The stranger looked me over again—looked me over from my feet to my head, and then he said to my father, “There is no need that he should do aught about these fishes. I have need of an apprentice, and it would be well for you both if he should come with me.”
My father then found his voice, and he said, “If my son does not sell these fishes in the market to-day he cannot bring back the bag of meal for our household.”
Said the man from the strange boat, “Bring me to your house and I shall put down gold for every copper that your son would get in the market.”
My father made a sign to me to throw the fishes back into the water. This I did, but I did it fearfully. And then my father stepped out of the pool of the sea and he made a sign to the stranger to follow us. We walked from the seashore and up the path of the cliffs, and we went through the heather of the headlands, following the goat tracks till we came to the wattled house where we lived. The man from the strange boat followed my father, and I came last of all. And when I went in and stood on the floor of our house my heart was thumping within me at the thought of what was before.
And there was the pot boiling over the fire with a few green herbs in it. There was Saba, my mother, stirring the last handful of meal amongst the green herbs. And there were my brothers, all older than I, sitting by the fire, waiting for the herbs and the meal to be ready.
When my mother looked toward us she saw the man from the strange boat. She thought that some crime had been committed by me or my father to bring a man of such high degree amongst us. She and my brothers were greatly afraid, for they were poor, and those who were high were harsh to them. But the stranger spoke softly, saying, “Good fortune has come to you from the sea to-day.” And when they all turned toward him he said, “I who am very knowledgeable will take your son with me as an apprentice, and I shall instruct him in arts and crafts and mysteries.”
My mother said, “The boy is young, sir, and we thought he would be with us for a time longer.” But the man from the strange boat said, “I would not take him to instruct him in arts and crafts and mysteries if he were a day older than he is now.” He said no more, but he went to the table and he laid down on it piece after piece of shining gold.
My father went to the table and held his hands around the gold. My mother looked on me who was just twice seven years old that day. I know she thought that she could never bear to part with me. But then she looked on her other sons, and she saw that they were men grown, and she thought they should have more to eat than the meal and the green herbs that were in the pot. She threw her arms around me and I knew it was a last clasp.
“He will have to go into far places to learn the arts and crafts and mysteries that I would teach him,” the stranger said. “Will he ever come back to me?” cried my mother. “He will come back to you when his cunning baffles my cunning,” was what the stranger said.
My father took the gold that was on the table and made it into a heap. My mother took her arms from around my neck, and my brothers kissed me farewell. Then the man from the strange boat opened the door of our wattled house and went out, and I followed him.