harbour.

      “Dear man!” said Skipper Tommy, with a glance at the vague black outline of the Watchman, “but ’tis a fine harbour!”

      “ ’Tis that,” sighed Jacky, wistfully, as a screaming little gust heeled the punt over; “an’—an’—I wisht we was there!”

      Skipper Tommy laughed at his son.

      “I does!” Jacky declared.

      “I—I—I’m not so sure,” I stammered, taking a tighter grip on the gunwale, “but I wisht we was—there—too.”

      “You’ll be wishin’ that often,” said Skipper Tommy, pointedly, “if you lives t’ be so old as me.”

      We wished it often, indeed, that day—while the wind blustered yet more wildly out of the north and the waves tumbled aboard our staggering little craft and the night came apace over the sea—and we have wished it often since that old time, have Jacky and I, God knows! I had the curious sensation of fear, I fancy—though I am loath to call it that—for the first time in my life; and I was very much relieved when, at dusk, we rounded the looming Watchman, ran through the white waters and thunderous confusion of the Gate, with the breakers leaping high on either hand, sharply turned Frothy Point and came at last into the ripples of Trader’s Cove. Glad I was, you may be sure, to find my mother waiting on my father’s wharf, and to be taken by the hand, and to be led up the path to the house, where there was spread a grand supper of fish and bread, which my sister had long kept waiting; and, after all, to be rocked in the broad window, safe in the haven of my mother’s arms, while the last of the sullen light of day fled into the wilderness and all the world turned black.

      “You’ll be singin’ for me, mum, will you not?” I whispered.

      “And what shall I sing, lad?” said she.

      “You knows, mum.”

      “I’m not so sure,” said she. “Come, tell me!”

      What should she sing? I knew well, at that moment, the assurance my heart wanted: we are a God-fearing people, and I was a child of that coast; and I had then first come in from a stormy sea. There is a song——

      “ ’Tis, ‘Jesus Saviour Pilot Me,’ ” I answered.

      “I knew it all the time,” said she; and,

      “ ‘Jesus, Saviour, pilot me,

       Over life’s tempestuous sea,’ ”

      she sang, very softly—and for me alone—like a sweet whisper in my ear.

      “ ‘Unknown waves before me roll,

       Hiding rock and treacherous shoal;

       Chart and compass