“‘Counter-fittin’!’ says Jim. ‘What’s that?’
“They says,” Tumm sighed, “that poor Jim Tool was wonderful s’prised t’ be give two year in chokee t’ St. John’s for passin’ lead shillin’s; for look you! Jim didn’t know they was lead.”
“And Elizabeth?” I ventured.
“Up an’ died,” he drawled....
“Well, now,” Tumm proceeded, “’twas three year later that Jim Tool an’ Archibald Shott an’ me was shipped from Twillingate aboard the Billy Boy t’ fish the Labrador below Mugford along o’ Skipper Alex Tuttle. Jim Tool was more slow an’ solemn an’ puzzled ’n ever I knowed un t’ be afore; an’ he was so wonderful shy o’ Archibald Shott that Arch ’lowed he’d have the superstitious shudders if it kep’ up much longer. ‘If he’d only talk,’ says Arch, ‘an’ not creep about this here schooner like a deaf an’ dumb ghost!’ But Jim said nar a word; he just’ kep’ a gray eye on Arch till Arch lost a deal more sleep ’n he got. ‘He irks me!’ says Arch. ‘’Tisn’t a thing a religious man would practise; an’ I’ll do something,’ says he, ‘t’ stop it!’ Howbeit, things was easy till the Billy Boy slipped past Mother Burke in fair weather an’ run into a dirty gale from the north off the upper French shore. The wind jus’ seemed t’ sweep up all the ice they was on the Labrador an’ jam it again’ the coast at Black Bight. There’s where we was, sir, when things cleaned up; gripped in the ice a hundred fathom off the Black Bight cliffs. An’ there we stayed, lifted from the pack, lyin’ at fearsome list, till the wind turned westerly an’ began t’ loosen up the ice.
“’Twas after noon of a gray day when the Billy Boy dropped back in the water. They was a bank o’ blue-black cloud hangin’ high beyond the cliffs; an’ I ’lowed t’ the skipper, when I seed it, that ’twould blow with snow afore the day was out.
“‘Ay,’ says the skipper; ‘an’ ’twon’t be long about it.’
“Jus’ then Slow Jim Tool knocked Archibald Shott flat on his back. Lord, what a thump! Looked t’ me as if Archibald Shott might be damaged.
“‘Ecod! Jim,’ says I, ‘what you go an’ do that for?’