The story which the Captain had told Anne, when they went for that memorable sail together, was this.
Fifteen years earlier his beloved daughter Anna had married a man from “the Main,” as the people of that part of the country called the mainland. To her parents’ grief he had taken her to live fifty miles away. How they had missed her! A year later she came home for a visit, bringing her little baby, called Anne—“and that was you,” the Captain said, “the cutest little baby I ever saw!”
Just before it was time for Anna to go back home, her husband came for her and they went on an automobile trip with some friends. The party had a terrible accident, and the young couple were killed. Their little baby remained for a few months with its grandparents, who grew to love it dearly. But the very next spring Captain Sackett’s own wife died. With all these griefs the Captain was nearly distracted. He was quite unfit to care for the little baby alone, and there was no one to help him. His one hope of recovering a quiet mind lay in a long ocean voyage. But what was to become of the little orphan?
Just before this time Mr. Poole came to the Harbor, and began buying land and cutting a wide swath. He seemed kind and generous—that was because he wanted to win the confidence of the people in that place. Many persons gave him their money to keep. The Captain did not do that; but he did more. He give him little Anne. The rich man’s wife had taken a fancy to the helpless little one, and as she had no children of her own wanted to adopt Anne. Mr. Poole was willing, and it seemed a lucky chance for the baby to be brought up in comfort and happiness. No one was ever to know Anne’s history. The only condition the Captain made was that the little girl should always be allowed to come to see him when she was at the Harbor, and that she should call him “Uncle.”
“I thought I was doin’ ye a good turn, Anne,” the Captain added wistfully. “I thought he was a good man, and you were lucky. But I made a big mistake. He was always selfish. And after his first wife died he grew more so. You’d a’ been better off with me, I guess, even if I’d a’ taken ye with me to sea.”
The Captain told Anne how Mr. Poole had written him early in the summer that a crash was coming shortly, and that Anne must be told the whole truth sooner or later. Poole could no longer take care of her, for he was penniless and worse. Anyway, his wife would have all she could do to care for their own baby, born this very year of disaster. This boy of course made all the difference. There was no longer any place for Anne who, it now seemed, had never been properly adopted. He wanted to give her up. He had arranged for her summer at Mrs. Batchelder’s camp. After that he shifted the responsibility back to the Captain. The old man paused here. All this had been about the past. Nothing was said about the future.
At first Anne was only dazed by this toppling of her whole family and home. But gradually one thought came uppermost. She asked only one question, “I am glad I am not the daughter of a thief!” she said tremulously. “Oh, I am glad! But if Mr. Poole isn’t—who was my truly father?”
The Captain brightened. “He was all right,” he answered. “At first I didn’t like Anna to marry him, because he was a foreigner. But he was an honest man, a sailor named Carlsen, a Norwegian.”
“A Norwegian!” Anne stared. The Captain went on.
“You ought to love the sea, Anne. Your father came from ’way up in the Northern ocean, a regular sailor, like me. He was thrifty and doing well. He had laid by a little. But of course Poole got that. Lucky he didn’t get my savings, by gum! I’m not rich, but I’ve got enough, Anne—” he broke off abruptly. He seemed to want to say more, but perhaps he did not dare.