Part 13 (2/2)

Scarce daring to look at their father, the Misses Buzza plunged their oars into the brine, and the Admiral, still shaking his fist, was borne slowly out of sight. At last even his language failed upon the breeze.

Caleb quietly returned to his work.

”Thicky Adm'ral,” he observed, contemplatively, after a silence of a minute or so, ”puts me in mind o' Humphrey Hambly's ducks, as is said to look larger than they be.”

He paused in the act of wringing a s.h.i.+rt, to look at Mr. Fogo.

The next instant the s.h.i.+rt was lying on the s.h.i.+ngle, and Caleb had sprung upon his master, taken him by the shoulders, and was shaking him with might and main.

”Come, wake up! Do 'ee hear? What be glazin' at?”

”Eh? Dear me!” stammered Mr. Fogo, as well as he might for the shaking. ”What's all this?”

”Axin' your pardon, sir,” explained Caleb, continuing the treatment, ”but 'tes all for your good, like ringin' a pig.

You'm a-woolgatherin'; wake up!”

Mr. Fogo came to himself, and sat down upon a log of timber to rearrange his thoughts and his spectacles. Caleb stood over him and sternly watched his recovery.

”You are quite right, Caleb: my thoughts were wandering.

Your treatment is a trifle rough, but honest. Are those extraordinary people gone?”

”Iss, sir; here they were, but gone--like Jemmy Rule's larks.”

”I beg your pardon?”

”Figger o' speech, sir. They be gone right enough--Adm'ral Buzza in full fig, and a row o' darters in jallishy buff. I sent 'em 'bout their bus'ness. Look 'ee here, sir: ef you'll promise to sit quiet and keep your wits at home, I'll run down to town for a happord o'

tar.”

”Tar, Caleb?”

”Iss, sir, tar!” and with this Caleb turned on his heel and strode away across the s.h.i.+ngle. In a moment or two he had untied his boat from the little quay, and was pulling down towards Troy Town.

When he returned, it was with a huge board, a pot of tar, and a brush. He looked anxiously about the beach, but Mr. Fogo was nowhere to be seen. ”Drownded hissel',” was Caleb's first thought, but his ear caught the sound of hammering up at the house. He walked indoors to see that all was right.

”How be feelin'?” he asked, putting his head in at the dining-room door.

Mr. Fogo laid down the mallet with which he had been nailing a loose plank in the flooring, and looked up.

”All right, Caleb, thank you.”

”I was afear'd you might be none compa.s.s agen.”

”What?”

”None compa.s.s--Greek for 'mazed.' Good-bye for the present, sir.”

Caleb borrowed a hammer, a nail or two, and a spade, and descended again to the beach. Here he chose a spot carefully, and began to dig a large hole in the s.h.i.+ngle. This finished, he turned to the board, and spent some time with the brush in his hand and his head on one side, thinking. Then he began to paint vigorously.

Half-an-hour later, a tall post with a board on top stood on the beach at Kit's House. On the board, in letters six inches long, was tarred the following inscription:--

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