The days crept on, I say, and got bright again; no June days ever stretched themselves to half such length; there was perfect stillness in the house,—it seemed to me that I counted every tick of the clock. In the evenings the neighbors used to drop in and sit mumbling over their fearful memories till the flesh crawled on my bones. Father, then, he wanted cheer, and he'd get me to singing "Caller Herrin'." Once, I'd sung the first part, but as I reached the lines,—
"When ye were sleepin' on your pillows,
Dreamt ye aught o' our puir fellows
Darklin' as they face the billows,
A' to fill our woven willows,"—
as I reached those lines, my voice trembled so's to shake the tears out of my eyes, and Jim Jerdan took it up himself and sung it through for me to words of his own invention. He was always a kindly fellow, and he knew a little how the land lay between me and Dan.
"When I was down in the Georges," said Jim Jerdan——
"You? When was you down there?" asked father.
"Well,—once I was. There's worse places."
"Can't tell me nothing about the Georges," said father. "'Ta'n't the rivers of Damascus exactly, but 'ta'n't the Marlstrom neither."
"Ever ben there, Cap'n?"
"A few. Spent more nights under cover roundabouts than Georgie'll have white hairs in her head,—for all she's washing the color out of her eyes now."
You see, father knew I set by my hair,—for in those days I rolled it thick as a cable, almost as long, black as that cat's back,—and he thought he'd touch me up a little.