The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1911-10-23
TIE EVENING STORY
The Captain,s story.

(By virginia 6ldlT.1
The time to visit Captain Tucker is
not in the warm weather, when he is
busy with boats and nets and summer
people, but in the winter, when nc IS
snug in his little house on the west +1s
shore of the harbor, sheltered from the
high winds that blow t1ercely on the
outer beach.
Yes. I've lived here all my life" the
captain told me one night, as we sat IN
front of the fire, waiting for the CHOW
der whose fragrance was waited in
from the kitchen.
Now and then the door would open
and Mrs. Tucker would trip IN,
plump and glowing person. VINO eX-
changed smiles with her husband as IL
they were kisses. It was cold outs de,
and the gale blew steadily from the
northeast, but so strongly was the lit
tie house set among the rocks that we
felt no fear of wind or waves.
Eyes, I've lived here all my life" the
captain repeated; but 1 fixed It up
some after 1 was married. My wife
like it here because she's safe from
storms. She used to live over there on
the neck. she and her brother. where
the sand shifts after every blow ana
you never know whether your going
to wake UP and find your house on its
foundations or in the middle of the
Atlantic.
1T was in a storm that I found
her," the captain was smiling into the
fire, land it was in a storm that took
her away to be married"
He hitched his chair closer to the
blaze. and I settled myself to listen.
Il was caught in a gale offshore one
September evening that drove my boat
to pieces on the rocks. Before that
happened, however, I had launched
my dorv and was making run for 1t
through the breakers. You know
small boat will slide over the waves IN
a sea where bigger craft can't live.
We'll, when the dory bumped her
nose into the sand. was spilled out
and / found myself at last high among
the sand drifts. with the rain washing
down on me in sheets. I sat up and
looked around, and it seemed to me
that through the grayness there was a
yellow blur. so I followed it and came
presently to a house and stood on the
steps knocking.
''She came to the door," he nodded
his head in the direction of the
kitchen, "and she didn't look much as
she does now. She was little and
white, and she peeped through the
crack and said in a kind of frightened
way, Come in. oh, amt the wind
8 Pretty bad 1 said. But she SEEM
ed kind O. crazy over it.
1T means siipwreck and dead sail
ors, and I hate it,, she said. and just
stood there shivering.
L didn't know just what to say, so I
took off my oilskins and asked her if
might put them out in the kitchen,
and she said, Yes So l went out and
He was cooking ham in a fryingpan,
and when 1 came out he nodded, and
went on with his cookin'.
II didn't know what sort of place 1
had struck. But 1 told about my boat
goin' to pieces, and he finished the
ham, and broke six eggs into the pan
and put the coffee where 1t would boil
up, and then he said. You'd better 1T
down and eat. You'll likely be hungry
after bein' out all day
60 Ne
girl came in and drank her coffee. but
she didn't eat anything She tried to
talk to me, but every time a blast
struck the house, she turned white and
ache to see her.
After supper she washed up the
dishes. and her brother went right off
to bed, after shown me where 1 was
to sleep. It's goin' to be awful she
kept sayin' over and over.
Tt amt goin' to be any worse than
it is now told her. You come here
and sit by the fire and talk to me. You
Won't feel half so scairt if you have
company
80 she set down beside me, and told
me how that fear had come upon her.
1t seems that her father and her
brothers-all except the brother ! had
seen-had gone out one morning and
had never come back-and since then
she Just couldn't stand it. And then
there was another reason for her to DC
nervous, for the house was old, and
she said that once in a February blow
the waves at high tide had washed
right there their sittin' room, and they
thought they was goin' to float out to
sea.
1T wasn't much of a life for a timid
woman, was it? But she said her
brother wouldn't leave. While she
didn't complain. I made out that he
was the lazy kind that liked to ser
around the house and do woman's
work, but he didn't have much idea OF
earnin' a Twin.
''sWhy, I'd work my fingers to the
bone to get away from here she said
to me, with her big eyes blazing
We'll I went away the next morn
ing. but 1 used to think of her when
the storms came, and kind O. got
into a fashion of running over and
settin' with her wher it was bad
enough to scrae her.
But after the winter set in it
wasn't easy gettin' there. No boat
could live in some of the blows we
had, and the big waves used to wash
over the causeway at high tide and
make a wall to beat me back
I'VE got to be such good friends that
was invited over to Christmas dinner
with them. Lizzie was going TO cook
a big turkey, and I had planned tol
take oysters for the soup.
But when Christmas day dawned
we were in the thick of the worst gale
I ever saw on the coast. There was
snow with il. SO that everything was