Cormorant Crag | Page 5

form most suitable for grasping a pair of oars to tug a boat against a heavy sea.
His dress was exceedingly simple, consisting of a coarsely-knitted blue jersey shirt that might have been the great-grandfather of the one Vince wore; and a pair of trousers, of a kind of drab drugget, so thick that they would certainly have stood up by themselves, and so cut that they came nearly up to the man's armpits, and covered his back and chest, while the braces he wore were short in the extreme. To finish the description of an individual who played a very important part in the lives of the two island boys, he had on a heavy pair of fisherman's boots, which might have been drawn up over his knees, but now hung clumsily about his ankles, like those of smugglers in a penny picture, as he stood looking down grimly, and slowly resettled his sealskin cap upon his head.
"What are you two a-doing of?" he asked. "Nothing," said Mike shortly.
"And what brings you round here?"
"I've been taking Jemmy Carnach a bottle of physic; and we came round," cried Vince. "Why?"
"Taking Jemmy Carnach a bottle of physic," said the old fellow, with a low, curious laugh, which sounded as if an accident had happened to the works of a wooden clock. "He's mighty fond o' making himself doctor's bills. I'd ha' cured him if he'd come to me."
"What would you have given him, Daygo?"
"Give him?" said the man, rubbing his great brown eagle-beak nose with a finger that would have grated nutmeg easily: "I'd ha' give him a mug o' water out of a tar tub, and a lotion o' rope's end, and made him dance for half an hour. He'd ha' been `quite well thank ye' to-morrow morning."
Vince laughed.
"Ay, that's what's the matter with him, young gentleman. A man who can't ketch lobsters and sell 'em like a Christian, but must take 'em home, and byle 'em, and then sit and eat till you can see his eyes standing out of his head like the fish he wolfs, desarves to be ill. Well, I must be off and see what luck I've had."
"Come on, Mike," cried Vince, springing up--an order which his companion obeyed with alacrity.
The old fellow frowned and stared.
"And where may you be going?" he asked.
"Along with you," said Vince promptly.
"Where?"
"You said you were going out to look at your lobster-pots and nets, didn't you?"
"Nay, ne'er a word like it," growled the man.
"Yes, you did," cried Mike. "You said you were going to see what luck you'd had."
"Ay, so I did; but that might mean masheroons or taters growing, or rabbit in a trap aside the cliff."
"Yes," said Vince, laughing merrily; "or a bit of timber, or a sea chest, or a tub washed up among the rocks, mightn't it, Mike? Only fancy old Joe Daygo going mushrooming!"
"You're a nice sarcy one as ever I see," said the man, with another of his wooden-wheel laughs. "I like masheroons as well as any man."
"Yes, but you don't go hunting for them," said Vince; "and you never grow potatoes; and as for setting a trap for a rabbit--not you."
"You're fine and cunning, youngster," said the man, with a grim look; and his keen, clear eyes gazed searchingly at the lad from under his shaggy brows.
"Sit on the cliff with your old glass," said Vince, "when you're not fishing or selling your lobsters and crabs. He don't eat them himself, does he, Mike?"
"No. My father says he makes more of his fish than any one, or he wouldn't be the richest man on the island."
The old man scowled darkly.
"Oh! Sir Francis said that, did he?"
"Yes, I heard him," cried Vince; "and my father said you couldn't help being well off, for your place was your own, and it didn't cost you anything to live, so you couldn't help saving."
A great hand came down clap on the lad's shoulder, and it seemed for the moment as if he were wearing an epaulette made out of a crab, while the gripping effect was similar, for the boy winced.
"I say, gently, please: my shoulder isn't made of wood."
"No, I won't hurt you, boy," growled the old fellow; "but your father's a man as talks sense, and I won't forget it. I'll be took bad some day, and give him a job, just to be neighbourly."
"Ha, ha!" laughed Vince.
"What's the matter?" growled the old man, frowning.
"You talking of having father if you were ill. Why, you'd be obliged to."
"Nay. If I were bad I dessay I should get better if I curled up and went to sleep."
"Send for me, Joe Daygo," cried Mike merrily, "and I'll bring Vince Burnet. We'll give you a mug of water out of a tar-barrel, and make you dance with the