But when the fish—in weight well over a pound—had been landed and lay, twitching too, in the grasses by the Mere bank, Brother Copas, after eyeing it a moment with legitimate pride, slowly wound up his reel.
"And I am to be a Protestant!… Saint Peter—King Fisherman— forgive me!"
CHAPTER IV.
CORONA COMES.
When Nurse Branscome reached the docks and inquired at what hour the Carnatic might be expected, the gatekeeper pointed across a maze of dock-basins, wharves, tramway-lines, to a far quay where the great steamship lay already berthed.
"She've broken her record by five hours and some minutes," he explained. "See that train just pulling out of the station? That carries her mails."
Nurse Branscome—a practical little woman with shrewd grey eyes— neither fussed over the news nor showed any sign of that haste which is ill speed. Scanning the distant vessel, she begged to be told the shortest way alongside, and noted the gatekeeper's instructions very deliberately, nodding her head. They were intricate. At the close she thanked him and started, still without appearance of hurry, and reached the Carnatic without a mistake. She arrived, too, a picture of coolness, though the docks lay shadeless to the afternoon sun, and the many tramway-lines radiated a heat almost insufferable.
The same quiet air of composure carried her unchallenged up a gangway and into the great ship. A gold-braided junior officer, on duty at the gangway-head, asked politely if he could be of service to her. She answered that she had come to seek a steerage passenger—a little girl named Bonaday.
"Ach!" said a voice close at her elbow, "that will be our liddle Korona!"