“Is that wind?” said my aunt.
“Thunder,” said Uncle Joe.
Bess went to the house door: I followed. We stood listening; the noise was thunder; there was not a breath of air, but all the stars were gone. A sort of film of storm had drawn over them, and I guessed I was in for a drenching walk to the beach. But Lord! rain to a man whose lifetime is spent in the eye of the weather!
“Bess,” said I, “you’ve grown a fine girl, d’ye know.”
“No compliments, William, dear. I am going to be married.”
“If I had known that before!” said I, kissing her now for the first time, for congratulation.
This was fresh news, and we talked about the coming son-in-law, who, to be sure, must be in the seafaring line too, for once inject salt water into the veins of a family, and it takes a power of posterity to flush the pipes clear.
“What’s wrong with Deal town?” said I. “Is it the neighborhood of the gibbet that damps the spirits of the place?”
“What d’ye mean, Bill?”
“Why, there’s nothing stirring along the beach. There are some two hundred craft off the town and the bench is as though it were in mourning; your luggers lie grim as a row of coffins, nothing moving amongst them but some shadow of old age—like old Jimmy Files, for example.”