“Oh no,” says he; “no need o’ bein’ upsot by 137 that ol’ bully. He’ve wonderful queer ways, I’ll not deny, but ye’re not in the way o’ knowin’, Dannie, that he’ve not a good heart. I ’low ye’ll maybe take to un, lad––when you comes t’ know un better. I hopes ye will. I hopes ye’ll find it easy t’ deal with un. They’s no need now o’ bein’ upsot; oh my, no! But, Dannie, an I was you,” says he, a bit hopelessly, “times bein’ what they is, an’ life uncertain––an I was you, lad––afore I went t’ sleep I––I––I ’low I’d overhaul that there twenty-third psa’m!”
He went away then....
XII
NEED O’ HASTE
When I awoke ’twas to a gray morning. The wind had fallen to half a gale for stout craft––continuing in the east, the rain gone out of it. Fog had come upon the islands at dawn; ’twas now everywhere settled thick––the hills lost to sight, the harbor water black and illimitable, the world all soggy and muffled. There was a great noise of breakers upon the seaward rocks. A high sea running without (they said); but yet my uncle had manned a trap-skiff at dawn (said they) to put a stranger across to Topmast Point. A gentleman ’twas (said they)––a gray little man with a red mole at the tip of his nose, who had lain the night patiently enough at Skipper Eli Flack’s, but must be off at break o’ day, come what might, to board the outside boat for St. John’s at Topmast Harbor. He had gone in high good-humor; crackin’ off along o’ Skipper Nick (said Eli) like he’d knowed un all his life. An’ Nick? why, ecod! Nick was crackin’ off, too. Never knowed such crackin’ off atween strangers. You could hear the crew laughin’ clear t’ the narrows. ’Twould be a lovely cruise! Rough passage, t’ be sure; but Nick could take a skiff 139 through that! An’ Nick would drive her, ecod! you’d see ol’ Nick wing it back through the narrows afore the night was down if the wind held easterly. He’d be the b’y t’ put she to it!
I scanned the sky and sea.
“Ay,” quoth Eli, of the gale; “she haven’t spit out all she’ve got. She quit in a temper, at dawn,” says he, “an’ she’ll be back afore night t’ ease her mind.”
’Twas a dismal prospect for my uncle.