Part 6 (2/2)
”How's the fis.h.i.+ng?” Andrew asked pointedly.
The old fellow broke into a slow chuckle.
”It might be better an' it might be waur; there's ower many o' the Board's watchers here awa' for my liking. An' noo, I'll need to win ash.o.r.e before the tide's on the bank.”
He went off across the sands and Whitney turned to Andrew with a smile.
”You people leave a good deal to the imagination, but, so far as I could understand him, he gave you a hint or two. What's his business?”
”Salmon-fis.h.i.+ng with a drift net. I've known Jock Marshall since I was a boy, and I believe he takes a well-meaning interest in me.”
”Why did he call Staffer a foreigner?”
”In a sense, he is a foreigner, although he's been a naturalized British subject for some time. We knew nothing about him until he married d.i.c.k's mother, but there's reason to believe his name used to be Von Stauffer, or something like it. Mrs. Woodhouse was born in Austria, but she came over young, and her husband was all right.”
Whitney was not much interested.
”What about to-morrow?” he asked.
”If the breeze holds, we'll have no trouble in crossing the sands to New Abbey. Elsie and d.i.c.k will come, and I expect you'll enjoy the trip. It's an interesting place.”
As they stowed the sails the boat suddenly rose upright, drifted a few yards, and then brought up with a jar of tightening cable while the tide splashed against her planks. Launching the light dinghy, they paddled sh.o.r.eward with the stream.
At high-water the next day they went back on board and the _Rowan_ stood out across the sands. Elsie sat at the tiller, while Andrew sounded with a long boat-hook, and d.i.c.k lounged in the c.o.c.kpit, smoking a cigarette. He laughed and told humorous stories, but Whitney noticed that Elsie was intent upon her steering. He had expected this, for he thought that whatever the girl undertook would be well done; but she did not obtrude her earnestness. Now and then she glanced at Andrew as he dipped the pole and a nod or a gesture was exchanged. He was feeling his way across the shoals with half-instinctive skill and the girl understood what he wished her to do. Their task was not an easy one: there was only a foot or two of water under the boat and she forged ahead fast through the short seas the tide made as it raced across the banks.
The seas began to curl as the ebb met the freshening wind, and little showers of spray splashed into the straining canvas. The deck got wet; the water was filled with sand and streaked with foam. There was no mark in all the glittering stretch, but Andrew knew when he reached the main channel, and told Whitney to let the centerboard down. Then they went to windward faster, the sea hurrying westward with them in confused eddies while small white combers foamed about the boat. She plunged through them, scooping their broken crests on board, and by and by the water ahead grew yellow and marked by frothy lines.
Elsie looked at Andrew, and he took out his watch.
”We ought to get a fathom most of the way across,” he said, and turned to Whitney. ”You might stand by below to pull up the board.”
Whitney crept into the low-roofed cabin, where he sat on a locker, holding the tackle that lifted the heavy iron centerplate. He knew that it would be desirable to heave it up as soon as possible after he got the order. From where he sat he could see nothing outside the boat, but as he looked aft through the hatch he was offered a fascinating picture.
A strip of the tanned mainsail, s.h.i.+ning ruby-red, cut against a patch of clear blue sky, and Elsie sat beneath it, her gracefully lined figure swaying easily as the boat rose and fell. She leaned on the long tiller, and a lock of loosened hair that shone like the sail fluttered across her forehead. Her eyes were bright, and there was a fine color in her face; but it was not so much her beauty as her decision and confidence that Whitney liked. The girl was capable of keen enjoyment, but it must be in something that was worth doing. He was already conscious of a curious respect for Elsie Woodhouse.
Andrew called to him to lift the board and come up; and when he reached the deck he saw close ahead of them a long, hump-backed mountain that rose abruptly from a narrow strip of rolling pasture. A row of very small white houses bordered a green common behind the beach, and the tide swept, froth-streaked, down the channel in front.
”Where do we bring up?” he asked.
”In the Ca.r.s.ethorn gut,” said Andrew. ”Do you think you can find it, Elsie?”
”I'll try. Give her a foot or two of sheet.”
The boat swung round a little, edging in toward the beach, and Whitney saw by the ripples that they were in shallow water. Andrew let the staysail run down, but when he stood ready with the boathook, Elsie smiled.
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