The Young Trawler by Robert Michael Ballantyne (classic novels txt) 📕

escape if the madman should proceed to violence. He made up his mind that if the worst should come to the worst, he would dive under the table, get between the old gentleman's legs, trip him up, and bolt up the companion before he could regain his feet. Relieved by the feeling that his mind was made up, he waited for more.

"Billy," resumed the captain, after a long gaze at the boy's features, "is your mother like you?"

"I should think not," replied Billy with some indignation. "She's a woman, you know, an' I'm a--a--man."

"Yes--of course," murmured the captain to himself, "there can be no doubt about it--none whatever--every gesture--every look!"

Then aloud: "What was her name, my boy?"

"Her name, sir? why, her name's Bright, of course."

"Yes, yes, but I mean her maiden name."

Billy was puzzled. "If you mean the name my father used to call 'er," he said, "it was Nell."

"Ah! that's it--nearly, at least. Nellie she used to be known by. Yes, yes, but that's not what I want to know. Can you tell me what her name was before she was married?"

"Well now, that _is_ odd," answered Billy, "I've bin pumped somethink in this way before, though nuffin' good came of it as I knows on. No, I _don't_ know what she was called afore she was married."

"Did you ever hear of the name of Bream?" asked the captain anxiously.

"Oh yes, I've heerd o' that name," said the boy, promptly. "There's a fish called bream, you know."

It soon became evident to poor Captain Bream that nothing of importance was to be learned from Billy, he therefore made up his mind at once as to how he should act. Feeling that, with such a possibility unsettled, he would be utterly unfit for his duties with the fleet, he resolved to go straight to Yarmouth.

"What is your mother's address?" he asked.

Billy gave it him.

"Now my boy, I happen to be much interested in your mother, so I'm goin' to Yarmouth on purpose to see her."

"It's wery good o' you, sir, an' if you takes your turn ashore afore we do, just give mother my respec's an' say I'm all alive and kickin'."

"I will, my boy," said the Captain, patting Billy on the head and actually stooping to kiss his forehead affectionately, after which he gave him leave to return on deck.

"I don' know how it is," said Billy to Zulu afterwards, "but I've took a likin' for that old man, an' at the same time a queer sort o' fear of 'im; I can't git it out o' my noddle that he's goin' to Yarmouth to inweigle my mother to marry him!"

Zulu showed all his teeth and gums, shut his eyes, gave way to a burst of laughter, and said, "Nonsense!"

"It may be nonsense," retorted Billy, "but if I thought he really meant it, I would run my head butt into his breadbasket, an' drive 'im overboard."

Explaining to the surprised and rather disappointed skipper of the mission vessel that an unexpected turn of affairs required his immediate presence in Yarmouth, the captain asked what means there were of getting to land.

"One of our fleet, the _Rainbow_, starts to-morrow morning, sir," was the reply; "so you can go without loss of time. But I hope we shall see you again."

"Oh yes, please God, I shall come off again--you may depend on that, for I've taken a great fancy to the men of the Short Blue, although I've been so short a time with them--moreover, I owe service as well as gratitude to the Mission for sending me here."

Accordingly next morning he set sail with a fair wind, and in due course found himself on shore. He went straight to the old abode of Mrs Dotropy, and, to his great satisfaction, found Ruth there. He also found young Dalton, which was not quite so much to his satisfaction, but Ruth soon put his mind at rest by saying--

"Oh! Captain Bream, I'm _so_ glad to have this unexpected visit, because, for months and months past I have wanted you to go with me to visit a particular place in Yarmouth, and you have always slipped through my fingers; but I'm determined that you shan't escape again."

"That's odd, my dear," returned the captain, "because my object in coming here is to take _you_ to a certain place in Yarmouth, and, although I have not had the opportunity of letting you slip through my fingers, I've no doubt you'd do so if you were tempted away by a bait that begins with a D."

"How dare you, sir!" said Ruth, blushing, laughing, and frowning all at once--"but no. Even D will fail in this instance--for my business is urgent."

"Well, Miss Ruth, my business is urgent also. The question therefore remains, which piece of business is to be gone about _first_."

"How can you be so ungallant? Are not a lady's wishes to be considered before those of a gentleman? Come, sir, are you ready to go? _I_ am quite ready, and fortunately D, to whom you dared to refer just now, has gone to the post with a letter."

Although extremely anxious to have his mind set at rest, Captain Bream gave in with his accustomed good-nature, and went out with Ruth to settle _her_ business first.

Rejoiced to have her little schemes at last so nearly brought to an issue, the eager girl hurried through the town till she came to one of its narrow Rows.

"Well, my dear," said the captain, "it is at all events a piece of good luck that so far you have led _me_ in the very direction I desired to lead you."

"Indeed? Well, that is odd. But after all," returned Ruth with a sudden feeling of depression, "it _may_ turn out to be a wild-goose chase."

"_What_ may turn out to be a wild-goose chase?"

"This--this fancy--this hope of mine, but you shall know directly-- come."

Ruth was almost running by this time, and the captain, being still far from strong, found it difficult to keep up with her.

"This way, down here," she cried, turning a corner.

"What, _this_ way?" exclaimed the captain in amazement.

"Yes, why not?" said Ruth, reflecting some of his surprise as she looked up in his face.

"Why--why, because this is the very Row I wanted to bring you to!"

"That _is_ strange--but--but never mind just now; you'll explain afterwards. Come along."

Poor Ruth was too much excited to attend to any other business but that on which her heart was set just then; and fear lest her latest castle should prove to have no foundations and should fall like so many others in ruins at her feet, caused her to tremble.

"Here is the door," she said at last, coming to a sudden halt before widow Bright's dwelling, and pressing both hands on her palpitating heart to keep it still.

"Wonders will never cease!" exclaimed the captain. "This is the very door to which I intended to bring _you_."

Ruth turned her large blue eyes on her friend with a look that made them larger and, if possible, bluer than ever. She suddenly began to feel as deep an interest in the captain's business as in her own.

"_This_ door?" she said, pointing to it emphatically.

"Yes, _that_ door. Widow Bright lives there, don't she?"

"Yes--oh! yes," said Ruth, squeezing her heart tighter.

"Well, I've come here to search for a long-lost sister."

"Oh!" gasped Ruth.

But she got no time to gasp anything more, for the impatient captain had pushed the door open without knocking, and stood in the middle of the widow's kitchen.

Mrs Bright was up to the elbows in soap-suds at the moment, busy with some of the absent Billy's garments. Beside her sat Mrs Joe Davidson, endeavouring to remove, with butter, a quantity of tar with which the "blessed babby" had recently besmeared herself.

They all looked up at the visitors, but all remained speechless, as if suddenly paralysed, for the expression on our big captain's face was wonderful, as well as indescribable. Mrs Bright opened her eyes to their widest, also her mouth, and dropped the Billy-garments. Mrs Davidson's buttery hands became motionless; so did the "babby's" tarry visage. For three seconds this lasted. Then the captain said, in the deepest bass notes he ever reached--

"Sister Nellie!"

A wild scream from Mrs Bright was the reply, as she sprang at Captain Bream, seized him in her arms, and covered the back of his neck with soap-suds.

The castle was destined to stand, after all! Ruth's joy overflowed. She glanced hurriedly round for some object on which to expend it. There was nothing but the "blessed babby"--and that was covered with tar; but genuine feeling does not stick at trifles. Ruth caught up the filthy little creature, pressed it to her bounding heart, wept and laughed, and covered it with passionate kisses to such an extent that her own fair face became thoroughly besmeared, and it cost Mrs Joe an additional half hour's labour to get her clean, besides an enormous expenditure of butter--though that was selling at the time at the high figure of 1 shilling 6 pence a pound!


CHAPTER THIRTY ONE.


THE LAST.

There came a day, not very long after the events narrated in the previous chapter, when a grand wedding took place in Yarmouth.

But it was not meant to be a grand one, by any means. Quite the contrary. The parties principally concerned were modest, retiring, and courted privacy. But the more they courted privacy, the more did that condition--like a coy maiden--fly away from them.

The name of the bride was Ruth, and the name of the bridegroom began,-- as Captain Bream was fond of saying--with a Dee.

Neither bride nor groom had anything particular to do with the sea, yet that wedding might have easily been mistaken for a fisherman's wedding-- as well as a semi-public one, so numerous were the salts--young and old--who attended it; some with invitation, and others without. You see, the ceremony being performed in the old parish church, any one who chose had a right to be there and look on.

The reason of this nautical character of the wedding was not far to seek, for had not the bridegroom--whose name began with a Dee--risked his life in rescuing from the deep a Bright--we might almost say the brightest--young life belonging to the fishing fleets of the North Sea? And was not the lovely bride one of the best and staunchest friends of the fisherman? And was she not mixed up, somehow, with the history of that good old sea-captain--if not actually a relation of his--who preached so powerfully, and who laboured so earnestly to turn seamen from darkness to light? And had not the wedding been expressly delayed until the period of one of the smacks' return to port, so that six fishermen--namely, Joe Davidson, Ned Spivin, Luke Trevor, John Gunter, Billy Bright, and Zulu--might be invited guests? Besides these, there were the skipper and crew of the gospel-ship which was also in port at that time; and other fishermen guests there were, known by such names as Mann,