"Come, Gerald, eat this."
He turned and there was his mother. His big bright eyes widened for her. And a lump rose in his throat. He wanted to hug, kiss her. With the heat of his mouth he wanted to brush away her tears, abolish her sorrow. He wanted, too, to breathe the lovely, holy beauty of her.
"Come, son, tek yo' fingah outa yo' mout', quick, de launch will be yah any minute now."
He took the lozenge, the sun making it soft and sticky.
"Don't yo' want some ginger beer, son?"
"Oh, mama, look!"
The launch had come up, and one of the sailor-cops, a husky, black fellow, was making it fast.
"Orright lady, yo' is de nex'—come ahlong."
With much agitation she got in the boat. She had to hang on to her bag, to Gerald, and she was not prepared to get the ends of her slip wet. The men seized him, and she stepped down, barely escaping a carelessly dangling oar.
Bewildered, they clung to each other. "All right, son?" she said. But he was too unspeakingly concerned over the concurrent miracles of sea and sky.