"Duty ain't to be shunned," announced he with solemnity. "An' as for experience, take it by an' large, I ain't sure but what you'll get a heap of it by lingerin' on here—more, mebbe, than you realize."
CHAPTER VI
MARRYING AND GIVING IN MARRIAGE
That afternoon, after making this elaborate but by no means misleading explanation to Willie, Bob sent off to a Boston jeweler a registered package and while impatiently awaiting its return set to work with redoubled zest at the new invention.
What an amazingly different aspect the motor-boat enterprise had assumed since yesterday! Then his one idea had been to humor Willie's whim and in return for the old man's hospitality lend such aid to the undertaking as he was able. But now Zenas Henry's launch had suddenly become a glorified object, sacred to the relatives of the divinity of the workshop, and how and where the flotsam of the tides ensnared it was of colossal importance. Into solving the nautical enigma Robert Morton now threw every ounce of his energy and while at work artfully drew from his companion every detail he could obtain of Delight Hathaway's strange story.
He learned how the Michleen had been wrecked on the Wilton Shoals in the memorable gale of 1910; how the child's father had perished with the ship, leaving his little daughter friendless in the world; how Zenas Henry and the three aged captains had risked their lives to bring the little one ashore; and how the Brewsters had taken her into their home and brought her up. It was a simple tale and simply told, but the heroism of the romance touched it with an epic quality that gripped the listener's imagination and sympathies tenaciously. And now the waif snatched from the grasp of the covetous sea had blossomed into this exquisite being; this creature beloved, petted, and well-nigh spoiled by a proudly exultant community.
For although legally a member of the Brewster family, Willie explained, the girl had come to belong in a sense to the entire village. Had she not been cast an orphan upon its shores, and were not its treacherous shoals responsible for her misfortune? Wilton, to be sure, was not actually answerable for the crimes those hidden sand bars perpetrated, but nevertheless the fisherfolk could not quite shake themselves free of the shadow cast upon them by the tragedies ever occurring at their gateway. Too many of their people had gone down to the sea in ships never to return for them to become callous to the disasters they were continually forced to witness. The wreck of the Michleen had been one of the most pathetic of these horrors, and the welfare of the child who in consequence of it had come into the hamlet's midst had become a matter of universal concern.
"'Tain't to be wondered at the girl is loved," continued Willie. "At first people took an interest in her, or tried to, from a sense of duty, for you couldn't help bein' sorry for the little thing. But 'twarn't long before folks found out 'twarn't no hardship to be fond of Delight Hathaway. She was livin' sunshine, that's what she was! Wherever she went, be it one end of town or t'other, she brought happiness. In time it got so that if you was to drop in where there was sickness or trouble an' spied a nosegay of flowers, you could be pretty sure Delight had been there. Why, Lyman Bearse's father, old Lyman, that's so crabbed with rhumatism that it's a cross to live under the same roof with him, will calm down gentle as a dove when Delight goes to read to him. As for Mis' Furber, I reckon she'd never get to the Junction to do a mite of shoppin' or marketin' but for Delight stayin' with the babies whilst she was gone. I couldn't tell you half what that girl does. She's here, there, an' everywhere. Now she's gettin' up a party for the school children; now makin' a birthday cake for somebody; now trimmin' a bunnit for Tiny or helpin' her plan out a dress."
Willie stopped to rummage on a distant shelf for a level.