Part 12 (1/2)
”Uncle Salters has catched his luck,” said Dan, as his father departed
”It's blown clear,” Disko cried, and all the fo'c'sle tuone, but a sullen sea ran in great rollers behind it The ”We're Here” slid, as it were, into long, sunk avenues and ditches which felt quite sheltered and hoed without rest orup the schooner to crown one peak of a thousand grey hills, while the wind hooted through her rigging as she zigzagged down the slopes
Far away a sea would burst in a sheet of foanal, till Harvey's eyes sith the vision of interlacing whites and greys Four or five Mother Carey's chickens stor as they swept past the bows A rain-squall or two strayed aiain, and melted away
”'Seems to me I saw somethin' flicker jest naow over yonder,” said Uncle Salters, pointing to the northeast
”Can't be any of the fleet,” said Disko, peering under his eyebrows, a hand on the fo'c'sle gangway as the solid bows hatcheted into the troughs ”Sea's oilin' over dretful fast Danny, don't you want to skip up a piece an' see how aour trawl-buoy lays?”
Danny, in his big boots, trotted rather than cli (this consu crosstrees, and let his eye rove till it caught the tiny black buoy-flag on the shoulder of a ht,” he hailed ”Sail O! Dead to the no'th'ard, comin'
down like smoke! Schooner she be, too”
They waited yet another half-hour, the sky clearing in patches, with a flicker of sickly sun froreen water Then a stump-foremast lifted, ducked, and disappeared, to be followed on the next wave by a high stern with old-fashi+oned wooden snail's-horn davits The sails were red-tanned
”Frenchmen!” shouted Dan ”No, 'tain't, neither Da-ad!”
”That's no French,” said Disko ”Salters, your bla-head”
”I've eyes It's Uncle Abishai”
”You can't nowise tell fer sure”
”The head-king of all Jonahs,” groaned Tom Platt ”Oh, Salters, Salters, asn't you abed an' asleep?
”How could I tell?” said poor Salters, as the schooner swung up
She led, and unkempt was every rope and stick aboard Her old-style quarter-deck was so flew knotted and tangled like weed at a wharf-end She was running before the wind--yawing frightfully--her staysail let down to act as a sort of extra foresail,--”scandalised,” they call it,--and her fore-boouyed out over the side Her bowsprit cocked up like an old-fashi+oned frigate's; her jib-boom had been fished and spliced and nailed and clamped beyond further repair; and as she hove herself forward, and sat down on her broad tail, she looked for all the world like a blowzy, frousy, bad old woirl
”That's Abishai,” said Salters ”Full o' gin an' Judique ood holt He's run in to bait, Miquelon way”
”He'll run her under,” said Long Jack ”That's no rig fer this weather”
”Not he, 'r he'd 'a' done it long ago,” Disko replied ”Looks's if he cal'lated to run us under Ain't she daown by the head more'n natural, Tom Platt?”
”Ef it's his style o' loadin' her she ain't safe,” said the sailor, slowly ”Ef she's spewed her oakuhty quick”
The creature thrashed up, wore round with a clatter and rattle, and lay head to ithin ear-shot
A greybeard wagged over the bulwark, and a thick voice yelled so Harvey could not understand But Disko's face darkened ”He'd resk every stick he hez to carry bad news Says we're in fer a shi+ft o'
wind He's in fer worse Abishai! Abishai!” He waved his aresture of a man at the puhed
”Jounce ye, an' strip ye, an' trip ye!” yelled Uncle Abishai ”A livin'
gale--a livin' gale Yah! Cast up fer your last trip, all you Gloucester haddocks You won't see Gloucester no more, no more!”
”Crazy full--as usual,” said Toh”
She drifted out of hearing while the greyhead yelled so about a dance at the Bay of Bulls and a dead man in the fo'c'sle Harvey shuddered He had seen the sloven tilled decks and the savage-eyed crew