Her father, had Nature only given him what she seemed to have intended at the outset, might have been as successful a fisherman as lived at the Bay. But he trusted to luck, and contrived to make half of what he earned a serious damage to him. The remainder was little enough for the comfort of his family, small though that family was.
Briton was a good fellow, everybody said. They meant that he was always ready for sport, and time-wasting, and drinking, and that sort of generosity which is the shabbiest sort of selfishness. They called him "Old Briton," but he was not, by many, the oldest man in Diver's Bay; he might have been the wickedest, had he not been the jolliest, and incapable of hiding malice in his heart. And if I said he was out and out the wickedest, I should request that people would refrain from lifting up their hands in horror, on account of the poor old fellow. We all know—alas, perhaps, we all love—wickeder souls than could have been produced from among the older fishermen, had all their sins been concentrated in one individual.
Old Briton was what the people called a lucky fisherman. In seasons when he chose to work, the result was sufficiently obvious, to himself and others, to astonish both. But even in the best seasons he was a bad manager. He trusted everybody, and found, to his astonishment, how few deserve to be trusted.
Dame Briton was a stout, loud-talking woman, whom experience had not softened in her ways of speech or thought or action. She was generally at strife with her husband, but the strife was most illogical. It did not admit of a single legitimate deduction in the mind of a third person. It seemed sometimes as if the pair were possessed of the instincts of those animals which unite for mutual destruction, and as if their purpose were to fulfil their destiny with the utmost rapidity.
In the years when Dame Briton, by nature proud and ambitious, was putting forth the most successful efforts she ever made at decent housekeeping, endeavoring to transform her husband into such a person as he was not born to be, striving hard to work her will,—in those years Clarice was born.
Is the pearl a product of disease?
Clarice grew up in the midst of influences not the purest or most elevating. She was not by nature gay, but silent, truthful, and industrious. She was no coward by nature, and her training made her brave and hardy. Sometimes Old Briton called her his boy, and exacted from her the service of a son. Dame Briton did not quarrel with him for that; she was as proud as the fisherman of any feat of skill or strength or courage performed by Clarice. In their way they were both fond of the child, but their fondness had strange manifestation; and of much tender speech, or fondling, or praise, the girl stood in no danger.
Idleness especially was held up before her, from the outset, as the most destructive evil and dire iniquity of which human creature was capable; and Old Briton, lounging about all day with his pipe in his mouth,—by no means a rare spectacle,—did not interfere with the lesson the child's mother enforced. Winter and summer there was enough for the little feet and hands to do. So, as Clarice grew up, she earned the best reputation for industry of any girl in Diver's Bay.
Before she became the praise of the serious Bay people, Luke Merlyn's bright eyes were on the little girl, and he had a settled habit of seeking times and opportunities for quiet talks with her. He liked to ask and follow her advice in many matters. Many a heavy basket of weeds had he helped her carry home from the rocks; many a shell and pebble had he picked up in his coast-work, when he went beyond the limits of the Bay,—because he knew the good girl had a liking for every pretty thing.
If Clarice Briton was the finest girl, Luke Merlyn, beyond question, was the most promising fellow in this little village of fishermen. He was strong, active, ready for any undertaking that required a bold spirit and firm hand,—was quicker in thought and readier in speech than any lad about. He had a little personal vanity,—and good looks to encourage the same; but he had besides a generous heart, and the conviction was general, whether expressed or not, that in Luke a man was growing up who would some day take the lead among the fishermen of Diver's Bay. He had a livelier fancy, a more active imagination, than any lad thereabout; these qualities of mind, united to his courage and warmth of heart, seemed to point toward a future worth arriving at.