The Puritan Twins | Page 6

were now clattering briskly about the room, butting into anything that came in their way in an effort to escape. He made a sudden dash after them and held them out toward Goodwife Pepperell.
"Here they be, ma'am," he said. "I 'd saved them for my supper, and I 'd take it kindly if ye 'd cook them for me, and help eat them, too. It 's raining cats and dogs, and if I was to start out now, I 'd have a hard time finding the Lucy Ann. Ye can't see a rod ahead of ye in such a downpour."
"We shall be glad to have thee stay as long as thou wilt," said the Goodwife heartily. "Put the lobsters in this while I set the kettle to boil." She held out a wooden puncheon as she spoke, and the Captain dropped them in. Then he sat down with Goodman Pepperell on the settle beside the fireplace, and the two men talked of their boyhood in England, while she hung the kettle on the crane over the fire and began to prepare the evening meal.
"Daniel, sit thee down by the fire and get a good bed of coals ready while I mix the johnny-cake," she said as she stepped briskly about the room, and Daniel, nothing loath, drew a stool to the Captain's side and fed the fire with chips and corn-cobs while he listened with all his ears to the talk of the two men.
[Illustration]
"Well, Thomas, how hast thou prospered since I saw thee last?" asked Goodman Pepperell.
"Tolerable, tolerable, Josiah," answered the Captain. "I 've been mining for sea gold." Daniel wondered what in the world sea gold might be. "Ye see," he went on, turning to include Daniel in the conversation, "my father was a sea captain before me, and my gran'ther too. Why, my gran'ther helped send the Spanish Armada to the bottom where it belonged. Many and many 's the time I 've heard him tell about it, and I judge from what he said he must have done most of the job himself, though I reckon old Cap'n Drake may have helped some." (Here the Captain chuckled.) "He never came back from his last voyage,--overhauled by pirates more 'n likely. That was twenty years ago, and I 've been following the sea myself ever since. I was wrecked off the Spanish Main on my first voyage, and I 've run afoul of pirates and come near walking the plank more times than one, I 'm telling ye, but somehow I always had the luck to get away! And here I be, safe and sound."
At this point the lobsters made a commotion in the wooden puncheon, and the Captain turned his attention to them. "Jest spilin' to get out, ain't ye?" he inquired genially. "Look here, boy," to Daniel, "that water's bilin'. Heave 'em in."
Daniel held his squirming victims over the pot, and not without a qualm of pity dropped them into the boiling water. Then he ventured to ask a question. "What is sea gold, Captain Sanders?"
"Things like them," answered the Captain, jerking his thumb at the lobsters, which were already beginning to turn a beautiful red color as they boiled in the pot; "as good gold as any that was ever dug out of mines ye can get for fish, and there never was such fishing in all the seas as there is along this coast! My! my! I 've seen schools of cod off the Cape making a solid floor of fish on the water so ye could walk on it if ye were so minded, and as for lobsters, I 've caught 'em that measured six and seven feet long! Farther down the coast there are oysters so big one of 'em will make a square meal for four or five people. It 's the truth I 'm telling ye."
Goodman Pepperell smiled. "Thomas," he said, "thou hast not lost thy power of narration!"
Captain Sanders for an instant looked a bit dashed, then he said, "Well, believe it or not, Josiah, it 's the truth for all that. Why, talk about the land of Canaan flowin' with milk and honey! This here water 's just alive with money! Any boy could go out and haul up a shilling on his own hook any time he liked."
Daniel, his eyes shining and his lips parted, was just making up his mind that he would rather be the captain of a fishing-smack than anything else in the world, since he knew he could n't be a pirate, when his mother came to the fireplace with a layer of corn-meal dough spread on a baking-board. She placed the board in a slanting position against an iron trivet before the glowing bed of coals, and set a pot of