Capn Abe, Storekeeper | Page 6

tell about ain't a patch on what Cap'n Am'zon suffered."
There was an uncertain, troubled movement among Cap'n Abe's hearers. Even the fishfly stopped droning. Cap'n Beecher looked longingly through the doorway from which the sea could be observed as well as a strip of that natural breakwater called "The Neck," a barrier between the tumbling Atlantic and the quiet bay around which the main village of Cardhaven was set.
All the idlers in the store on this June afternoon were not natives. There were several young fellows from The Beaches--on the Shell Road to which Cap'n Abe's store was a fixture. In sight of The Beaches the wealthy summer residents had built their homes--dwellings ranging in architectural design from the mushroom-roofed bungalow to a villa in the style of the Italian Renaissance.
The villa in question had been built by I. Tapp, the Salt Water Taffy King, and Lawford Tapp, only son of the house, was one of the audience in Cap'n Abe's store.
"Cap'n Amazon said," boomed the storekeeper a good deal like the fishfly--"Cap'n Amazon said the Posy Lass was loaded with lumber and her cargo's 'bout all that kep' her afloat as fur as Hat'ras. Then the smashin' big seas that come aboard settled her right down like a wounded duck.
"The deck load went o' course; and about ev'rything else was cleaned off the decks that warn't bolted to 'em. The seas rose up and picked off the men, one after t'other, like a person'd clean off a beach plum bush."
"I shouldn't wonder," spoke up Cap'n Beecher, "if we seen some weather 'fore morning."
He was squinting through the doorway at an azure and almost speckless sky. There was an uneasy shuffling of boots. One of the boys from The Beaches giggled. Cap'n Abe--and the fishfly--boomed on together, the storekeeper evidently visualizing the scene he narrated and not the half-lighted and goods-crowded shop. At its best it was never well illumined. Had the window panes been washed there was little chance of the sunshine penetrating far save by the wide open door. On either hand as one entered were the rows of hanging oilskins, storm boots, miscellaneous clothing and ship chandlery that made up only a part of Cap'n Abe's stock.
There were blue flannel shirts dangling on wooden hangers to show all their breadth of shoulder and the array of smoked-pearl buttons. Brown and blue dungaree overalls were likewise displayed--grimly, like men hanging in chains. At the end of one row of these quite ordinary habiliments was one dress shirt with pleated bosom and cuffs as stiff as a board. Lawford Tapp sometimes speculated on that shirt--how it chanced to be in Cap'n Abe's stock and why it had hung there until the flies had taken title to it!
Centrally located was the stove, its four heavily rusted legs set in a shallow box which was sometimes filled with fresh sawdust. The stovepipe, guyed by wires to the ceiling, ran back to the chimney behind Cap'n Abe.
He stood at the one space that was kept cleared on his counter, hairy fists on the brown, hacked plank--the notches of the yard-stick and fathom-stick cut with a jackknife on its edge--his pale eyes sparkling as he talked.
"There she wallered," went on the narrator of maritime disaster, "her cargo held together by rotting sheathing and straining ribs. She was wrung by the seas like a dishrag in a woman's hands. She no longer mounted the waves; she bored through 'em. 'Twas a serious time--to hear Cap'n Am'zon tell it."
"I guess it must ha' been, Abe," Milt Baker put in hastily. "Gimme a piece o' that Brown Mule chewin' tobacker."
"I'll sell it to ye, Milt," the storekeeper said gently, with his hand on the slide of the cigar and tobacco showcase.
"That's what I mean," rejoined Milt boldly, fishing in his pocket for the required nickel.
"For fourteen days while the Posy Lass was drivin' off shore before an easterly gale, Cap'n Am'zon an' two others, lashed to the stump o' the fo'mast, ex-isted in a smother of foam an' spume, with the waves picklin' 'em ev'ry few minutes. And five raw potaters was all they had to eat in all that endurin' time!"
"Five potatoes?" Lawford Tapp cried. "For three men? And for fourteen days? Good-night!"
Cap'n Abe stared at him for a moment, his eyes holding sparks of indignation. "Young man," he said tartly, "you should hear Cap'n Am'zon himself tell it. You wouldn't cast no doubts upon his statement."
Cap'n Joab snorted and turned his back again. Young Tapp felt somewhat abashed.
"Yes, sir!" proceeded Cap'n Abe who seldom lost the thread of one of his stories, "they was lashed to that stump of a mast and they lived on them potaters--scraping 'em fine with their sheath-knives, and husbandin' 'em like they was jewels. One of 'em went mad."
"One