“I wouldn’t be carin’ so much,” Jonathan softly persisted—“no, not so much, if ’twasn’t their birthday. She told un three year ago they could have un—when they was twelve. An’, dear man! they’ll be twelve two weeks come Toosday. Dear man!” he exclaimed again, with a fleeting little smile, “how the young ones grows!”
The trader slapped his lean thigh and turned his eyes from Jonathan’s simple face to the rafters. Jonathan bungled with the bandage on his wrist; but his fingers were stiff and large, and he could not manage the thread. A gust of wind made the roof ring with the rain.
“An’ the other little thing?” Jonathan inquired. “Was you ’lowin’ my woman could have—the other little thing? She’ve her heart sort o’ sot on that. Sort o’ sot on havin’—that there little thing.”
“Can’t do it, Jonathan.”
“Ay,” Jonathan repeated, blankly. “She was sayin’ the day ’twas sort o’ giddy of her; but she was ’lowin’ her heart was sort o’ sot on havin’—that little thing.”
Totley shook his head.
“Her heart,” Jonathan sighed.
“Can’t do it, John.”
“Mm-m-m! No,” Jonathan muttered, scratching his head in helplessness and bewilderment; “he can’t give that little thing t’ the woman, neither. Can’t give she that.”
Totley shook his head. It was not an agreeable duty thus to deny Jonathan Stock of Candlestick Cove. It pinched the trader’s heart. “But a must is a must!” thought he. The wind was in the east, with no sign of change, and ’twas late in the season; and there was no fish—no fish, God help us all! There would be famine at Candlestick Cove—famine, God help us all! The folk of Candlestick Cove—Totley’s folk—must be fed; there must be no starvation. And the creditors at St. John’s—Totley’s creditors—were wanting fish insistently. Wanting fish, God help us! when there was no fish. There was a great gale of ruin blowing up; there would be an accounting to his creditors for the goods they had given him in faith—there must be no waste of stock, no indulgence of whims. He must stand well. The creditors at St. John’s must be so dealt with that the folk of Candlestick Cove—Totley’s folk—could be fed through the winter. ’Twas all-important that the folk should be fed—just fed with bread and molasses and tea: nothing more than that. Nothing more than that, by the Lord! would go out of the store.