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+The Project Gutenberg eBook, A Sailor's Lass, by Emma Leslie
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: A Sailor's Lass
+
+
+Author: Emma Leslie
+
+
+
+Release Date: June 10, 2007  [eBook #21797]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A SAILOR'S LASS***
+
+
+E-text prepared by David Clarke, V. L. Simpson, and the Project Gutenberg
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team (https://www.pgdp.net)
+
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+
+Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this
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+
+
+
+
+
+A SAILOR'S LASS
+
+by
+
+EMMA LESLIE,
+
+Author of "The Gipsy Queen,"
+"Dearer Than Life,"
+"Gytha's Message," Etc.
+
+With Five Illustrations.
+
+Second Edition.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+London:
+S.W. Partridge & Co.,
+9, Paternoster Row.
+
+
+
+[Illustration: "HE PICKED UP THE WHITE BUNDLE, AND HURRIED AFTER
+PETERS."]
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+  CHAPTER I.
+  ONE STORMY NIGHT           7
+
+  CHAPTER II.
+  THE FISHERMAN'S HOME      22
+
+  CHAPTER III.
+  TINY'S HOPE               41
+
+  CHAPTER IV.
+  TINY'S TREASURE           57
+
+  CHAPTER V.
+  ON THE SANDS              74
+
+  CHAPTER VI.
+  BAD TIMES                 92
+
+  CHAPTER VII.
+  A TEA MEETING            110
+
+  CHAPTER VIII.
+  BRIGHTER DAYS            127
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+ONE STORMY NIGHT.
+
+
+"Mother, we're afloat agin." It was a gruff, sleepy voice that spoke,
+and the old fisherman turned over and snored on, as though the fact of
+their home being afloat was of no consequence to him. His wife, however,
+was by no means so easy in her mind, for it was only during the
+equinoctial gales and an unusually high tide that their home was lifted
+from its moorings; and now it had been swinging and swaying for hours,
+and the rusty chains that held it fast to some posts were creaking and
+straining as though the next gust of wind would certainly carry them out
+to sea or drive them up the river, where they would inevitably be
+swamped in a very short time, for their boat-home was leaky at the
+bottom--had been a water-logged boat before the fisherman took
+possession of it and turned it into a quaint-looking cottage by running
+up some wooden walls along the sides, and roofing it in with planks and
+tarpaulin. Thus converted into a dwelling-house, the boat had been
+secured, by four chains fixed to posts in the ground, on the top of a
+mud-bank that formed the boundary of the mouth of the river.
+
+The ocean itself was less than a quarter of a mile from where the old
+boat was moored, and so the poor woman might well be excused for growing
+more alarmed as the minutes went on and the gale increased, until the
+boat fairly rocked, and the children in the adjoining cabin began crying
+and screaming in their fright.
+
+"Coomber! Coomber!" she said at last, shaking her husband, and starting
+up in bed; for a sound more dreadful than the children's screams had
+made itself heard above the din of the wind and waves.
+
+"There's a ship, Coomber, close in shore; I can hear the guns!" screamed
+his wife, giving him another vigorous shake.
+
+"Ship! guns!" exclaimed the old fisherman, starting up in bed. The next
+minute he was on his feet, and working himself into his clothes. "She
+must be on the sand-bar if you heard the guns," he said.
+
+A sudden lurch of the boat almost pitched the old man forward, and the
+children's screams redoubled, while Mrs. Coomber hastily scrambled out
+of bed and lighted the lantern that hung against the wall.
+
+"What are yer going to do?" asked her husband, in some surprise; "women
+ain't no good in such work as this."
+
+"What are you going to do?" asked Mrs. Coomber, almost crying herself;
+"the boat will soon be adrift with this wind and tide, and we shall all
+be drowned like rats in a hole."
+
+"Nay, nay, old woman, the boat was made taut enough before I brought you
+here, and you think she wouldn't have broke away before this if she was
+going to do it? Don't be a stupid lubber," he added.
+
+"But the children, Coomber, the children. I ain't afraid for myself,"
+said the mother, with a sob.
+
+"Well, well, the old boat'll hold the boys for many a day yet," said the
+fisherman; "you go in and stop their noise, while I get help for the
+poor souls that are surely perishing out there."
+
+"But what can you do for them?" asked his wife; "there ain't a boat
+besides ours at Bermuda Point, nor a man to help you manage it besides
+Bob."
+
+"No, no; Bob and I couldn't manage the boat in such a sea as this; but
+he shall go with me to Fellness. Bob! Bob!" called his father, in the
+same breath.
+
+"Aye, aye," came an answering shout from the adjoining cabin.
+
+"Slip into your things as quick as you can; we must be off to Fellness;
+there's a ship out there on the bar sands."
+
+"I'm a'most ready, dad; I heard mother call yer, and thought you'd let
+me go along," replied Bob.
+
+Before the fisherman put on his sou'-wester he took a black bottle from
+a recess, and after taking a hearty draught, he said, "It's lucky we've
+got a drop to-night," as he handed it to his wife; and with a parting
+word to her not to be afraid, he and Bob stepped out of the boat-house
+door, to meet the full fury of the blast, that threatened at first to
+carry them off their legs. The three miles' walk to the little fishing
+village of Fellness was no easy task such a wild night as this, for
+although the road was inland, it was fully exposed to the sea, and
+between the wilder outbreaks of the wind and rain they could hear the
+guns of distress, and occasionally see a rocket piercing the midnight
+blackness of the sky, appealing for help for the drowning men.
+
+At the coastguard station, midway between the Point and the village,
+they found the men on the alert, and two volunteered to go with Coomber
+and help man the boat. Then the four plodded silently along the slushy
+road, for talking was next to impossible in such a gale, and it needed
+all the strength and energy they could muster to fight the wind and
+rain.
+
+They made their way to the beach as soon as they reached Fellness, and,
+as they expected, found most of the men gathered there, watching the
+distressed vessel.
+
+"Halloo! here's Coomber from the Point," said one, as the new-comers
+pushed their way in among them.
+
+"What are yer standing here for?" shouted Coomber, in some impatience;
+"looking won't do her no good."
+
+"We can't do nothing else," said the man; "we've got Rodwell's boat
+here--she's the best craft on this coast for such a trip, and we've made
+three tries in her, but it's no good; nothing could live in such a sea
+as this; we've been beat back every time, and well-nigh swamped."
+
+"Well, mates, I don't say nothing but what yer may have tried; but
+suppose now one of yer had got a boy out in that there ship--_I've_ got
+a boy in that, or another, if he ain't gone to where there's no more
+sea," said the old fisherman, with a groan; and before he had done
+speaking, one or two had moved to where the boat had been dragged on to
+the low sandy shore.
+
+"We'll try again," they said, in quiet but determined voices.
+
+"Let the youngsters go," said Coomber, as two or three married men
+pressed forward; "them as has got wives ain't no call to go on such a
+trip as this. There'll be enough of us; there's me and Bob, and Rook and
+White came with us a purpose, and----"
+
+"But how about your wife, Coomber?" interrupted one of the men.
+
+"Oh, never you fear, lads; she'll not grudge me if I save her boy. Now,
+lads, look here; seven of us'll be enough, and we've got four."
+
+There were so many volunteers for the three vacant places, that the men
+seemed on the point of quarrelling among themselves now for the
+privilege of joining in this dangerous errand; but by common consent
+Coomber was constituted the leader of the party, and he chose three of
+the most stalwart of the single men, and the rest were allowed to run
+the boat down through the surf. Then, with a loud cheer from all who
+stood on the shore, the seven brave men bent to their oars, and during a
+slight lull in the wind, they made a little headway towards the wreck.
+But the next minute they were beaten back again, and the boat well-nigh
+swamped. Again they pushed off, but again were they driven back; and
+five times was this repeated, and thus an hour was lost in the fruitless
+endeavour to get away from the shore. At length the fury of the storm
+somewhat abated, and they were able to get away, but it was a long time
+before they could get near the dangerous bar sands, on which the vessel
+had struck, and when they did get there, the ship had disappeared. There
+was plenty of wreckage about--broken spars, fragments of masts and torn
+sail-cloth.
+
+"We're too late," groaned one of the men, as he peered through the
+darkness, trying to descry the hull of the vessel. They had not heard
+the guns or seen a rocket thrown up for some time.
+
+"They're all gone, poor fellows," said another, sadly; "we may as well
+go back now, before the gale freshens again."
+
+"Oh, stop a bit; we'll look among this rubbish, and see what there is
+here; perhaps some of them are holding on to the floating timber," said
+Coomber, who had frequently been out on a similar errand.
+
+They raised their voices together, and cried "Hi! hi!" trying to
+outscream the wind; but it was of no use; there was no answering call
+for help, and after waiting about for some time, and going as near to
+the dangerous sands as they dared, they at length reluctantly turned
+their boat towards the shore, and began to row back. But before they had
+got far on their way, they descried the gleam of something white
+floating in front of them.
+
+"Only a bit of sail-cloth," said one, as they paused in their rowing to
+concentrate all their attention upon the object.
+
+"Let's make sure, mates," said Coomber. "Steady, now; mind your oars;
+let her float; it's coming this way, and we'll pick it up;" and in
+another minute Coomber had reached over and seized the white bundle,
+which he found to be carefully lashed to a spar.
+
+"It's a child!" he exclaimed. "Mates, we ain't come out for nothing,
+after all. Now row for dear life," he said, as he carefully laid the
+bundle in the bottom of the boat. They could do nothing for it here, not
+even ascertain whether it was dead or alive; and they pulled for the
+shore with even greater eagerness than they had left it.
+
+The dawn was breaking before they got back, and they were welcomed with
+a shout from their waiting comrades, who were watching anxiously for the
+return of the boat. There was disappointment, however, in the little
+crowd of watchers when they saw only the brave crew returning from the
+perilous journey.
+
+"What, nothing!" exclaimed one of the men, as the boat drew close in
+shore.
+
+"Only a child, and that may be dead," shouted one of the crew.
+
+"But I think it's alive," said Coomber. "Run, Peters, and rouse up your
+missus; the womenfolk are better hands at such jobs than we are;" and as
+soon as he could leave the boat, he picked up the white bundle, and
+hurried after Peters, leaving his companions to tell the story of their
+disappointment.
+
+Mrs. Peters was a motherly woman, and had already lighted a fire to
+prepare some breakfast for her husband, in readiness for his return from
+the beach, so the wet clothes were soon taken off the child, and they
+saw it was a little girl about five years old, fair and
+delicate-looking, decently, but not richly clad, with a small silver
+medal hung round her neck by a black ribbon. At first they feared the
+poor little thing was dead, for it was not until Mrs. Peters had
+well-nigh exhausted all her best-known methods for restoring the
+apparently drowned, that the little waif showed any sign of returning
+life.
+
+Coomber stood watching with silent but intense anxiety the efforts of
+the dame to restore animation, not daring to join in the vigorous
+chafings and slappings administered, for fear his rough horny hands
+should hurt the tender blue-white limbs.
+
+For some time the woman was too much occupied with her task to notice
+his presence, but when her labour was rewarded by a faint sigh, and a
+slightly-drawn breath parted the pale lips, she heard a grunt of
+satisfaction behind her; and turning her head, she exclaimed, "What
+gowks men are, to be sure."
+
+"Eh, what is it, dame?" said Coomber, meekly; for he had conceived a
+wonderful respect for Mrs. Peters during the last ten minutes.
+
+"Ha' you been a-standing there like a post all this while, and never put
+out yer hand to help save the child?" she said, reproachingly.
+
+"I couldn't, dame, I couldn't with such hands as these; but I'll do
+anything for you that I can," whispered the fisherman, as though he
+feared to disturb the child.
+
+"Well, I want a tub of hot water," snapped Mrs. Peters. "You'll find the
+tub in the backyard, and the kettle's near on the boil. Look sharp and
+get the tub, and then go upstairs and get a blanket off the bed."
+
+Coomber soon brought the tub, and a pitcher of cold water that stood
+near, but it was not so easy for him to grope his way upstairs. The
+staircase was narrow and dark, and seemed specially contrived that the
+uninitiated might bump and bruise themselves. Coomber, in his boat-home,
+having no such convenience or inconvenience in general use, found the
+ascent anything but easy, and the dame's sharp voice was heard calling
+for the blanket long before he had groped his way to the bedroom door.
+But what would he not do for that child whose faint wail now greeted his
+ears? He pushed on, in spite of thumps and knocks against unexpected
+corners, and when he had found the blanket, was not long in making his
+way down with it.
+
+"Now what's to be done with her?" demanded the woman, as she lifted the
+little girl out of the water, and wrapped her in the blanket.
+
+"Won't she drink some milk?" said Coomber, scratching his head
+helplessly.
+
+"I dessay she will presently; but who's to keep her? You say there ain't
+none of the people saved from the wreck to tell who she belongs to?"
+
+"No, there ain't none of 'em saved, so I think I'll take her myself,"
+said Coomber.
+
+"You take her!" exclaimed the woman; "what will your wife say, do you
+think, to another mouth to fill, when there's barely enough now for what
+you've got--four hearty boys, who are very sharks for eating?"
+
+"Well, dame, I've had a little gal o' my own, but ain't likely to have
+another unless I takes this one," said Coomber, with a little more
+courage, "and so I ain't a-going to lose this chance; for I do want a
+little gal."
+
+"Oh, that's all very well; but you ain't no call to take this child
+that's no ways your own. She can go to the workus, you know. Peters'll
+take her by-and-by. Her clothes ain't much, so her belongings ain't
+likely to trouble themselves much about her. Yer can see by this
+trumpery medal she don't belong to rich folks; so my advice is, let her
+go to the workus, where she'll be well provided for."
+
+"No, no! the missus'll see things as I do, when I talk to her a bit. So
+if you'll take care of her for an hour or two, while I go home and get
+off these duds, and tell her about it, I'll be obliged;" and without
+waiting for the dame's reply, Coomber left the cottage.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+THE FISHERMAN'S HOME.
+
+
+"Why, mother, are you here?" Coomber spoke in a stern, reproachful tone,
+for he had found his wife and the cowering children huddled together in
+the corner of the old shed where the family washing and various
+fish-cleaning operations were usually carried on; and the sight did not
+please him.
+
+"Are yer all gone mad that yer sitting out there wi' the rain drippin'
+on yer, when yer might be dry an' comfortable, and have a bit o'
+breakfast ready for a feller when he comes home after a tough job such
+as I've had?"
+
+"I--I didn't know when you was coming to breakfast," said Mrs. Coomber,
+timidly, and still keeping close in the corner of the shed for fear her
+husband should knock her down; while the children stopped their mutual
+grumblings and complaints, and crept closer to each other behind their
+mother's skirts.
+
+"Couldn't you ha' got it ready and waited wi' a bit o' fire to dry these
+duds?" exclaimed her husband.
+
+"But the boat, Coomber, it wasn't safe," pleaded the poor woman. "We
+might ha' been adrift any minute."
+
+"Didn't I tell yer she was safe, and didn't I ought to know when a
+boat's safe better nor you--a poor tool of a woman? Come out of it," he
+added, impatiently, turning away.
+
+The children wondered that nothing worse than hard words fell to their
+share, and were somewhat relieved that the next question referred to
+Bob, and not to their doings.
+
+"You say he ain't come home?" said Coomber.
+
+"I ain't seen him since he went with you to Fellness. Ain't you just
+come from there?" said his wife, timidly.
+
+"Of course I have, but Bob ought to have been back an hour or so ago,
+for I had something to do in the village. Come to the boat, and I'll
+tell you all about it," he added, in a less severe tone; for the thought
+of the child he had rescued softened him a little, and he led the way
+out of the washing-shed.
+
+The storm had abated now, and the boat no longer rocked and swayed, so
+that the children waded back through the mud without fear, while their
+father talked of the little girl he had left with Dame Peters at
+Fellness. They listened to his proposal to bring her home and share
+their scanty meals with very little pleasure, and they wished their
+mother would say she could not have another baby; but instead of this
+Mrs. Coomber assented at once to her husband's plan of fetching the
+child from Fellness that afternoon.
+
+The Coombers were not a happy family, for the fisherman was a stern,
+hard man by nature, and since he had lost his little girl he had become
+harder, his neighbours said. At all events, his wife and children grew
+more afraid of him--afraid of provoking his stern displeasure by any of
+those little playful raids children so delight in; and every one of them
+looked forward to the day when they could run away from home and go to
+sea, as their grown-up brother had done. Bob, the eldest now at home,
+was already contemplating taking this step very soon, and had promised
+to help Dick and Tom when they were old enough. It had been a startling
+revelation to Bob to hear his father speak as he had done on the beach
+at Fellness about his brother, for he had long ago decided that his
+father did not care a pin for any of them, unless it was for the baby
+sister who had died, and even of that he was not quite sure. He had made
+up his mind, as he walked through the storm that morning, that he would
+not go back again, but make his way to Grimsby, or some other seaport
+town, after his business at Fellness was done. But what he had heard on
+the beach from his father somewhat shook his purpose, and when he
+learned from Dame Peters afterwards, that the child they had rescued was
+to share their home, he thought he would go back again, and try to bear
+the hard life a little longer, if it was only to help his mother, and
+tell her his father did care for them a bit in spite of his stern, hard
+ways.
+
+Perhaps Mrs. Coomber did not need to be told that her husband loved her
+and his children; at all events, she received Bob's information with a
+nod and a smile, and a whispered word. "Yer father's all right, and a
+rare good fisherman," she said; for in spite of the frequent unkindness
+she experienced, Mrs. Coomber was very fond of her husband.
+
+"Ah, he's a good fisherman, but he'd be all the better if he didn't have
+so much of that bottle," grumbled Bob; "he thinks a deal more about that
+than he does about us."
+
+It was true enough what Bob said. If his father could not by any chance
+get his bottle replenished, wife and children had a little respite from
+their usual hard, driving life, and he was more civil to their only
+neighbours, who were at the farm about half a mile off; but once the
+bottle got filled again, he grew sullen and morose, or quarrelsome. He
+had recently made himself very disagreeable to Farmer Hayes in one of
+his irritable fits, a fact which suddenly recurred to his wife when she
+heard of the sick child being brought home to her to nurse, but she
+dared not mention it to her husband. When Coomber brought the child that
+afternoon, he said, gaily: "Here's a present for yer from the sea,
+mother; maybe she'll bring us good luck coming as she did."
+
+"It 'ud be better luck if we'd picked up a boat," muttered Bob, who was
+standing near.
+
+"Why, she ain't such a baby as you said," exclaimed Mrs. Coomber, as she
+unpinned the shawl in which she was wrapped; "she is about five."
+
+"Five years old," repeated Coomber; "but she'd talk if she was as old as
+that, and Dame Peters told me she'd just laid like a dead thing ever
+since she'd been there."
+
+"She's ill, that's what it is, poor little mite--ill and frightened out
+of her senses;" and Mrs. Coomber gathered her in her arms, and kissed
+the little white lips, and pressed her to her bosom, as only a tender
+mother can, while the boys stood round in wondering silence, and Coomber
+dashed a tear from his eye as he thought of the little daughter lying in
+Fellness churchyard. But he was ashamed of the love that prompted this
+feeling, and said hastily: "Now, mother, we mustn't begin by spoiling
+her;" but then he turned away, and called Bob to go with him and look
+after the boat.
+
+For several days the child continued very ill--too ill to notice
+anything, or to attempt to talk; but one day, when she was lying on Mrs.
+Coomber's lap before the fire, the boys mutely looking at her as she
+lay, she suddenly put up her little hands, and said in a feeble whisper,
+"Dear faver Dod, tate tare o' daddy and mammy, and Tiny;" and then she
+seemed to drop off into a doze.
+
+The boys were startled, and Mrs. Coomber looked down hastily at the
+little form on her lap, for this was the first intimation they had had
+that the child could talk, although Mrs. Coomber fancied that she had
+showed some signs of recognising her during the previous day.
+
+"I say, did you hear that?" whispered Dick. "Was she saying her prayers,
+mother, like Harry Hayes does?"
+
+Mrs. Coomber nodded, while she looked down into the child's face and
+moved her gently to and fro to soothe her to sleep.
+
+"But, mother, ought she to say that? Did you hear her? She said 'dear
+God,'" said Dick, creeping round to his mother's side.
+
+Mrs. Coomber was puzzled herself at the child's words. They had awakened
+in her a far-off memory of days when she was a girl, and knelt at her
+mother's knee, and said, "Our Father," before she went to bed. But that
+was long before she had heard of Bermuda Point, or thought of having
+boys and girls of her own. When they came she had forgotten all about
+those early days; and so they had never been taught to say their
+prayers, or anything else, in fact, except to help their father with the
+boat, shoot wild-fowl in the winter, and gather samphire on the shore
+during the summer.
+
+She thought of this now, and half wished she had thought of it before.
+Perhaps if she had tried to teach her children to pray, they would have
+been more of a comfort to her. Perhaps Jack, her eldest, would not have
+run away from home as he did, leaving them for years to wonder whether
+he was alive or dead, but sending no word to comfort them.
+
+The boys were almost as perplexed as their mother. The little they had
+heard of God filled them with terror, and so to hear such a prayer as
+this was something so startling that they could think and talk of
+nothing else until their father came in, when, as usual, silence fell on
+the whole family, for Coomber was in a sullen mood now.
+
+The next day Tiny, as she had called herself, was decidedly better. A
+little bed had been made up for her in the family living-room, and she
+lay there, quiet but observant, while Mrs. Coomber went about her
+work--cooking and cleaning and mending, and occasionally stopping to
+kiss the little wistful face that watched her with such quiet curiosity.
+
+"Am I in a s'ip now?" the child asked at length, when Mrs. Coomber had
+kissed her several times.
+
+"You're in a boat, deary; but you needn't be afraid; our boat is safe
+enough."
+
+"I ain't afraid; Dod is tatin' tare of me," said the child, with a
+little sigh.
+
+Mrs. Coomber wondered whether she was thinking of the storm; whether she
+could tell them who she was, and where her friends might be found; and
+she ventured to ask her several questions about this, but failed to
+elicit any satisfactory answer. The child was sleepy, or had forgotten
+what Mrs. Coomber thought she would be sure to remember; but it was
+evident she had taken notice of her surroundings during the last few
+days, for after a little while she said, "Where's der boys--dat Dick and
+Tom?"
+
+Mrs. Coomber was amused. "They're out in the boat looking after the
+nets," she said.
+
+"When they toming home?" asked the little girl; "home to dis boat, I
+mean," she added.
+
+"Oh, they'll come soon," replied Mrs. Coomber. "But, now, can't you tell
+me something about your mother and father, and where you lived, my
+deary?" she asked again.
+
+"I tomed in a s'ip, and 'ou my mammy now," said the child, looking round
+the cosy room with perfect content.
+
+"But where is your own mammy, who taught you to say your prayers?" asked
+Mrs. Coomber.
+
+The tears came into the sweet blue eyes for a minute as she said, "See
+dorn up dere, to tay in Dod's house, and Tiny do too if see a dood dal."
+
+Mrs. Coomber laid down the jacket she was patching, and kissed the
+serious little face. "Is your mother dead, my deary?" she asked, while
+the tears shone in her own eyes.
+
+"See done to see daddy, and tell him about Tiny," answered the child;
+from which Mrs. Coomber gathered that mother and father were both dead;
+and when her husband came home she told him what she had heard, which
+seemed to afford the old fisherman a good deal of satisfaction.
+
+"Then she's ours safe enough, mother," he said, rubbing his hands, "and
+when she gets well she'll toddle about the old boat like our own little
+Polly did."
+
+"But I thought you said Peters was going to see the newspaper man to
+tell him to put something in the _Stamford Mercury_ about finding her,
+so that her friends should know she was saved, and come and fetch her."
+
+"I said her mother or father," interrupted Coomber, sharply; "but if
+they're dead, there ain't anybody else likely to want such a little 'un,
+and so we may keep her, I take it. But Peters shall go to the newspaper
+man, never fear," added Coomber; "I don't want to rob anybody of the
+little 'un; but if nobody don't come in a week, why then, Mary----" and
+Coomber paused, and looked at his wife.
+
+"Well, then, I'll get out little Polly's things; they'll just about fit
+her," said Mrs. Coomber, hastily wiping her eyes with her apron for fear
+her husband should reproach her again for her tears.
+
+When the boys came in, the little girl said, shyly, "Tome and tell me
+about the nets."
+
+Dick looked at her, and then at his mother.
+
+"What does she mean?" he asked, drawing near the little bed where Tiny
+lay.
+
+"She wants to know about the fishing," said Mrs. Coomber. "Have you had
+a good take, Dick?" asked his mother, rather anxiously, for she wanted
+some more milk for Tiny, and her little secret store of halfpence was
+gone now.
+
+"Oh, it ain't much," said Dick; "Bob has taken a few plaice to Fellness,
+and I dessay he'll bring back some bread or some flour."
+
+"But I want some milk for the child; she can't eat bread and fish and
+potatoes now she's ill. Couldn't you run up to the farm, Dick, and ask
+Mrs. Hayes if she wants a bit o' fish, and I'll be thankful for a drop
+o' milk for it."
+
+But Dick looked dubious. "I'd like to go," he said, "if it was only to
+have a word with Harry Hayes, and ask him about his rabbits; but father
+don't like the farm people now, and he said I was never to speak to
+them. You know they've had a quarrel."
+
+"Well, what are we to do? They are our only neighbours, and they ain't a
+bad sort either, Mrs. Hayes is a kind soul, who has children of her own,
+and would let me have milk in a minute if she knew I wanted it for this
+poor little mite," said Mrs. Coomber, in perplexity as to the best thing
+to do.
+
+"I'll go, mother, if you can find any fish worth taking," at last said
+Dick.
+
+Mrs. Coomber went and turned over what the boys had brought. The best
+had been picked out and sent to Fellness, and what was left was not more
+than sufficient for themselves; but she carefully looked out the largest
+she could find and washed it. While she was doing this her husband came
+in.
+
+"It's a poor take to-day, mother," he said.
+
+"Yes, and I wanted a bit extra, to get some milk for the child," said
+Mrs. Coomber; "but I think I can manage with this," she said, still
+busying herself with the fish, and not turning to look at her husband.
+
+"What are yer goin' to do wi' it?" he inquired.
+
+"I want to send Dick up to the farm; Mrs. Hayes will give me some milk
+for it, I know," replied his wife, trying to speak in a matter-of-fact
+tone.
+
+[Illustration: "'ME LIKES 'OU,' SHE SAID." (_See page 40._)]
+
+"And you'd send Dick to that place when I said they shouldn't go near
+the house," said her husband, angrily. "Take the fish and cook it for
+supper. Not a bit o' my fish shall they have."
+
+"But the milk. What am I to do for the milk for the child now she's
+ill?"
+
+"What have yer done afore?" demanded her husband; and the poor woman was
+obliged to confess that she had taken milk from the man as he went past
+in his cart to the village each day since the child had been there. "She
+couldn't do wi'out milk," protested Mrs. Coomber.
+
+"How do you know she couldn't?" said her husband. "What business have
+you to spend money for milk--what business have you wi' money at all?"
+he inquired, suspiciously; for he saw in this wastefulness a cause for
+the recent strange scarcity of whisky; and he felt he had been deeply
+wronged. His quarrel with Hayes had also been disregarded, and this made
+him further angry with his wife, and he strictly charged her never to
+have any more dealings with any of the farm people.
+
+"We can live very well without milk," he said. "I will feed the little
+'un, and you'll see she can eat fish and bread as well as the rest of
+us."
+
+It was useless for Mrs. Coomber to protest against this; she knew if her
+husband made up his mind to do anything he would do it; but she almost
+dreaded supper-time coming, for she could not tell how Tiny would like
+the proposed change in her nurse and diet.
+
+But as it happened the little girl was very pleased to be lifted out of
+bed and seated on Coomber's knee at the table.
+
+"Me likes 'ou," she said, patting his cheek with her little white hand;
+and she ate the fish and bread as though she was quite used to such
+food.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+TINY'S HOPE.
+
+
+The slant rays of the setting sun lay on the wide stretch of level sand
+surrounding Bermuda Point, for the tide was out, and had left it smooth,
+or slightly rippled as with tiny wavelets. Standing at the very edge of
+the sands, with her eyes shaded, and her clothes blowing round her bare
+legs, was a little fair-haired girl. She was slender and
+delicate-looking still, in spite of the sun-browned arms and face.
+Months had passed, but Tiny was still at the Point.
+
+She stood gazing seawards for some minutes, and then turned and walked
+slowly across the rippled sand.
+
+"I can't see him, Dick," she said, in a disappointed tone.
+
+"Oh, well, never mind," said the boy, who sat scooping the loose sand up
+in a heap, beyond the reach of the present ordinary tides.
+
+"Have you filled both the baskets?" asked the little girl, as she waded
+through the loose dry sand to where the boy was sitting.
+
+"No, that I ain't," answered Dick, "mother said you could pick the
+samphire to-day."
+
+"Yes, but you said you'd help me," said the girl, walking steadily
+across the sand to the salt-marsh beyond. Here the samphire grew in
+abundance, and the little girl set to work to fill the two large baskets
+that stood near.
+
+"You might come and help, Dick," she called, hardly repressing a sob as
+she spoke.
+
+"Look here, I'll help if you'll just come and make some more of them
+letters. You said you would, you know," added the boy, still piling up
+the sand.
+
+"Oh, Dick, you know I can't; you know I've forgot a'most everything
+since I've been here;" and this time the little girl fairly burst into
+tears, and sat down beside the half-filled baskets, and sobbed as though
+her heart would break.
+
+The boy's heart was touched at the sight of her distress, and he ran
+across to comfort her.
+
+"Don't cry, Tiny; I'll help yer, and then we'll try agin at the letters.
+I know three--A B C: you'll soon find out about the others, and make 'em
+in the sand for me."
+
+But Tiny shook her head. "I'd know 'em if I had a book," she said,
+sadly; "ain't it a pity daddy ain't got one?"
+
+"What 'ud be the good of books to dad?" said Dick. "Harry Hayes has got
+some, I know; but then he goes to school, and knows all about 'em.
+There, let's forget we see him with that book yesterday, for it ain't no
+good for us to think about it," concluded Dick; for he did not like to
+see Tiny's tears, and the easiest way of banishing them was to forget
+the original cause, he thought. But the little girl was not of the same
+opinion. She shook her head sadly as she said--
+
+"I've forgot a'most everything my mother told me."
+
+"Oh, that you ain't," contradicted the boy, "You never forget to say
+your prayers before you go to bed. I wonder you ain't forgot that; I
+should, I know."
+
+"How could you, Dick, if you knew God was waiting to hear you?" said
+Tiny, lifting her serious blue eyes to his face.
+
+"Then why ain't He waiting to hear me?" asked Dick.
+
+The question seemed to puzzle the little girl for a minute or two; but
+at length she said--
+
+"He is, Dick, I think; I'm a'most sure He's waiting for yer to begin."
+
+"Then He's waited a good while," said Dick, bluntly; and he got up and
+began to pull away at the samphire, by way of working off or digesting
+the wonderful thought. After working away in silence for some minutes,
+Dick said--
+
+"D'ye think God cares for us down here at Bermuda Point?"
+
+Tiny paused, with her hands full of samphire.
+
+"Why shouldn't He?" she said. "I know He cares for me. He loves me," she
+added, in a tone of triumph; "my mother told me so. She said He loved me
+just as well as she did."
+
+"I'd like to know whether He cares about me," said Dick. "D'ye think yer
+could find out for us, Tiny? Yer see everybody likes you--mother, and
+father, and Bob; and Harry Hayes showed you his book yesterday. You see
+you're a gal, and I think you're pretty," added Dick, critically; "so it
+'ud be a wonder if He didn't like you."
+
+"And why shouldn't He love you, Dick?" said Tiny.
+
+Dick looked down at the patched, ragged, nondescript garments that
+served him as jacket and trousers, and then at his bare, sunburnt arms
+and legs. "Well, I'm just Dick of the Point. I ain't a gal, and I ain't
+pretty." Nobody could dispute the latter fact, which Dick himself seemed
+to consider conclusive against any interest being taken in him, for he
+heaved a sigh as he returned to his work of picking the samphire.
+
+The sigh was not lost on Tiny. "Look here, Dick," she said, "you ain't a
+gal, and p'r'aps you ain't pretty, but I love you;" and she threw her
+arms round his neck as he stooped over the basket. "I love yer, Dick,
+and I'll find out all about it for yer. I'm a'most sure God loves yer
+too."
+
+"Oh, He can't yet, yer know," said Dick, drawing his arms across his
+eyes to conceal the tears that had suddenly come into them. "I don't
+never say no prayers nor nothing. I ain't never heerd about Him, only
+when dad swears, till you come and said your prayers to Him."
+
+"Still, He might, yer know," said Tiny; "but if you'll help, I'll find
+out all about it."
+
+"What can yer do?" asked Dick.
+
+"Well, I'll tell yer why I want dad to come home soon to-night," said
+Tiny, resting her hands on the basket, and looking anxiously across the
+sea. "Mother said he'd take the samphire by boat to Fellness, and I
+thought perhaps he'd take me too."
+
+"Well, s'pose he did?" said Dick, who could see no connection between a
+visit to the village and the attainment of the knowledge they both
+desired.
+
+"Why, then I might get a book," said Tiny. "I'd go with dad to sell the
+samphire; and then we'd see the shops; and if he had a good take, and we
+got a lot of samphire, he'd have enough money to buy me a book, as well
+as the bread and flour and tea."
+
+Dick burst into a loud laugh. "So this is your secret; this is what
+you've been thinking of like a little goose all day."
+
+Tiny was half offended. "You needn't laugh," she said; "I shall do it,
+Dick."
+
+"Will yer?" he said, in a teasing tone. "If there wasn't no whisky, and
+there was bookshops at Fellness, you might. Why, what do you think the
+village is like?" he asked.
+
+"Like? Oh, I dunno! Everything comes from Fellness," added the little
+girl, vaguely.
+
+To the dwellers at the Point, the little fishing-village was the centre
+of the universe; and Tiny, with faint recollections of a large town,
+with broad streets, and rows of shops all brilliantly lighted at night,
+had formed magnificently vague notions of Fellness as being something
+like this; and she had only got to go there, and it would be easy to
+coax the old fisherman to buy her a book, as she coaxed him to build her
+a castle in the sand, or take her on his knee and tell her tales of
+ships that had been wrecked on the bar sands.
+
+"But do you know what Fellness is like?" persisted Dick. "There ain't no
+shops at all--only one, where they sells flour, and bread, and 'bacca,
+and tea, and sugar, and soap. They has meat there sometimes; but I never
+sees no books, and I don't believe they ever has 'em there," concluded
+the boy.
+
+"Perhaps they keeps 'em in a box where you can't see 'em," suggested
+Tiny, who was very unwilling to relinquish her hope.
+
+"Pigs might fly, and they will when they sells books at Fellness,"
+remarked Dick.
+
+"Where does Harry Hayes get his from?" suddenly asked the girl; and at
+the same moment she espied a speck on the horizon, which she decided was
+a fisherman's boat. "He's coming, Dick, dad's coming," she exclaimed.
+"Make haste--make haste and fill up the baskets;" and she tore away at
+the seaweed, piling it into the baskets as fast as her small hands would
+permit. "Now we'll carry one down," she said, taking hold of the handle.
+"Catch hold, Dick;" for she wanted to be at the edge of the sands by the
+time the boat touched the shore.
+
+But Dick was in no such hurry to meet his father. "There's plenty of
+time," he said, leisurely untying a knot in a piece of string.
+
+"No there isn't, Dick; don't you know I'm going to Fellness in the
+boat."
+
+"But you're afraid," said the boy; "ain't father tried to coax you lots
+o' times to go out with him, and yer never would? You'll just get to the
+edge, and when yer sees it rock a bit yer'll run away."
+
+"No, I won't, Dick, this time," said the little girl. But as she spoke a
+shiver of fear and dread ran through her frame at the thought of the
+swaying boat.
+
+Dick saw it, and laughed. "Didn't I tell yer you was afraid," he said,
+in a mocking tone; "what's the good of going down there, when you're
+frightened?"
+
+"But I want a book, Dick; I must learn to read, and find out what we
+want to know. Oh, do make haste!" she added, as she saw the boat
+approaching the shore.
+
+Dick was still laughing, but he helped her carry the basket, though he
+teased her as they went along about being frightened. They got across
+the sands with their samphire, just as Coomber and Bob were springing
+ashore.
+
+"Oh, daddy, take me with yer to Fellness," called Tiny, shutting her
+eyes as she spoke that she might not see the treacherous waves and the
+swaying boat.
+
+"Halloo, halloo! What now, deary?" exclaimed Coomber. And it was
+wonderful to see the change in his hard face as he lifted the little
+girl in his arms and kissed her.
+
+"She says she'll go," said Dick, "but I don't believe she means it."
+
+"Yes I do. You'll take me, daddy, won't yer--'cos I've picked a lot of
+samphire--all that, and another basketful up there? Go and fetch it,
+Bob, and daddy can put it in the boat. And I'm going, too."
+
+"So you shall, deary, so you shall," said the old fisherman, in a
+pleased tone, for he had often tried to coax her out with him on the
+sea; but the memory of that awful night on the bar sands still clung to
+her, and the sight of the boat, swayed about at the mercy of the waves,
+filled her with a nameless terror.
+
+"There won't be a storm, will there?" asked Tiny, with a shiver of fear,
+as the fisherman carefully lifted her in and placed her beside the
+basket of samphire.
+
+"My deary, if I thought the wind 'ud be even a bit fresh to-night, I
+wouldn't take yer," said the fisherman, in an earnest tone.
+
+He had never been so tender with one of his own children--unless it was
+to the little girl lying in the churchyard--as he was to this little
+waif of the sea; and now, as he pushed off from the shore, he was
+careful to keep the old boat as steady as possible, and sat watching her
+little frightened face as he plied his oars. He kept as close to the
+beach, too, as he well could, just skirting the sand-banks, so that she
+should have the comfort of seeing the land all the way along.
+
+After a few minutes Tiny grew less frightened, and ventured to ask a
+question about where they were going.
+
+"Oh, I'll take yer to see Dame Peters while Bob unloads the boat," said
+Coomber, nodding at her in an approving manner.
+
+"And shall I see the shops?" asked Tiny; for she did not believe what
+Dick had told her.
+
+"Shops, shops!" repeated the fisherman, resting on his oars for a minute
+to stare at the little girl. "Well, there's a shop," he said, slowly;
+"but I don't see what you can want there."
+
+"Do they sell books?" asked Tiny, eagerly.
+
+For answer the fisherman burst into a loud laugh. "What does a little
+'un like you know about books?" he said. "But I know of something they
+do sell, as 'll suit you a deal better; they sell sweets, and almond
+rock, as well as 'bacca and bread, and you shall have some, my deary."
+
+The fisherman expected a joyous outburst in anticipation of these
+unwonted dainties, but the little girl said slowly--
+
+"Don't they sell books, too, daddy? I'd rather have a book than almond
+rock," she added.
+
+"Why, what do you want with a book, a little 'un like you?" said
+Coomber, impatiently.
+
+"We both wants it, Dick and me; we wants to find out whether God loves
+boys as well as gals."
+
+The fisherman looked at her serious little face for a minute, and then
+burst into a laugh again. "Well, you are a rum 'un as ever I came
+across. Did you hear that, Bob?" he asked, appealing to his elder son,
+who was steering. Bob turned his sulky face round.
+
+"What's she saying now?" he asked.
+
+"What was, it little 'un--whether God loved boys and gals, wasn't it?"
+asked the fisherman, who was highly amused at the question.
+
+"He don't love none of us, I can tell her that," said Bob, sharply. "He
+forgot us long ago, if ever He knowed anything about us."
+
+"There, what d'ye think o' that, little 'un?" said the fisherman,
+pulling away at the oars.
+
+Tiny looked perplexed for a minute or two, but at length she said: "I
+think God knows all about the Point, 'cos He loves me, and He listens
+when I say my prayers. But s'pose I tell him," she suddenly added, as
+though the thought had just occurred to her; "I can ask Him to bless you
+and mammy, and Dick and Bob. But I should like to get a book," she said,
+in conclusion.
+
+"Oh, the sweets 'll do as well," said the fisherman, who saw little use
+in books. He might have humoured Tiny in what he looked upon as a most
+extraordinary whim, but he never remembered seeing such a thing as a
+book in Fellness all the years he had known the place. People might have
+books, some of them, at least, but they were not of much use to
+fisher-folks, and he rather despised them.
+
+The sun had gone down before they landed; but the moon was rising; and
+so, between daylight and moonlight, they would be able to get back
+without any difficulty, when the fish and samphire were disposed of.
+
+"Now, Bob, get her unloaded, while I take the little 'un up to see Dame
+Peters," said Coomber, as he lifted Tiny out of the boat.
+
+She was looking round eagerly in search of the houses and shops, for in
+spite of what she had been told, she could not divest herself of the
+idea that Fellness was a grand, glorious place, where everything could
+be bought if people only had fish and seaweed enough; and surely two big
+baskets of samphire were sufficient to buy a book.
+
+But to her disappointment she saw only a few lounging fishermen and
+children--like herself and Dick--instead of the crowds of people she had
+expected; and as for shops--well, she could see a row of stone cottages
+at a distance. There might be a dozen, perhaps, and a few sheds and
+outbuildings, but the rest of the landscape was flat and unoccupied as
+their own Point; and at the sight Tiny hid her face in the fisherman's
+neck and burst into tears.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+TINY'S TREASURE.
+
+
+"Well, now, if you can make her out, it's more than I can," said
+Coomber, pausing in the doorway of Dame Peters' cottage, after he had
+seated Tiny by the old woman's fire.
+
+"Oh, leave her here for half an hour; she'll be all right by the time
+you come back; there's no 'counting for children, and she may feel
+frightened a bit, for all she ain't cried till she got ashore."
+
+"It's just that that beats me," said the fisherman; "she's as lively as
+you please in the boat, but as soon as she gets out, down she pops her
+head, and begins to pipe her eye."
+
+"Well, there, you go and look after Perkins and the fish, and I'll see
+to her," said Dame Peters, a little impatiently; for she had some
+potatoes cooking for her husband's supper, and she knew they needed
+attention. After looking to these, she turned to Tiny, who had dried her
+tears by this time, and sat watching the old woman. "D'ye like to see
+pictures, deary?" she asked; and at the same time she opened the top
+drawer of an old-fashioned chest of drawers, and brought out a print,
+which she laid on the table, and lifted Tiny, chair and all, close up to
+look at it.
+
+Pictures were not to be seen in every cottage a few years ago, as they
+may be now. The _Band of Hope Review_ and _British Workman_ had not been
+heard of in Fellness at the time of which we write, and so Dame Peters
+was very choice of her picture, although she knew nothing about the
+reading at the back of it.
+
+Tiny brightened up wonderfully when her eyes fell upon this treasure;
+but after looking at it for some minutes, while Dame Peters turned out
+the potatoes, she ventured to lift it up and look at the other side, and
+she exclaimed joyfully: "Oh, it's a book! There's reading on it!"
+
+"What, what!" exclaimed the old woman, turning from the fireplace to see
+what had happened. "What is it, child?"
+
+"See, see, there's reading--G O D! What does that spell?" asked Tiny,
+looking up in the old woman's face, her finger still resting on the word
+she had picked out.
+
+"Bless the child, how should I know? S'pose it is some sort of reading,
+as you say; but I never learned a letter in my life."
+
+"And I've a'most forgot," said Tiny, sadly; and then her finger roved
+over the printed page, and she found that she could remember most of the
+letters now she saw them again; but how to put them together was the
+difficulty. She had forgotten how to do this entirely. G O D spelt a
+word familiar enough to her at one time, but which of all the words she
+used now those letters were intended to signify, she could not remember.
+Again and again her finger returned to the well-remembered letters, but
+beyond this her memory failed her; and she sat, with puckered brow and
+steadfast eyes, still looking at the printed page instead of the
+picture, when Coomber came back.
+
+"Oh, daddy, daddy, look here!" exclaimed Tiny; "here's a book with
+reading!"
+
+"She's just sat and looked at them letters, as she calls 'em, ever since
+you've been gone," said Dame Peters, in a half-offended tone; for her
+picture was not valued as much as it ought to be, she thought.
+
+"Oh, she's a rum 'un," said Coomber. "Well, now, are you ready, little
+'un?" he asked.
+
+Tiny looked up wistfully in the old woman's face. "Couldn't I take this
+home, and show it to Dick?" she asked, timidly, laying her hand on the
+print.
+
+"Take my picture home!" exclaimed the old woman.
+
+Coomber turned the paper over, and looked at it contemptuously. "Peters
+got this when he went to Grimsby, I s'pose?" he said.
+
+"Yes, he did."
+
+"Well now, couldn't you let her have it, and let Peters bring you
+another?" said the fisherman, who was anxious that his darling should be
+gratified if possible.
+
+But the old woman was little more than a child herself over this
+picture, and was unwilling to part with it at first. At last she agreed
+to sell it to Tiny for a basket of samphire, for this seaweed made a
+kind of pickle among the fisher-folk, and was of some marketable value,
+too, for it did not grow everywhere along the coast, although round
+Bermuda Point it flourished in great luxuriance.
+
+Tiny was only too glad to obtain such a treasure on such easy terms,
+although she was paying about five times the value of it; and when it
+had been folded up and carefully stowed away in Coomber's pocket, she
+was quite ready to go to the boat, although Dame Peters pressed them to
+stay and have some of the hot potatoes for supper.
+
+Tiny seemed brimful of joy that night; and when she was seated in the
+boat, and they were rowing over the placid water, she so far forgot her
+fears as to begin singing. Something in the surroundings had recalled to
+her mind the time when she used to sing nearly every night her mother's
+favourite hymn. It all came back to her as freshly as though she had
+sung it only last week; and her sweet young voice rang out bold and
+clear--
+
+    "Star of Peace to wanderers weary,
+      Bright the beams that smile on me;
+    Cheer the pilot's vision dreary,
+      Far, far at sea."
+
+She paused there, not feeling quite sure of the next verse; but Coomber
+said quickly--
+
+"Go on, deary, go on; don't you know the next bit?"
+
+"I'll try," said Tiny; and again the voice rang out in its childish
+treble--
+
+    "Star of Hope, gleam on the billow,
+      Bless the soul that sighs for Thee;
+    Bless the sailor's lonely pillow,
+      Far, far at sea."
+
+"Who told you that, deary?" asked the fisherman, eagerly, when she
+paused again.
+
+"My mother used to sing it every night. She used to say it was meant for
+daddy. And she told me I must always sing it, too, only somehow I've
+forgot everything since I came here."
+
+"Never mind the rest, deary; try and think about that. It's just the
+song for a sailor and a sailor's lass."
+
+"That's just what my mother used to say--that I was a sailor's lass!"
+exclaimed Tiny.
+
+"And she taught you just the right kind of a song. Now try a bit more,
+deary," he added, coaxingly.
+
+    "Star of Faith, when winds are mocking
+      All his toil, he flies to Thee;
+    Save him, on the billows rocking,
+      Far, far at sea."
+
+"I don't think I know any more," said the child, as she finished this
+verse.
+
+"Well, you've done first-rate, deary; and mind, you must sing that song
+to me every night," he added.
+
+For a little while they went on in silence, and nothing could be heard
+but the gentle lap, lap of the waves at the side of the boat, until
+Coomber said: "Come, sing to us again about that sailor's star. Bob, you
+try and pick it up as she sings," he added.
+
+So the verses were sung through again, and without a break this time;
+and Tiny was able to recall the last verse, too, and sang--
+
+    "Star Divine, oh! safely guide him,
+      Bring the wanderer back to Thee;
+    Sore temptations long have tried him,
+      Far, far at sea."
+
+"Bravo, little 'un," exclaimed Bob, who was completely charmed out of
+his sulky mood by the singing.
+
+"I say, Bob," suddenly exclaimed Coomber, "is the bottle up there?"
+
+"I ain't seen the bottle," sulkily responded the lad, his ill-humour
+returning at once.
+
+"I--I took it up, and told 'em to fill it," exclaimed Coomber; and as he
+spoke he drew in his oars, and felt under the seat, and all round the
+boat. "I must ha' forgot it, thinking about the little 'un and her
+picture," he said, after searching round the boat in vain.
+
+"It's too late to go back," said Bob; "it'll be dark soon."
+
+"Ye-es, it's too late to go back with the child," said Coomber, slowly
+and regretfully; though what he should do without his nightly dose of
+whisky he did not know.
+
+"Sing again," whispered Bob to Tiny; and the next minute the little
+voice rang out once more its "Star of Peace."
+
+It brought peace to the angry fisherman--the more angry, perhaps,
+because he had nobody but himself to blame that the bottle had been left
+behind. Before they landed the singing had worked its mysterious charm,
+and the fisherman had almost forgotten his anger, and his bottle, too.
+
+"You tie up the boat, and make haste in, Bob," he said, as he took the
+little girl in his arms, and stepped out upon the shore. A light was
+shining in the window of the old boat-house, and Tiny was all impatience
+to get home and show her treasure to Dick.
+
+"Take it out of your pocket, daddy, and give it to me," she said, as
+they were crossing the sands; and the moment the door was opened she ran
+in, exclaiming, "I've got it! I've got it, Dick!"
+
+"Hush, hush, deary; Dick and Tom have gone to bed, and both are fast
+asleep. Come in and get your supper; it's been waiting ever so long for
+you." As she spoke, the poor woman cast several furtive glances at her
+husband, fearing that he was more than usually morose, as he had not
+spoken; but, to her surprise, he said, in a merry tone:
+
+"Bless you, mother, the little 'un has got something better than supper.
+Dame Peters wanted her to stay and have some hot potatoes; but she was
+in such a hurry to be off with her prize that she wouldn't look at the
+potatoes."
+
+"I've got some reading," said Tiny, in a delighted whisper, holding up
+her sheet of paper.
+
+"Why, what's the good of that?" exclaimed Mrs. Coomber, in a
+disappointed tone. "Nobody at the Point can read, unless it's the Hayes'
+at the farm."
+
+"And she'd better not let me catch her with any of them," put in
+Coomber, sharply.
+
+"Dick and me are going to learn to read by ourselves," announced Tiny,
+spreading out her picture on the table. This would enhance its value to
+everybody, she thought, since Dame Peters set such store by it solely
+because of the picture. And so she did not venture to turn it over to
+con the letters on the other side until after Bob had come in, and they
+had all looked at it.
+
+"What's it all about?" asked Bob, turning to the smoking plate of fish
+which his mother had just placed on the table.
+
+"Don't you see it's a kind man putting his hand on the boys' heads?"
+said Tiny, rather scornfully.
+
+"Oh, anybody can see that," said Bob. "But what does it mean? That's
+what I want to know."
+
+But Tiny could only shake her head as she gazed earnestly at the print.
+"I dunno what it is," she said, with a sigh.
+
+"Come, come, you must put that away for to-night," said Mrs. Coomber;
+"you ought to have been in bed an hour ago;" and she would have taken
+the picture away, but Tiny hastily snatched it up, and, carefully
+folding it, wrapped it in another piece of paper, and then begged that
+it might be put away in a drawer for fear it should be lost before the
+morning.
+
+Mrs. Coomber smiled as she took it from her hand. "I'll take care of
+it," she said, "and you go and get your supper."
+
+It was not often that the fisherman's family were up so late as this,
+but no one seemed in a hurry to go to bed. Coomber himself was so
+good-tempered that his wife and Bob forgot their habitual fear of him in
+listening to his account of how brave Tiny had been, and how Dame Peters
+thought she was growing very fast. Then Tiny had to sing one verse of
+"Star of Peace," after she had finished her supper--Mrs. Coomber would
+not let her sing more than that, for she was looking very sleepy and
+tired--and then they all went to bed, with a strange, new feeling of
+peace and content, Mrs. Coomber vaguely wondering what had become of the
+whisky bottle, and wishing every night could be like this.
+
+As soon as her eyes were open the next morning Tiny thought of her
+treasure, and crept into the boys' room to tell Dick the wonderful news.
+But to her surprise she found the bed was empty; and, peeping into the
+kitchen, saw Mrs. Coomber washing up the breakfast things.
+
+"Oh, mammy, what is the time?" she exclaimed, but yawning as she spoke.
+
+"Oh, you're awake at last. Make haste and put your clothes on, and come
+and have your breakfast," said Mrs. Coomber.
+
+"Where's Dick?" asked Tiny.
+
+"He's helping daddy and Bob with the net; and you can go, too, when
+you've had your breakfast. Daddy wouldn't let the boys come and wake you
+'cos you was so tired last night."
+
+"What are they doing to the net?" asked Tiny, as she came to the table.
+
+"Mending it, of course. Daddy's going shrimping to-day."
+
+"What a bother that net is," said Tiny. "Daddy's always mending it."
+
+"Yes, so he is, deary. It's old, you see, and we can't afford to get a
+new one."
+
+"I've got to get a lot of samphire to-day, and I promised Dick I'd make
+some more letters for him in the sand," said Tiny, meditatively.
+
+"But daddy wants you to help him with the net," suggested Mrs. Coomber.
+The little girl had always been so pliant, so amenable to control, that
+Mrs. Coomber was surprised to hear her say passionately--
+
+"I won't do that nasty net. I must pick the samphire for Dame Peters,
+and show Dick my picture, first;" and then she snatched up a basket, and
+ran out, not to the sands, where the fisherman and his boys sat mending
+the torn net, but away to the salt-marsh, where the seaweed grew
+thickest, and she could fill her basket most quickly. In an hour or two
+she came home, looking tired and cross.
+
+"Ain't Dick come home yet?" she asked, throwing herself on the floor.
+
+"They ain't done the net yet. Tom came to fetch you a little while ago."
+
+"I don't want Tom, I want Dick. We're going to make some letters, and
+learn to read," said Tiny.
+
+"You'd better leave the reading alone, if it makes you so cross," said
+Mrs. Coomber.
+
+"No, it don't make me cross; it's that nasty net."
+
+"But you always liked to help daddy wind the string and mend the net
+before. Why don't you go to them now?"
+
+But Tiny would not move. She lay on the floor, kicking and grumbling,
+because Dick could not leave the net and come and see her picture.
+
+"You're a very naughty girl, Tiny," said Mrs. Coomber at last; "and I
+don't see how you can think God will love you if you don't try to be
+good."
+
+The little girl sat up instantly, and looked earnestly into her face.
+"My other mammy used to say something like that," she said, slowly. And
+then she burst into tears, and ran and shut herself in the boys'
+bedroom.
+
+What passed there, Mrs. Coomber did not know; but, half an hour
+afterwards, as she glanced out of the little kitchen window, she saw her
+running across the sands to where the group of boys sat mending the old
+net; and she smiled as she thought of what her words had done. She did
+not know what a hard fight Tiny had had with herself before she could
+make up her mind to give up her own way; she only thought how pleased
+her husband would be when he saw the child come running towards him, and
+that a fit of ill-humour, from which they would probably all have
+suffered, had been warded off by the little girl's conquest of herself.
+
+But neither Tiny nor Mrs. Coomber ever forgot that day. A new element
+was introduced into the lives of the fisherman's family. The little girl
+learned her first lesson in self-control, and Dick and Tom began to
+master the difficulties of the alphabet; for, when the net was finished,
+and Bob and his father waded out into the sea on their shrimping
+expedition, Tiny ran and fetched her pretty picture to show the boys,
+and then they all set to work with bits of stick to make the letters in
+the sand.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+ON THE SANDS.
+
+
+Tiny was somewhat disappointed as the days went on to find that her
+pupils, Tom and Dick, took less and less interest in learning the
+letters she marked in the sand, or pointed out on the paper. They teased
+her to know how to put the letters together and make them into words
+which they could understand. But, alas! labour as she would, Tiny could
+not get over this difficulty even for herself. She had a dim idea that
+G O D spelt God, but she could not be quite sure--not sure enough to tell
+Dick that it was so. It was enough, however, to quicken her own interest
+in what the lines of letters might be able to tell her if only she could
+solve the mystery of putting them into words, for doubtless they would
+clear up her anxiety as to whether God loved boys as well as girls.
+
+She did not spend her whole time poring over her picture. She gathered
+samphire, helped to sort the fish when it was brought in, or mend the
+much-despised net; but every day she spent some time diligently tracing
+out the letters she knew and spelling over G O D.
+
+She might have mastered the difficulty with very little trouble if the
+fisherman had been less obstinate in his quarrel with the farm people,
+for Harry Hayes and his sisters were often down on the sands, sometimes
+bringing their books with them, and Dick, who longed to join them in
+their play, tried to persuade Tiny to go and ask them to help her with
+the reading difficulty.
+
+"Dad won't say anything to you, even if he should see you talking; but
+he won't see, and I won't tell," urged Dick, one day, when the children
+from the farm were at play among the sandhills, and occasionally casting
+sidelong glances towards Dick and Tiny.
+
+But the little girl only shook her head. "I can't, Dick," she said; "God
+wouldn't like it; mother told me that long ago."
+
+"But how is He to know if you don't tell Him?" said the boy, in an
+impatient tone.
+
+"Don't you know that God can see us all the time; that He's taking care
+of us always?" said Tiny, slowly.
+
+"Oh, come! what'll you tell us next?" said Dick, looking over his
+shoulder with a gesture of fear. "He ain't here now, you know," he
+added.
+
+"Yes he is," said the little girl, confidently; "mother said God was a
+Spirit. I dunno what that is, but it's just as real as the wind. We
+can't see that you know, but it's real; and we can't see God, but He's
+close to us all the time."
+
+The boy crept closer to her while she was speaking. "What makes you talk
+like that?" he said, in a half-frightened tone.
+
+"What's a matter, Dick?" she asked, not understanding his fear. "Don't
+you like to think God is close to you, and all round you," she suddenly
+added, in surprise.
+
+Dick shook his head. "Nobody never thinks about God at Bermuda Point, so
+p'r'aps He don't come here," he said, at last, in a tone of relief. "Oh,
+I say, Tiny, look! Harry Hayes has got a book! Let's go and see what
+it's about!"
+
+"Well, we'll ask dad when he come home to-night, and p'r'aps he'll let
+us," said the little girl, turning resolutely to her own paper again.
+
+"Oh, then, it's dad you're afraid of, and not God?" said Dick.
+
+"Afraid! What do you mean?" asked Tiny. "God loves me, and takes care of
+me, and so does daddy; and if I was to talk to Harry Hayes, it would
+make him cross, and God doesn't like us to make people cross; and little
+gals has to do as they are told, you know."
+
+"Oh yes; I know all about that," said Dick; "but what do you suppose God
+thinks of dad when he makes himself cross with the whisky?"
+
+"Oh! He's dreadfully sorry, Dick, I know He is, for He makes me afraid
+of him sometimes, when he's had a big lot; and he's just the dearest
+daddy when he forgets to bring the bottle home from Fellness."
+
+"Ah, but that ain't often," grunted Dick; "and if God wouldn't like you
+to talk to Harry Hayes, 'cos dad says you musn't, I'd like to know what
+He thinks of dad sometimes, that's all." And then Dick ran away, for if
+he could not speak to the farm children, he liked to be near them when
+they came to play on the sands.
+
+A minute or two after Dick had left her, Tiny was startled by a sound
+close at hand, and, looking round, she saw Coomber coming from the other
+side of the sandhill.
+
+"Oh, dad, I thought you was out in the boat," she said.
+
+[Illustration: "'I WANT YOU TO SING A BIT, WHILE I RUB AWAY AT THIS OLD
+GUN.'" (_See page 81._)]
+
+"Bob and Tom have gone by themselves to-day, for I wanted to clean the
+gun ready for winter," said the fisherman, still rubbing at the lock
+with a piece of oiled rag.
+
+Tiny looked up at him half shyly, half curiously, for if he had only
+been on the other side of the sand-ridge, he must have heard all she and
+Dick had been talking about.
+
+But if he had heard the fisherman took no notice of what had passed.
+
+"Come, I want you to sing a bit, while I rub away at this old gun," he
+said. "Sing 'Star of Peace'; it'll sound first-rate out here;" as though
+he had never heard it out there before, when, as a matter of fact,
+scarcely a day passed but she sang it to please him.
+
+When she had finished, he said, quickly: "What do you think about that
+'Star of Peace' deary? It's the sailor's star, you know, so I've got a
+sort of share in it like."
+
+"I think it means God. I'm a'most sure mother said it meant God," added
+the little girl.
+
+"Ah, then, I don't think there's much share of it for me," said Coomber,
+somewhat sadly; and he turned to rubbing his gun again, and began
+talking about it--how rusty he had found it, and how he would have to
+use it more than ever when winter came, for the boat was growing old,
+and would not stand much more knocking about by the rough wintry sea; so
+he and Bob must shoot more wild birds, and only go out in calm weather
+when winter came. Then half shyly, and with apparent effort, he brought
+the conversation round so as to include Farmer Hayes.
+
+"He ain't a bad sort, you know, Tiny, if he could just remember that a
+fisherman is a bit proud and independent, though he may be poor; and if
+you could do one of them young 'uns a good turn any time, why, you're a
+sailor's lass, yer know, and a sailor is always ready to do a good turn
+to anybody."
+
+"Yes, daddy," said Tiny, slowly and thoughtfully; and then, after a
+minute's pause, she said: "Daddy, I think Harry or Polly would just like
+to help me a bit with this reading."
+
+For answer the fisherman burst into a loud laugh. "That's what you'd
+like, I s'pose?" he said, as he looked at her.
+
+"Yes; I want to find out about this picture, and these letters tell all
+about it, I know--if I only could find out what they mean," said Tiny,
+eagerly.
+
+"Oh, well, when I'm gone indoors you can go and ask 'em if they'd like
+to help you," he said, with another short laugh. "Maybe you'll be able
+to tell us all about it when winter comes, and it'll soon be here now,"
+added the fisherman, with a sigh.
+
+Never before had Coomber looked forward with such dread to the winter.
+Until lately he had always thought the fishing-boat would "last his
+time," as he used to say; but he had patched and repaired it so often
+lately, until at last the conviction had been forced upon him that it
+was worn out; and to be caught in a sudden squall on the open sea, would
+inevitably break her up, and all who were in her would meet with a
+watery grave. He was as brave as a lion; but to know that his boat was
+gradually going to pieces, and that its timbers might part company at
+almost any moment, made even his courage quail; especially when he
+thought of his wife, and the boys, and this little helpless girl. Some
+hard things had been said at Fellness about his folly in taking her upon
+his hands when she could without difficulty have been sent to the
+poorhouse. A girl was such a useless burden, never likely to be helpful
+in managing a boat, as a boy might be; and it was clear that no reward
+would ever be obtained from her friends, even if they were found, for
+her clothing made it evident that she was only the child of poor
+parents.
+
+This had been the reasoning among the Fellness busybodies ever since
+Coomber had announced his intention of taking the little girl home; but
+he was as obstinate in this as in most other things. He had followed his
+own will, or rather the God-like compassion of his own heart, in spite
+of the poverty that surrounded him, and the hard struggle he often had
+to get bread enough for his own children.
+
+"I'll just have to stay out a bit longer, or go out in the boat a bit
+oftener," he said, with a light laugh, when they attempted to reason him
+out of his project. He did not know then that the days of his boat were
+numbered; but he knew it now--knew that starvation stared them in the
+face, and at no distant date either. He could never hope to buy a new
+boat. It would cost over twenty pounds, and he seldom owned twenty pence
+over the day's stock of bread and other household necessaries. Among
+these he counted his whisky; for that a fisherman could do his work
+without a daily supply of ardent spirits never entered his head. Blue
+ribbon armies and temperance crusades had never been heard of, and it
+was a fixed belief among the fisher folk that a man could not work
+without drinking as well as eating, and drinking deeply, too.
+
+So Coomber never thought of curtailing his daily allowance of grog to
+meet the additional expense of his household: he rather increased the
+allowance, that he might be able to work the boat better, as he fancied,
+and so catch more fish. When he forgot his bottle and left it at
+Fellness, it struck him as something all but marvellous that he should
+be able to work the next day without his usual drams, but it had not
+convinced him that he could do without it all together. Of its effect
+upon himself, in making him sullen, morose, and disagreeable, he was in
+absolute ignorance, and so the children's talk about it came upon him as
+a revelation. He knew that Tiny sometimes shrank from and avoided him;
+but he had considered it a mere childish whim, not to be accounted for
+by anything in himself; and so to hear that she was absolutely afraid of
+him sometimes was something to make him think more deeply than he had
+ever done in his life before.
+
+But he did not say a word to Tiny about this. When he had done rubbing
+his gun he carried it home, and Tiny was left free to make acquaintance
+with the farm children.
+
+She walked shyly up to where they were sitting--Polly reading, and Harry
+throwing sand at Dick, who had seated himself at a short distance, and
+was returning the salute.
+
+"Would--wouldn't you like to tell me about these letters, please?" said
+Tiny, holding out her paper to Polly.
+
+"Well, that's a rum way of asking," said Harry, with a laugh. "Suppose
+she wouldn't now, little 'un," he added.
+
+"Then she mustn't," said Tiny, stoutly; though the tears welled up to
+her eyes at the thought of all her hopes being overthrown just when they
+seemed about to be realised.
+
+"Don't, Harry; what a tease you are!" said his sister. "I should like to
+tell you, dear," she added, in a patronising tone. "Come and sit down
+here, and tell me what you want."
+
+"It's what you want; don't forget that, Polly, else she'll get her back
+up, and go off again," laughed her brother; but he was not sorry the
+embargo had been taken off their intercourse with the fisherman's
+family; for although he had had surreptitious dealings with boys
+sometimes, they had to be so watchful lest they should be discovered
+that the play was considerably hindered. Now he understood that this
+advance on Tiny's part was a direct concession from Coomber himself, for
+he and the boys had long ago agreed to try and draw the little girl into
+some intimacy as the only way of breaking down the restrictions laid
+upon them. But Tiny had proved obstinate. She had been asked again and
+again, but she had always returned the same answer: "Daddy would let her
+some day, and then she would play with them." So Harry Hayes was
+perfectly aware that she had won the fisherman's consent at last,
+although no word had been said about it.
+
+When the girls were left to themselves, Polly took up the picture and
+looked at it, then turned it over and read, "God is good to all: He
+loves both boys and girls." At this point Tiny interrupted her by laying
+her hand on her arm, and saying eagerly: "Are you quite sure that is
+what it says?"
+
+"Why, don't you think I can read?" said Polly, in a half-offended tone.
+But the subject was new to her, and so she was anxious to read further,
+and turned to the page again and read on. At the bottom was a line or
+two in smaller print, and Polly read these longer words with a touch of
+pride: "Jesus said, Suffer the little children to come unto Me, and
+forbid them not: for of such is the kingdom of God."
+
+"Then this must be Jesus, and these are the little children," concluded
+Polly, as she turned over the paper to look at the picture again.
+
+The two girls sat and looked at it and talked about it for a few
+minutes, and then Tiny said wistfully: "Will you show me now how you
+make up them nice words?"
+
+"Oh, it's easy enough if you know the letters; but you must learn the
+letters first," said Polly; and she proceeded to tell Tiny the name of
+each; and the little girl had the satisfaction of knowing now that she
+had remembered them quite correctly, and that G O D did spell God, as
+she had surmised.
+
+She was not long now in putting other words together; and before she
+went home she was able to spell out the first two lines of the printed
+page, for they were all easy words, and intended for beginners.
+
+What a triumph it was to Tiny to be able to read out to the fisherman's
+family what she had learned on the sands that day. She was allowed to
+have the candle all to herself after supper, and they sat round the
+table looking at each other in wondering amazement as her little finger
+travelled along the page, and she spelt out the wonderful news, "'God is
+good to all: He loves both boys and girls.' It's true, Dick, what I told
+you, ain't it?" she said, in a tone of delighted satisfaction.
+
+Dick scratched his head, and looked round at his father, wondering what
+he would think or say. For a minute or two the fisherman smoked his pipe
+in silence. At length, taking it from his mouth, he said, in a slow,
+meditative fashion: "Well, little 'un, I s'pose if it's printed that way
+it's true; and if it is, why I s'pose we've all got a share in that
+'Star of Peace' we was talking about to-day."
+
+Tiny did not quite follow his train of thought; but she nodded her head,
+and then proceeded to tell them what she had heard about the picture,
+and the conclusion she and Polly had arrived at upon the subject--that
+Jesus, the kind, loving man of the picture, had come to show them how
+kind God was to them.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+BAD TIMES.
+
+
+Winter around Bermuda Point was at all times a dreary season, and the
+only thing its few inhabitants could hope for was that its reign might
+be as short as possible. A fine, calm autumn was hailed as a special
+boon from heaven by the fisher-folk all round the coast, and more
+especially by the lonely dwellers at the Point.
+
+A fine autumn enabled Coomber to go out in his boat until the time for
+shooting wild fowl began, and the children could play on the sands, or
+gather samphire, instead of being penned up in the house half the time.
+But when the weather was wild and wet, and the salt marshes lay under
+water, that meant little food and much discomfort, frequent quarrels,
+and much bitterness to the fisherman's family.
+
+This autumn the weather was more than usually boisterous; and long
+before the usual time the old boat had to be drawn up on to the bank,
+for fear the waves should dash it to pieces. The fisherman sometimes
+went to Fellness, on the chance of picking up a stray job, for it was
+only the state of his boat, and his anxiety to keep it together as long
+as possible, that prevented him braving the perils of the sea; and so he
+sometimes got the loan of another boat, or helped another fisherman with
+his; and then, rough though they might be, these fisher-folk were kind
+and helpful to each other, and if they could not afford to pay money for
+a job, they could pay for it in bread or flour, or potatoes, perhaps,
+and so they would generally find Coomber something to do, that they
+might help him, without hurting him.
+
+But there was little work that could be done in such bad weather as
+this, and he knew it, and his proud, independent spirit could not brook
+to accept even a mouthful of bread that he had not earned; and so there
+were many weary days spent at home, or sauntering round the coast with
+his gun, on the look-out for a stray wild fowl. Tiny often went to bed
+hungry, and woke up feeling faint and sick; and although she never
+forgot to say her prayers, she could not help thinking sometimes that
+God must have forgotten her. She read her paper to Dick, and he and Tom
+had both learned to spell out some of the words, and she read to herself
+again and again the Divine assurance, "God is good to all: He loves both
+boys and girls;" but then, as Dick said sometimes, Bermuda Point was
+such a long way from anywhere, and He might forget there were any boys
+and girls living there.
+
+When she was very hungry, and more than usually depressed, Tiny thought
+Dick must be right, but even then she would not admit such a thought to
+others. When she saw Mrs. Coomber in tears, because she had no food to
+prepare for her hungry children, she would steal up to her, pass her
+little arm round the poor woman's neck, and whisper, "God is good; He'll
+take care of us, mammy; He'll send us some supper, if He can't send us
+any dinner;" and the child's hopeful words often proved a true prophecy,
+for sometimes when Coomber had been out all day without finding anything
+that could be called food, he would, when returning, manage to secure a
+wild duck, perhaps, or a couple of sea magpies, or a few young gulls.
+Nothing came amiss to the young Coombers at any time, and just now a
+tough stringy gull was a dainty morsel.
+
+It threatened to be an unusually hard and long winter, and at last Mrs.
+Coomber ventured to suggest that Tiny should be taken to the poorhouse,
+at least until the spring, when she could come back again.
+
+"Look at her poor little white face," said the woman, with her apron to
+her eyes; "I'm afraid she'll be ill soon, and then what can we do?"
+
+"Time enough to talk about that when she is ill," said Coomber, gruffly,
+as he took up his gun and went out. They were generally able to keep a
+good fire of the drift-wood and wreckage that was washed ashore, for
+unfortunately there was scarcely a week passed but some noble vessel
+came to grief on the perilous bar sands during the more boisterous
+weather. Once, when they were at their wits' end for food, and Bob had
+begged his mother to boil some samphire for supper, Tiny was fortunate
+enough to discover an unopened cask which the sea had cast up the night
+before, and left high and dry behind the ridge of sandhills. She was not
+long fetching Bob and the boys to see her treasure trove; all sorts of
+wild speculations passing through her mind as to what it could contain
+as she ran shouting--
+
+"Bob! Bob! Dick! Dick! Come and see what I've found."
+
+[Illustration: "'DICK, DICK, COME AND SEE WHAT I'VE FOUND.'" (_See page
+96._)]
+
+The boys were not long in making their appearance, and Bob fetched a
+hatchet, and soon broke open the cask; and oh! what joy for the starving
+children--it was full of ship biscuits!
+
+"Oh, Dick, didn't I tell you this morning God hadn't forgotten us?" said
+Tiny, in a quavering voice, when Bob announced what the cask contained.
+
+"Oh, yes," said Dick, "so you did;" but he was too hungry to think of
+anything but the biscuits now--too hungry even to shout his joy, as he
+would have done at another time. As soon as they could be got at, he
+handed one to Tiny, and then Tom and Dick helped themselves, filling
+their pockets and munching them at the same time; but Tiny, though she
+nibbled her biscuit as she went, ran at once to tell Mrs. Coomber of her
+wonderful discovery; and she, scarcely daring to believe that such good
+news could be true, ran out at once to see for herself, and met the
+boys, who confirmed Tiny's tale. But she must see the cask for herself,
+and then she ate and filled her apron, and shed tears, and thanked God
+for this wonderful gift all at the same time. Then she told the boys to
+come and fetch some baskets at once, to carry them home in, and she
+would sort them over, for some were soaked with sea-water, but others
+near the middle were quite dry. Bob took a bagful and went in search of
+his father along the coast, and everybody was busy carrying or sorting
+or drying the biscuits, for they had to be secured before the next tide
+came in, or they might be washed away again.
+
+When Coomber came home, bringing a couple of sea-gulls he had shot, he
+was fairly overcome at the sight of the biscuits.
+
+"Daddy, it was God that sent 'em," said Tiny, in an earnest, joyful
+whisper.
+
+The fisherman drew his sleeve across his eyes. "Seems as though it must
+ha' been, deary," he said; "for how that cask ever came ashore without
+being broken up well-nigh beats me."
+
+"God didn't let it break, 'cos we wanted the biscuits," said Tiny
+confidently; "yer see, daddy, He ain't forgot us, though Bermuda Point
+is a long way from anywhere."
+
+The biscuits lasted them for some time, for as the season advanced
+Coomber was able to sell some of the wild ducks he shot, and so
+potatoes, and flour, and bread could be brought at Fellness again. If
+the fisherman could only have believed that whisky was not as necessary
+as bread, they might have suffered less privation; but every time he got
+a little money for his wild fowl, the bottle had to be replenished, even
+though he took home but half the quantity of bread that was needed; and
+so Tiny sometimes was heard to wish that God would always send them
+biscuits in a tub, and then daddy couldn't drink the stuff that made him
+so cross.
+
+Mrs. Coomber smiled and sighed as she heard Tiny whisper this to Dick.
+She, too, had often wished something similar--or, at least, that her
+husband could do without whisky. Now, as the supply of wild fowl
+steadily increased, he came home more sullen than ever. His return from
+Fellness grew to be a dread even to Tiny at last; and she and Dick used
+to creep off to bed just before the time he was expected to return,
+leaving Bob and Tom to bear the brunt of whatever storm might follow.
+
+He seldom noticed their absence, until one night, when, having drunk
+rather more than usual, he was very cross on coming in, and evidently on
+the look-out for something to make a quarrel over.
+
+"Where's Dick and the gal?" he said, as he looked round the little
+kitchen, after flinging himself into a chair.
+
+"They're gone to bed," said his wife, timidly, not venturing to look up
+from her work.
+
+"Then tell 'em to get up."
+
+"I--I dunno whether it 'ud be good for Tiny," faltered the poor woman;
+"she's got a cold now, and--and----"
+
+"Are you going to call 'em up, or shall I go and lug 'em out of bed?"
+demanded the angry, tipsy man.
+
+"But, Coomber," began his wife.
+
+"There, don't stand staring like that, but do as I tell you,"
+interrupted the fisherman; "I won't have 'em go sneaking off to bed just
+as I come home. I heard that little 'un say one day she was afraid of me
+sometimes. Afraid, indeed; I'll teach her to be afraid," he repeated,
+working himself into a passion over some maudlin recollection of the
+children's talk in the summer-time.
+
+His wife saw it would be of no use reasoning with him in his present
+mood, and so went to rouse the children without further parley. They
+were not asleep, and so were prepared for the summons, as they had
+overheard what had been said.
+
+"Oh mammy, must I come?" said Tiny, her teeth chattering with fear, as
+she slipped out of bed.
+
+"Don't be afraid, deary--don't let him see you're frightened," whispered
+Mrs. Coomber; "slip your clothes on as quick as you can, and come and
+sing 'Star of Peace' to him; then he'll drop off to sleep, and you can
+come to bed again."
+
+"I will--I will try," said the child, trying to force back her tears and
+speak bravely. But in spite of all her efforts to be brave, and not look
+as though she was frightened, she crept into the kitchen looking cowed
+and half-bewildered with terror, and before she could utter a word of
+her song, Coomber pounced upon her.
+
+"What do yer look like that for?" he demanded; "what business have you
+to be frightened of me?"
+
+Tiny turned her white face towards him, and ventured to look up.
+"I--I----"
+
+"She's going to sing 'Star of Peace,'" interposed Mrs. Coomber; "let her
+come and sit over here by the fire."
+
+"You let her alone," roared her husband; "she's a-going to do what I
+tell her. Come here," he called, in a still louder tone. Tiny ventured a
+step nearer, but did not go close to him.
+
+"Are you coming?" he roared again; then, stretching out his hand, he
+seized her by the arm, and dragged her towards him, giving her a violent
+shake as he did so. "There--now sing!" he commanded, placing her against
+his knee.
+
+The child stared at him with a blank, fascinated gaze. Once he saw her
+lips move, but no sound came from them; and after waiting a minute he
+dashed her from him with all the strength of his mad fury.
+
+There was a shriek from Mrs. Coomber, and screams from the boys, but
+poor little Tiny uttered no sound. They picked her up from where she had
+fallen, or rather had been thrown, and her face was covered with blood;
+but she uttered no groan--gave no sign of life.
+
+"Oh, she's dead! she's dead!" wailed Dick, bending over her as she lay
+in his mother's arms.
+
+The terrible sight had completely sobered Coomber. "Did I do it? Did I
+do that?" he asked, in a changed voice.
+
+"Why, yer know yer did," growled Bob; "or leastways the whisky in yer
+did it. I've often thought you'd do for mother, or one of us; but I
+never thought yer'd lift yer hand agin a poor little 'un like that."
+
+Coomber groaned, but made no reply. "Hold your tongue, Bob," commanded
+his mother; for she could see that her husband was sorry enough now for
+what he had done.
+
+"What's to be done, mother?" he asked, in a subdued voice; "surely,
+surely I haven't killed the child!"
+
+But Mrs. Coomber feared that he had, and it was this that paralysed all
+her faculties. "I don't know what to do," she said, helplessly, wiping
+away the blood that kept flowing from a deep gash on Tiny's forehead.
+
+"Couldn't you give her some water?" said Dick, who did not know what
+else to suggest. Coomber meekly fetched a cupful from the pan outside,
+and Mrs. Coomber dipped her apron in it, and bathed Tiny's face; and in
+a minute or two Dick saw, to his great delight, that she drew a faint,
+fluttering breath. Coomber saw it too, and the relief was so great that
+he could not keep back his tears. "Please God He'll spare us His little
+'un, I'll never touch another drop of whisky," he sobbed, as he leaned
+over his wife's chair, and watched her bathe the still pallid face.
+
+"Open the door, Dick, and let her have a breath of fresh air; and don't
+stand too close," said his mother, as Tiny drew another faint breath.
+
+The door was opened, and the boys stood anxiously aside, watching the
+faint, gasping breath, until at last Tiny was able to swallow a little
+of the water; and then they would have closed round her again, but their
+mother kept them off.
+
+"Would a drop o' milk do her good?" whispered Coomber after a time; but
+she was sensible enough to recognise his voice, and shuddered visibly.
+He groaned as he saw it; but drew further back, so that she should not
+see him when she opened her eyes.
+
+"Give me the sticking-plaster, Dick," said his mother, when Tiny had
+somewhat revived. Mrs. Coomber was used to cuts and wounds, and could
+strap them up as cleverly as a surgeon. It was not the sight of the ugly
+cut that had frightened her, but the death-like swoon, which she did not
+understand.
+
+"How about the milk, mother?" Coomber ventured to ask, after Tiny's
+forehead was strapped up and bandaged.
+
+Again came that shudder of fear, and the little girl crept closer to the
+sheltering arms. "Don't be frightened, deary; daddy won't hurt you now."
+
+"Don't let him come," whispered Tiny; but Coomber heard the whisper, and
+it cut him to the heart, although he kept carefully in the background as
+he repeated his question.
+
+"Would yer like a little milk, deary?" asked Mrs. Coomber.
+
+"There ain't no money to buy milk," said Tiny, in a feeble, weary tone.
+
+But Coomber crept round the back of the kitchen, so as to keep out of
+sight, took up the bottle of whisky he had brought home, and went out.
+He brought a jug of milk when he came back. "You can send for some more
+to-morrow, and as long as she wants it," he said, as he stood the jug on
+the table.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+A TEA MEETING.
+
+
+Tiny was very ill the next day--too ill to get up, or to notice what was
+passing around her. Mrs. Coomber, who had had very little experience of
+sickness, was very anxious when she saw Tiny lying so quiet and
+lifeless-looking, the white bandage on her forehead making her poor
+little face look quite ghastly in its paleness. The fisherman had crept
+into the room before he went out, to look at her while she was asleep,
+and the sight had made his heart ache.
+
+"I never thought I could ha' been such a brute as to hurt a little 'un
+like that," he said, drawing his sleeve across his eyes, and speaking in
+a whisper to his wife.
+
+"It was the whisky," said his wife, by way of comforting him.
+
+But Coomber would not accept even this poor comfort. "I was a fool to
+take so much," he said. "Wus than a fool, for I knowed it made me savage
+as a bear; and yet I let it get the mastery of me. But it's the last,
+mother; I took the bottle to the farm last night, and they're going to
+let me have the value of it in milk for the little 'un, and please God
+she gets well again, it's no more whisky I'll touch."
+
+It was not easy for a man like Coomber to make such a promise, and still
+more difficult to keep it. For the first few days, while Tiny was very
+ill, it was not so hard to send Bob and Tom to Fellness, with the teal
+and widgeon he had shot; but when she began to get better, and the
+craving for the drink made itself felt, then began the tug of war.
+During the first few days of the little girl's illness, the fisherman
+kept carefully out of her sight, though he longed to see her once more,
+and hear her say she had forgiven him the cruel blow he had dealt to
+her.
+
+Tiny, too, longed for him to come and see her in the daytime; but as it
+grew dusk the longing passed away, and every night, as the hour drew
+near when he usually came back from Fellness, a positive dread and
+terror of him seized her, and she would lie shivering and holding Mrs.
+Coomber's hand whenever she heard his voice in the kitchen.
+
+Mrs. Coomber tried to persuade her husband to go and see the child in
+the daytime; but he only shook his head. "She hates me, and I don't
+deserve to see her agin," he said, gloomily.
+
+He returned the same answer again and again, when pressed to go in and
+see her before he went out with his gun in the morning. At length, as he
+sat at breakfast one day, he was startled by Tiny creeping up to him,
+just as she had slipped out of bed.
+
+"Oh, daddy, why didn't you come to me?" she said, with a little gasping
+sob, throwing her arms round his neck.
+
+"My deary, my deary," he said, in a choking voice, gathering her in his
+arms, and kissing her, while the tears rolled down his weather-beaten
+face.
+
+"Oh, daddy, don't you love me," said Tiny; "that you didn't come to see
+me all these days?"
+
+"Love you, my deary? Ah, you may well ask that, after what I've done to
+yer; but it was just because I did love yer that I kept away from yer,"
+he went on; "I thought you'd never want to see yer cruel old daddy any
+more; and as for me, why I'd punish myself by not trying to see yer, or
+get back your love. That's just how it was, deary," said the fisherman,
+as he looked tenderly at the little pallid face.
+
+"But, daddy, I love you, and I wanted you all the days," said Tiny,
+nestling closer to him as she spoke.
+
+"Bless you, deary, I believe you're one of God's own bairns, as well as
+a sailor's lass," said Coomber.
+
+"I wanted you all the days, daddy; but--but--don't--come--at--night,"
+she added, in a hesitating tone.
+
+"I know what you mean; mother's told me, little 'un," he said, drawing
+his sleeve across his eyes, and sighing.
+
+"I can't help it, daddy, I can't help it," said the little girl, with a
+sob.
+
+"Well, I s'pose not; but you needn't be afraid now, you know. I've done
+with the bottle now; and it wasn't me you was afraid of, mother said,
+but the whisky."
+
+Tiny nodded. "Yes, that's it," she said; "and I shan't be afraid long if
+I know you don't have it now;" and from that time the little girl set
+herself strenuously to overcome the terror and dread that nightly crept
+over her; but still it was some time before she could endure Coomber's
+presence after dusk.
+
+Meanwhile pinching want was again making itself felt in the household.
+For some reason known only to themselves, the teal and widgeon did not
+come within range of the fisherman's gun just now; and sometimes, after
+a whole day spent in the punt, or among the salt marshes along the
+coast, only a few unsaleable old gulls would reward Coomber's toil. They
+were not actually uneatable by those who were on the verge of
+starvation; but they were utterly unfit for a child like Tiny, in her
+present weak, delicate condition; and again the question of sending her
+to the poorhouse until the spring was mooted by Mrs. Coomber. Her
+husband did not refuse to discuss it this time when it was mentioned,
+and it was evident that he himself had thought of it already, for he
+said, with a groan--
+
+"It seems as though God wasn't going to let me keep the little 'un,
+though she's getting on a bit, for never have I had such a bad shooting
+season as this since I knocked the little 'un down. It seems hard,
+mother; what do you think?"
+
+But Mrs. Coomber did not know what to think; she only knew that poor
+little Tiny was often hungry, although she never complained. They had
+eaten up all the store of biscuits by this time; and although Dick and
+Tom often spent hours wandering along the shore, in the hope of finding
+another wonderful treasure-trove, nothing had come of their wanderings
+beyond the usual harvest of drift wood that enabled them to keep a good
+fire in the kitchen all day.
+
+At length it was decided that Coomber should take Tiny to the poorhouse,
+and ask the authorities to keep her until this bitter winter was over;
+and then, when the spring came, and the boat could go out once more, he
+would fetch her home again.
+
+But it was not without many tears that this proposal was confided to
+Tiny, the fisherman insisting--though he shrank from the task
+himself--that she should be told what they thought of doing. "She is a
+sailor's lass, and it's only fair to her," he said, as he left his wife
+to break the news to Tiny.
+
+She was overwhelmed at the thought of being separated from those who had
+been so kind to her, and whom she had learned to love so tenderly, but
+with a mighty effort she choked back her tears, for she saw how grieved
+Mrs. Coomber was; though she could not help exclaiming: "Oh! if God
+would only let me stay with you, and daddy, and Dick!"
+
+Her last words to Dick before she started were in a whispered
+conference, in which she told him to pray to God every day to let her
+come back soon. "I will, I will!" said Dick through his tears; "I'll say
+what you told me last night--I'll say it every day." And then Coomber
+and Tiny set out on their dreary walk to Fellness, reaching it about the
+middle of the afternoon.
+
+Bob and Tom had let their old friends know that their father had given
+up the whisky, and now he, foolish man, felt half afraid and half
+ashamed to meet them; but he was obliged to go, for he wanted Peters to
+go with him, and tell the workhouse people about the rescue of the
+little girl, for fear they should refuse to take her in unless his story
+was confirmed.
+
+Coomber explained this to his friend in a rather roundabout fashion, for
+he had not found Peters on the shore, as he had expected, and where he
+could have stated his errand in a few words. He had found instead that
+all the village was astir with the news of a tea-meeting, that was to
+take place that afternoon in the chapel, and that Peters, who was
+"something of a Methody," as Coomber expressed it, had gone to help in
+the preparations.
+
+He was astonished to see Coomber when he presented himself, and still
+more to hear the errand he had come upon. He scratched his head, and
+looked pityingly at the little girl, who held fast to Coomber's hand.
+"Well now, mate, I'm in a fix," he said, slowly, and pointing round the
+room; "I've got all these forms to move, and to fix up the tables for
+'em by four o'clock; but if you'll stay and lend a hand, why, you and
+the little 'un 'll be welcome to stay to tea, I know; it's free to all
+the village to-day," he added, "and the more that come, the better we
+shall like it."
+
+Coomber looked at Tiny, and saw how wistfully her eyes rested on a pile
+of cakes that stood near; and that look decided him. "Would you like to
+have some of it?" he said, with a faint smile. The little girl's face
+flushed with joy at the prospect of such a treat. "Oh, daddy! if I could
+only take Dick some, too," she said.
+
+Both the men laughed, but Peters said, "Well, well, we'll see what we
+can do; come in here while daddy helps me with the forms;" and he led
+the way into a small room, where several of the fishermen's wives were
+cutting bread and butter. Peters whispered a word to one of them, and
+she seated Tiny by the fire, and gave her some bread and butter at once.
+When the tea was all ready, and the company began to arrive, Coomber
+fetched Tiny to sit with him, and the two had a bountiful tea, and such
+cake as the little girl had not tasted for a long time. But she would
+not eat much. She took what was given to her, but slipped most of it
+into Coomber's pocket, that he might take it home to Dick, for the
+little girl thought they would go on to the poorhouse as soon as tea was
+over.
+
+But while the tea-things were being cleared away, and they were
+preparing for the meeting that was to follow, the fisherman drew her
+aside, and whispered: "I do believe God has heard what you've been
+a-praying for, deary, for Peters has heard of a job of work for me since
+I've been here."
+
+"Oh, daddy! and we shall go home together again," exclaimed Tiny,
+looking round for her bonnet at once.
+
+"Yes, but not jest yet. There's to be some preaching or somethin',
+and--and--little 'un, I've been a bad man, and I dunno as God'll have
+anything to do wi' helping such a tough customer to be any better; but
+if He would--"
+
+And here Coomber drew his sleeve across his eyes, and turned his head
+aside to hide his emotion.
+
+The little girl threw her arms round his neck, and drew his face close
+to hers. "Oh, daddy, He will! He will!" she whispered, earnestly; "He
+loves you, and He's been waiting all this long time for you to love Him;
+and you will, won't you, now, you know?"
+
+But there was no time for Coomber to reply, for the people were taking
+their seats again, and Peters touched him on the shoulder, motioning him
+to do the same. The two sat down, feeling too eager for shyness, or to
+notice that others were looking at them. A hymn was sung, and a prayer
+followed, and then Coomber began to feel disappointed, for he was
+hungering to hear something that might set his doubts at rest. At length
+he heard the words that have brought help and gladness to so many souls:
+"God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that
+whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting
+life." Then followed a simple address, enlarging upon the text, and an
+exhortation to accept God's offer of salvation. "The Lord Jesus Christ
+Himself said: 'Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and
+I will give you rest,'" continued the speaker, "and in His name I beg
+each one of you to become reconciled to God. He is waiting: He is
+willing to receive each one of you."
+
+These were his closing words, and Coomber, who had listened with eager,
+rapt attention, stayed only for the people to move towards the door, and
+then followed the speaker into the little vestry. "Beg pardon, sir," he
+said, pausing at the door, "but 'tain't often as I gets the chance of
+hearing such words as I've heard from you to-night, and so I hopes
+you'll forgive me if I asks for a bit more. I'm a bad man. I begins to
+see it all now; but--but----"
+
+"My friend, if you feel that you are a sinner, then you are just one of
+those whom the Lord Jesus died to redeem. He came to seek and to save
+those who are lost--to redeem them from sin. He gave His life--dying
+upon the cross, a shameful, painful death--not, mark me, that they may
+continue in sin. To say we believe in God, and to live in sin, makes our
+belief of no effect. We must learn of Christ, or He will have died in
+vain for us. We must learn of Him, and He will help us to overcome our
+love of drink, our selfishness, and sullenness, and ill-temper;" for the
+gentleman knew something of Coomber, and so particularised the sins he
+knew to be his easily besetting ones.
+
+"And you think He'd help me? You see, sir, He's done a deal for me
+lately, bad as I am," said Coomber, twisting his hat in his hand.
+
+"Help you! ah, that He will. If He gave His only Son, what do you think
+He will withhold? 'What man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread,
+will he give him a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a
+serpent? If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your
+children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good
+things to them that ask Him.'"
+
+"And what are the good things that I'm to ask for," said Coomber. "I
+know what the asking means; this little 'un here has taught me that
+praying is asking God; and though I ain't never done it afore, I'll
+begin now."
+
+"Do, my man. Ask that the Holy Spirit may be given you, to lead you, and
+teach you, and guide you into all truth. Without His help you can do
+nothing; but, seeking His help, trusting in his guidance, you will be
+enabled to overcome every difficulty and obstacle, however hard it may
+be."
+
+"And you think God will forgive me all the past?"
+
+"My brother, Christ died--He shed His precious blood, to wash away our
+sin, to set our conscience free from guilt, and to assure us beyond a
+doubt of the perfect love of God towards us."
+
+The words spoken fell into prepared soil, for Coomber had been hungering
+and thirsting after righteousness, and he went home that night feeling
+that he had been fed.
+
+What a happy walk home that was for Tiny and the fisherman! As he left
+the little chapel at Fellness, a basket, well filled with the odds and
+ends left from the tea-meeting, had been handed to Coomber to take home,
+and Peters whispered, as he went out: "I've heard of another job for
+yer, so be along in good time in the morning, mate." To describe Mrs.
+Coomber's joy, when her husband walked in with Tiny asleep in his arms,
+and also with the basket of bread and butter, would be impossible.
+
+"God has given us the little 'un back, mother," he said, placing the
+child in his wife's arms. "He's been good to me, better than I deserved,
+only the Lord Jesus Christ has died for me, and that explains it all."
+
+His heart was full of joy and gratitude to-night, and he forgot his
+usual shyness, and told his wife of the good news he had heard at
+Fellness, both for body and soul. "Now, mother," he said, as he
+concluded, "you and I must both begin a new life. We must ask God to
+help us like this little 'un, and we must teach our boys to do the same.
+We owe it all to her," he added, as he kissed Tiny, "for if she hadn't
+come among us, we might never have heard about God down here at Bermuda
+Point."
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+BRIGHTER DAYS.
+
+
+The dreary winter came to an end at last, and with the first spring days
+there was a general bustle of preparation in the fisherman's family, for
+boat and nets alike required overhauling, and there would be a good deal
+of repairing to do before the old boat would be fit for further use.
+
+Bob's face was fast losing its sullen, defiant, angry look, and he was
+whistling as merrily as a lark one morning, when he and Coomber went to
+remove the tarpaulin that had been covered over the boat during the
+winter; but the whistling suddenly ceased when the boat was uncovered,
+for, with all their care, the winter's storms had worked sad havoc with
+the little craft. Seams were starting, ribs were bulging, and there were
+gaping holes, that made Coomber lift his hat and scratch his head in
+consternation.
+
+"This'll be a tough job, Bob," he said.
+
+"Aye, aye, dad, it will that," said the lad, carefully passing his
+finger down where one rib seemed to be almost rotten.
+
+A few months before Coomber would have raved and blustered, and sworn it
+was all Bob's fault, but since that tea-meeting at Fellness he had been
+a changed man--old things had passed away, and all things had become
+new; and none felt this more than Bob. It was a blessed change for him,
+and he had given up all thoughts of running away now, if the old boat
+could only be patched up and made serviceable. But it was a problem
+whether this could ever be done effectually enough to make it seaworthy.
+
+"If I'd only found out ten years ago that I could do better without the
+whisky than with it, we might ha' got a new boat afore this, Bob," said
+the fisherman, with a sigh.
+
+"Aye, aye, and had Jack with us, too, dad," Bob ventured to remark. He
+had not dared to mention his brother's name for years, but he had
+thought a good deal of him lately, wishing he could come home, and see
+the blessed change that had been wrought in his father.
+
+The old fisherman lifted his head, and there was a look of bitter
+anguish in his face, as he said: "Hark ye, lad, I'd give all the days of
+my life to bring Jack back. The thought of him is making yer mother an
+old woman afore her time, and I can't help it now; it's too late, too
+late;" and the old fisherman covered his face and groaned.
+
+"There now, father, ain't I heard you say it was never too late to
+repent?"
+
+"Aye, lad, that you have, and the precious blood of Christ can take away
+the guilt of our sin; but, mark me, not even God Himself can do away
+with the consequences of sin. Hard as they may be, and truly and
+bitterly as we may repent, the past can't be undone; and as we sow we
+must reap. Poor Jack! Poor Jack! If I could only know where he was. Why,
+it's nigh on ten years since he went away, and never a storm comes but
+I'm thinking my boy may be in it, and wanting help."
+
+Bob recalled what had passed on Fellness Sands the night they rescued
+Tiny, and which had helped him often since to bear with his father's
+gruff, sullen ways and fierce outbursts of temper; but he would not say
+any more just now, only he thought that but for that tea-meeting his
+father would now be mourning the loss of two sons; for he had made up
+his mind to leave home when it was decided to take Tiny to the
+poorhouse.
+
+They were working at the boat a few days after this, caulking, and
+plugging, and tarring, when Tiny, who had been playing on the sandhills
+a little way off, came running up breathless with some news.
+
+[Illustration: TINY AND THE OLD MAN. (_See page 130._)]
+
+"Oh, daddy! there's a little ugly, old man over there, and he says my
+name is Coomber. Is it, daddy?"
+
+The fisherman lifted his hat and scratched his head, looking puzzled.
+Strange to say, this question of the little girl's name had never
+suggested itself to anybody before, living as they did in this
+out-of-the-way spot. She was "Tiny," or "deary," or "the little 'un,"
+and no need had arisen for any other name; and so, after scratching his
+head for a minute, he said: "Well, deary, if I'm your daddy, I s'pose
+your name is Coomber. But who is the old man?" he asked; for it was not
+often that strangers were seen at Bermuda Point, even in summer-time.
+
+"I dunno, daddy; but he says he knowed my mother when she was a little
+gal like me."
+
+Coomber dropped the tar-brush he was using, and a spasm of pain crossed
+his face. Had somebody come to claim the child after all? He
+instinctively clutched her hand for a minute, but the next he told her
+to go home, while he went to speak to the stranger.
+
+He found a little, neatly-dressed old man seated on one of the
+sandhills, and without a word of preface he began:
+
+"You've come after my little gal, I s'pose?"
+
+The old man smiled. "What's your name, my man?" he said, taking out a
+pocket-book, and preparing to write.
+
+"Coomber."
+
+"Coomber!" exclaimed the old man, dropping his book in his surprise.
+
+"Why, yes; what should it be?" said the fisherman. "Didn't you tell my
+little Tiny that you knew her name was Coomber? But how you came to
+know----"
+
+"Why, I never saw you before that I know of," interrupted the other,
+sharply; "so how do you suppose I should know your name? I told the
+child I knew her name was Matilda Coomber, for she is the very image of
+her mother when she was a girl, and she was my only daughter."
+
+"Oh, sir, and you've come to fetch her!" gasped the fisherman.
+
+The stranger took out his snuff-box, and helped himself to a pinch.
+"Well, I don't know so much about that," he said, cautiously; "I am her
+grandfather, and I thought, when I picked up that old newspaper the
+other day, and read about her being saved, I'd just like to come and
+have a look at her. I was pretty sure she was my Tilly's little one, by
+the description of the silver medal she wore, for I'd given it to her
+mother just before she ran away to get married to that sailor Coomber."
+
+"Oh, sir, a sailor, and his name was Coomber! Where is he? What was he
+like?" asked the fisherman, eagerly.
+
+"He was drowned before his wife died; she never held up her head
+afterwards, the people tell me. I never saw her after she was married,
+and swore I'd never help her or hers; but when she was dying she wrote
+and told me she was leaving a little girl alone in the world, and had
+left directions for it to be brought to me after her death. With this
+letter she sent her own portrait, and that of her husband and child,
+begging me to keep them for the child until she grew up. A day or two
+after came another letter, saying she was dead, and a neighbour was
+coming from Grimsby to London by ship, and would bring the child to me;
+but I never heard or saw anything of either, and concluded she was
+drowned, when, about a month ago, an old newspaper came in my way, and
+glancing over it, I saw the account of a little girl being saved from a
+wreck, and where she might be heard of. I went to the place, and they
+sent me here, and the minute I saw the child, I knew her for my
+Tilly's."
+
+The old man had talked on, but Coomber had comprehended very little of
+what was said. He stood looking half-dazed for a minute or two after the
+stranger had ceased speaking. At length he gathered his wits
+sufficiently to say: "Have you got them pictures now?"
+
+"Yes," said the old man, promptly, taking out his pocket-book as he
+spoke. "Here they are; I took care to bring 'em with me;" and he brought
+out three photographs.
+
+Coomber seized one instantly. "It is him! It is my Jack!" he gasped.
+"Oh, sir, tell me more about him."
+
+"I know nothing about him, I tell you," said the other, coldly; "I never
+saw or spoke to my daughter after she married him; but I'm willing to do
+something for the little child, seeing it was my girl's last wish."
+
+"The child," repeated Coomber. "Do you mean to say little Tiny is my
+Jack's child?"
+
+"Well, yes, of course I do. What else could I mean?" replied the other.
+
+"Then--then I'm her grandfather, and have as much right to her as you
+have," said the fisherman, quickly.
+
+The stranger shrugged his shoulders. "Well, I s'pose you have," he said;
+"I'm not going to dispute it. I'm willing to do my duty by her. But
+mind, I'm not a rich man--not a rich man," he added.
+
+Coomber was puzzled for a minute to know what he meant, and was about to
+say that he wanted no payment for keeping Tiny; but the other lifted his
+hand in a commanding manner, and exclaimed: "Now, hear me first. Let me
+have my say, and then, perhaps, we can come to terms about the matter.
+You've got a wife, I s'pose, that can look after this child. I haven't;
+and if she came to me, I shouldn't know what to do with her. Well now,
+that being the case, she'd better stay here--for the present at least;
+she's happy enough, I s'pose; and I'll pay you twenty pounds a year as
+my share towards her expenses."
+
+Coomber was about to exclaim indignantly against this, and protest that
+he would accept no payment; but just then he caught sight of Bob and the
+old boat, and the thought of what that money would enable him to do kept
+him silent a little longer.
+
+"Well now," resumed the old man, "if that plan suits you, we'll come to
+business at once. You've had her about eighteen months now, so there's
+about thirty pounds due. You see I'm an honest man, and mean to do the
+just thing by her," he added.
+
+"Thirty pounds!" repeated Coomber, to whom such a sum seemed immense
+wealth. But the other mistook the exclamation for one of discontent, and
+so he said, quickly, "Well now, I'll throw you ten pounds in, as I hear
+you were the one that saved her, and pay you the next six months in
+advance. That'll make it a round fifty; but I won't go a penny farther.
+Now will that satisfy you?"
+
+Satisfy him? Coomber was debating with himself whether he ought to take
+a farthing, considering what a rich blessing the little girl had been to
+him. It was only the thought of the bitter winter they had just passed
+through, and that, if he could get a new boat, he could better provide
+for the child, that made him hesitate, lest in refusing it he should do
+Tiny a wrong.
+
+At length, after a pause, during which he had silently lifted his heart
+in prayer to God, he said: "Well, sir, for the little 'un's sake I'll
+take your offer. But, look you, I shall use this money as a loan that is
+to be returned; and as I can save it, I shall put it in the bank for
+her."
+
+The other shrugged his shoulders. "You can do as you like about that. I
+shall come and see the child sometimes, and----"
+
+"Do, sir, do, God bless her! To think she's my Jack's child!"
+interrupted Coomber, drawing his sleeve across his eyes. "Do you know,
+sir, where my boy went down?" he asked, in a tremulous voice.
+
+But the other shook his head. "I tell you I know nothing of my daughter
+after she married; but she sent me a box with some letters and these
+portraits, and some other odds and ends, to be kept for her little
+Matilda. I'll send you them if you like;" and the old man rose as he
+spoke. "Can you go with me to Fellness now, and settle this business
+about the money?" he added.
+
+"But don't you want to see Tiny?" exclaimed Coomber, who could not
+understand his willingness to give up his claim to the child.
+
+"I have seen her. We had a long talk here before you came. You may tell
+her that her Grandfather West will come and see her sometimes. And now,
+if you'll follow me as quickly as you can to the village, we'll settle
+this business;" and as he spoke, Mr. West turned towards the road,
+leaving Coomber still half-dazed with astonishment.
+
+"Bob, Bob," he called at last, "I've got to go to the village. A strange
+thing has happened here to-day, and I want to get my wits a bit together
+before I tell your mother. But you needn't do much to the boat till I
+come back, for it may be we shall have a new one after all."
+
+Bob looked up in his father's face, speechless with surprise. He spoke
+of having a new boat as though it was a very sad business. But his next
+words explained it. "I've heard of Jack," he said; "no storms will
+trouble him again;" and then the fisherman burst forth into
+heart-breaking sobs and groans, and Bob shed a few tears, although he
+felt heartily ashamed of them.
+
+"Now go back, Bob, and tell your mother I've gone to Fellness; and if I
+ain't home by five o'clock, you come and meet me, for I shall have some
+money to carry--almost a fortune, Bob."
+
+Having heard so much, Bob wanted to hear more, and so walked with his
+father for the first mile along the road, listening to the strange tale
+concerning Tiny. Then he went back, and told the news to the astonished
+group at home; and so, before Coomber returned, his wife had got over
+the first outburst of grief for the death of her son, and she and Bob
+had had time to talk calmly over the whole matter. They had decided that
+the money must be used in such a way as would give the little girl the
+greatest benefit from it, and that she must go to school, if possible.
+
+"Now, if dad could buy a share in one of the bigger boats where he and I
+could work, wouldn't it be better than buying a little one for
+ourselves?" suggested Bob; "then we could go and live at Fellness, and
+Tiny could go to school--Sunday-school as well as week-day."
+
+"And Dick, too," put in Tiny.
+
+"Yes, and we should all go to God's house on Sunday," said Mrs. Coomber,
+drying her eyes.
+
+Strange to say, a similar project had been suggested to Coomber by his
+old friend Peters, who knew a man who wanted to sell his share in one of
+the large fishing-boats, and was asking forty pounds for it.
+
+"That will leave us ten pounds, mother, to buy the children some new
+clothes, and take us to Fellness. What do you say to it now?" asked her
+husband, after they had talked it over.
+
+"Why, it seems too good to be true," said the poor woman, through her
+tears. "But oh! if only poor Jack was here!" she sighed.
+
+Her husband shook his head, and was silent for a minute or two; but at
+length he said: "God has been very good to us when we had no thought of
+Him. I always knew the little 'un must be a sailor's lass, but to think
+that she should be our Jack's own child is wonderful. The old gentleman
+had made quite sure of it before he came here--he wouldn't part with his
+money unless he'd been sure, I know; and now she's ours, just as much as
+Dick and Bob is. And we'll take good care of her, God bless her, and Him
+for sending her to us."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The rest of my story is soon told. The fisherman and his family removed
+to Fellness, and brighter days dawned for them than they had ever hoped
+to see. When the box arrived from Mr. West, containing the letter and
+papers relating to the latter years of their son's life, they found that
+he had become a true Christian through his wife's influence. He had also
+learned to read and write; and in the last letter sent to his wife
+before his death, he told her he meant to go and see his parents as soon
+as he returned from that voyage. Alas! he never did return; but the
+"little lass," of whom he spoke so lovingly, became God's messenger to
+his old home, and the joy and comfort of his parents' hearts.
+
+
+
+
+Printed by Cooke & Halsted, The Moorfields Press, London, E.C.
+
+
+
+***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A SAILOR'S LASS***
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