“We were steaming into the harbour as quick as we could, so I told the man to fall astern, and we towed them behind us. When I got to Mrs. Rogers, I found that she was better, and that I shouldn’t be wanted probably that day at all; but I did not intend to go back home—I thought it best not; but after an hour or two I saw my boat run in alongside the jetty, and one of the fellows come ashore. In a few moments, Rogers brought me a note from my wife begging me to come back if I possibly could; she was frightened about the child.
“I knew I could do nothing, but I couldn’t bear the thought of the wife’s being all alone up there and looking for me—and perhaps, later on, I shouldn’t be able to go—so, as I found when I went up to Rogers’ cottage that everything was put off, and my patient preparing her husband’s tea, I set off home again.
“The day had clouded over, and the hot wind that had blown off the land all day had died down, and there was that dead silence we always have before a black squall of wind and rain comes up from the sea.
“Before we got across the bay, gusts of wind dead in our teeth caught us once or twice and curled the water round her bows; and just as I jumped ashore, the first dash of rain came. As I stepped on to our verandah, a great roaring gust nearly swept me away.
“I went up to the windows, and took down one of the outside shutters my wife had put up to protect the glass, and saw her sitting with the little one in her arms. She was relieved to see me, and beckoned to me to go round and come in. But, you know,” said the pilot, clearing his throat, “I couldn’t go in, going back, as I was, to the good woman in labour over at Albany. It wouldn’t have been safe.”
“No,” I said, “I suppose not;” but I wondered if I should have been so conscientious if it had been I.
“It may have been hard of me, perhaps,” said the pilot, looking straight in front of him; “but I thought it right; and I could do nothing; I knew that when I left in the morning. I opened the window and told the wife how it was. She was very good; she wanted me to come in, of course, if only to kiss the little thing before it died. But I told her I did not think I ought. I couldn’t do anything for the child; it was dying then.”
The good honest fellow stopped a moment, and again I heard a movement, and I thought a stifled sob, from our cabin; but the captain broke in in a rather unnecessarily loud voice:
“You were quite right, doctor. It was very good of you. I couldn’t have done it myself, I should have felt so for the missis.”
“I felt for my wife,” said the pilot, in rather a hard voice; “but I couldn’t have done any good,” he repeated, as if afraid to trust himself to say anything else. Then he went on: