Sidney never failed to thrill to the changing scenes that Rockman’s offered. She had become, like Mart and Lavender and a score of other youngsters, a familiar figure on the old wharf. With the ease of a Cape Coder born she talked to the Portuguese fishermen and to the men who worked in the shed and to Captain Hawkes, who when he was not on the Mabel T sat on a leaning pile smoking and waiting for tourists to engage him. She knew the fishermen and their boats by name and was as interested in how much old Amos Martin got for his beautiful catch as Amos himself. Rockman’s knew her as “that summer gal of Achsa Green’s.” “She beats all for askin’ questions,” it agreed, smilingly. “Ain’t anything misses that gal!”
Sidney certainly did not intend anything should. She had to make up for all the years she had not lived in Provincetown and if she watched and listened closely she might some day catch up with Mart and Lavender. She sat on the wharf late one afternoon, dangling her bare legs over its edge, and watched the sails and the circling seagulls and everything within sight and waited for Mart and Lavender to join her as they had agreed. Lavender was running an errand for Cap’n Hawkes and Mart had gone to Commercial Street for some candy.
It was too early in the day for the fishermen to come in. Sidney knew that. For that reason a dory approaching Rockman’s caught her eye. In it were two men, in oilskins and rubber boots. As it came near to the wharf a thickset fellow stepped out from the shed. Sidney had never noticed him before. And her eyes grew round as she observed that in place of one hand he wore an iron hook. Like a flash there came to her a confused memory of stories she had read of high piracy and buccaneers. She looked at the ugly hook and at the man and then at the approaching dory and every pulse quickened and tingled. Without moving a muscle she leapt to attention.
Partly concealed as she was by the pile of old canvas the man did not see her. Nor did the two in the dory notice her. As the dory bumped its nose against the wharf one of the men threw a line to the man on the dock who caught it dexterously with the iron hook. He had evidently been waiting for the dory. Then one of the two in the boat sprang to the wharf while the other busied himself in shutting off the engine.
“’Lo, Jed. Good catch?”
“Yep. Good catch.”
Not unusual words for Rockman’s wharf but they rang with strange significance to Sidney, athirst for adventure. Why, there were not any fish in the dory! And the man with the hook had called the other Jed! Jed Starrow! It was Jed Starrow. She peeked cautiously around the old sails. Jed Starrow was tall and very dark and had just the right swagger. If he had worn a gay ’kerchief knotted about his head, earrings, and a cutlass in his sash he would have been the pirate true; as it was easy for Sidney to see him like that in spite of his commonplace oilskins and his cap.
The two men walked slowly up the wharf, Jed Starrow a little in advance of the other. The man in the dory, having shut off the engine, lounged in the bow of the boat and lighted a pipe.
Sidney sat very still until Jed Starrow and his companion were out of sight. Then she climbed to her feet, slipped along the side of the shed and ran up the wharf until she could jump down on the beach. Here she waited Mart’s return.
Mart and Lavender came almost at the same moment, Mart with a bulging bag of assorted and dreadful-hued candies. Mysteriously Sidney beckoned to them to join her in the seclusion of the beach.