The Virginia enterprise., 1909-02-12

the dried sea grass of the higher
beaches while she worked at the torn
nets and watched the blue strip of
water beyond the Point for the sweep
of home-spread sail. Even when
Caleb's boat had just cleared the har-
Dor and her hands still twitched as
She tried to weave the threads, her
eyes would dream around the spot
where she knew the masts would first
loom above the dunes on Long Point
Maybe it was in those long waiting
months that Jedediah's eyes began to
look like his mothers, a misty revery
about them, but seeing every dot that
hecked the sea. And with the Octo-
bers coming, when the cranberries
were red drops in the brown bogs,
Lucia would take him across the strip
OF land that held the sea from the lit
tie town, and while she cleaned the
Dogs he Kept on the upper dunes,
where he could see the ships standing
we'll out past the bars of Peaked Hills.
Where are you?" Lucia cried out,
starting suddenly. And when she
turned out he pointed out to sea and
laughed down to her:
I'm in that riggin', reefin' the top
sail!"
You shant! Never-never!" she
cried to herself, as she bent to the
cleaning again. But if your baby has
slept in the dried sea grass and rolled
among the nets and comes at last to
watch, always, the ships go up and
down and is glad when the wind flies
strong, and does not know why, there
is no use trying to hold him when his
time comes. And Jedediah's time came
soon enough, for when they came to
tell Lucia that Caleb would never come
back she just said: Yes, know" and
in few weeks she died and left Jede-
diah to watch the ships alone. He
went across the dunes, past the bogs
where his mother had cleaned, and
when he came TO the sea his eyes saw
nothing but a far white sail, no greater
than his hand.
She's rigged outward bound, but
she's making harbor," he said aloud.
She's coming for me!" And he
turned to run all the way to the vii
lage to wait by the wharf until the
boat came in. But when he asked to
ship on her the captain of the whaler
looked him over slowly with a careful
noting of the 1.-the, boyish figure, and
then long stare into Jededialls eyes,
Can you keep your head and eyes
by you?"
/ YES"
Don't look it,"
Il can."
"Sign in, then. put in here for an
other hand. One didn't show up at
sailing. Didn't want boy, but sign
in" And Jedediah signed for a two
years cruise.
While the ship beat up the coast
toward Davis strait there was little
work to do, and Jedediah could dream
and grow solemn in the great new
marvel OF it ALL and then laugh aloud
because he was glad, and drag his bed
up from below to lie under this new
sky and take the swish of the sea and
the purr of the wind on the sails into
his sleep with him. But when they
had entered the straits and the bay
was nearing, there was too serious
work to be dreaming. There were the
long cold days at the masthead that
grew suddenly pulsing hot at sight of
spouting whale. Then the great
swing of the boats pull to meet it;
the craft and cunning of stealth, and
the stifled joy in the danger of fight
and capture.
The ice had come early that year,
or, maybe, the whales were shy, for
the ship could not get her full cargo
and ran down by the Azores to CON-
plete it, and made Amsterdam her
market close to the ending of her first
year. But Jedediah was afraid of
that great strange thing at the end of
the quays that was city, where the
sailors rioted at night and the very
children spoke language he did not
know, and he stayed by the ship when
the work of the day was over, climb
ing the rigging to watch the lights
that pricked the blackness into life,
and to wonder about the people who
drifted up and down the quays. And
there he was even the last night be-
fore the ship dropped down the harbor
on her return voyage. The mist was
breathing in off the sea and Jedediah
was thinking what queer faint trails
the lights made in it, when, just below
him on the quay, an English voice
a girls, soft. supple. a little sob in it
laughed out, dimpling the mist. Jede-
diah gripped the rope with tingling
fingers and crouched to listen, for she
was saying something, but he could
not hear, and those with her cried
out: "Oh, Betty" and she laughed
again, and Jedediah's pulses throbbed.
He did not know a voice could hold
such sound. 1t was long after they
had passed into the city that Jedediah
swung down to stand on the quay just
where the girls laugh had rung up to
him.
Betty" he whispered to the lights
Of the harbor. "One day I shall have
ship Of my own and her name shall
be Betty.
Betty" he said to the wind that
was driving the mist away, Betty"
But it was nearly fifteen years be-
fore Jedediah had boat of his own
the youngest captain in the fleet then.
She was three-master, schooner
rigged and painted black. And because
just Betty" seemed too bold for other
men tn Snoak Todpdiah ca11od hor