Part 32 (1/2)
Katherine stood listening while the chorus ended Then Mrs Jenkin started on afresh: ”My love is a sailor clothed in blue”
But this was too etting the s, crossed the threshold and stood, a dripping figure, just inside the door
”My dear Miss Radford, what is theup in such a hurry that she upset the baby on to the floor, where he lay and yelled, more from consternation than because he was hurt
Katherine hesitated Where could she begin? But then, to her surprise, Mrs Jenkin burst out excitedly: ”You surely haven't been putting any belief in that story that Oily Dave has been going round with this ?”
”Isn't it true?” faltered Katherine; then, feeling suddenly weak, she dropped into the nearest seat, and tried to keep her lips fro
”Did you ever know hi but the truth?” de infant and cuddled hiain
”But the others ith him, Jean Doulais, and Mickey White, and they found the boat of the Mary,” faltered Katherine,
”What of that?” cried Mrs Jenkin ”The Mary had two boats, and one hed in his face when he told about the water jar and the bag of biscuit Nick Jones and Stee always keep water and biscuit in the little boats when they are hoping for a whale, for soet just about worn out”
”The fleet boats have been very safe so far,” re to find co
”Yes, the safest boats that go fishi+ng in the bay, my man says, and he reckons it is because they are so shted to have a visitor, and evidently not much concerned about her husband's safety ”But slip that wet coat off, dear, and come closer to the stove; this damp makes us chilly, and re up at the back of the wind You surely are not out delivering goods on alike this?”
”No, I came because I was so sorry for you,” Katherine answered simply
”Now, that is the real sort of friendshi+p, and I thank you with allKatherine on the shoulder with a hand that was not too clean Then she issued a cohter: ”Take Percival, Gwendoline, and do you and Valerie go and play onround in the blankets”
Shrieks of delight greeted this suggestion, and the three grandly named but very dirty babies pro their mother and the visitor in peace, if not in quiet The walls of the little house were very thin, and rolling round in the blankets appeared to be a very noisy pastione down, it is a very miserable woently in a rocking-chair, ”for Stee is a good husband, though perhaps he hasn't always been as straight as he ought to have been But that hen Oily Dave was in power here It is like master, likeor right”
”If only we knew that the Mary was safe!” moaned poor Katherine
”I should know if it wasn't,” Mrs Jenkin answered confidently Then she hesitated, turned very red in the face, and burst into iht last winter when he and Oily Dave went through the snow to steal goods from your cache, and the wolves set upon theh I knew nothing about as afoot, and I knelt praying on the floor till Stee came home with his clothes all torn, and told h Ah! that was a dark and dreadful night; may I never see such another”
”I do not think you will,” said Katherine softly She spoke with conviction, too, for certainly Stee Jenkin had been a very different individual since that time
Mrs Jenkin wiped her eyes with a pinafore of Valerie's, which happened to lie handy ”I don't believe in that saying about love being blind,” she rey ”I know that I have been able to see Stee's faults plain enough, and yet he is all the world to me Yes, dear, you had better be wed to a faulty el that you don't love”
Katherine rose and began to struggle into her long wet mackintosh ”I would have stayed if you had really needed me,” she said; ”but all the while you can hope you are not to be pitied”
”Thank you, thank you, Miss Radford, good of you to come,” said the little woman Stee isn't dead yet, or I er even”
”If only I could feel like that!” mur rain once more
CHAPTER XXVIII
The Gladness
Six days went by The weather had cleared as if by ic, a brilliant sun shone every day in a cloudless sky, and suain to cheer the northern land But never a word had co waters, to let the anxious watchers at Seal Cove knohether the Mary still lived, or whether her crew had really gone to the bottom from the little boat which Oily Dave and hiskeel upwards
Mrs Jenkin still preserved her attitude of determined cheerfulness, and persisted in her belief that no harm had come to the vessel or the men But she was the only one who still hoped Mrs Jones, the wife of Nick Jones, a wohbours, and of a disposition the reverse of friendly, had already put on black Her ar apparel was not regarded as one of the necessaries of life, and so it was not stocked by the store at Roaring Water Portage