Sheila of Big Wreck Cove Part 20

"Charity? Huh! I'll take a pinch of snuff instead. That's a warnin', Prudence! _A-choon!_"

Not until the second Sunday after the _Seamew_ had brought Ida May from Boston did Big Wreck Cove folk in general get a "good slant,"

as they expressed it, at the b.a.l.l.s' visitor. There was an ancient carryall in the barn, and on the Sat.u.r.day previous little John-Ed was caught and made to clean this vehicle, rub up the green-molded harness, and give the Queen of Sheba more than "a lick and a promise" with the currycomb and brush.

At ten o'clock on Sunday morning Sheila herself backed the gray mare out of her stable and harnessed her into the shafts of the carryall.

"For a city gal, you are the handiest creature!" sighed Prudence, marveling.

The girl only smiled. She was now used to such comments. They did not make her heart flutter as had any reference to her past life at first.

The bell in the steeple of the green-blinded, white-painted church on the farther edge of the port was tinkling tinnily as the girl drove the old mare down the hill, with Cap'n Ira and Prudence in the rear seat of the carriage.

"We ain't felt we could undertake churchgoing for months, Ida May,"

the old woman said. "And I miss Elder Minnett's sermons."

"So do I," agreed her husband, with his usual caustic turn of speech. "I swan! I can sleep better under the elder's preaching than I can to home."

"If you go to sleep to-day, Ira, I shall step on your foot," warned his wife.

"You'd better take care which one you step on," rejoined Cap'n Ira.

"I got a corn on one that jumps like an ulcerated tooth. If you touch that I shall likely surprise you more'n I do when I take snuff."

The Portygees had a chapel devoted to their faith. The carriage pa.s.sed that on the way to the Congregational Church. A girl, very dark as to features, very red as to lips, and dressed in very gay colors in spite of her destination, was mounting the chapel steps.

She halted to stare particularly at the quietly dressed girl driving the gray mare.

"Ain't that Pareta's girl, Ira?" asked Prudence.

"I cal'late."

"What a bold-looking thing she's grown to be! But she's pretty."

"As a piney," agreed Cap'n Ira. "I reckon she sets all these Portygee boys by the ears. I hear tell two of 'em had a knife fight over her in Luiz's fish house some time ago. She'll raise real trouble in the town 'fore she's well and safely married."

"That is awful," murmured the old woman, casting another glance back at the girl and wondering why Eunez Pareta scowled so hatefully after them.

Following service, as usual, there was social intercourse on the steps of the church and at the horse sheds back of it. Particularly did the women gather about Aunt Prudence and Sheila. As for the men, both young and old, the newcomer's city ways and unmistakable beauty gave them much to gossip about. Several of the younger masculine members of Elder Minnett's congregation came almost to blows over the settlement of who should take the fly cloth off Queenie, back her around, and lead her out to the front of the church when the time came to drive back to the Head.

In addition, Cap'n Ira found himself as popular with the young men as he was wont to be in the old days when he was making up his crew at the port for the _Susan Gatskill_.

"Prudence," he said to his wife, but quite loud enough for the girl to hear as they drove sedately homeward, "I cal'late I shall have to buy me some shot and powder and load up the old gun I put away in the attic, thinking I wouldn't never go hunting no more."

"Goodness gracious gallop!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed his wife. "What for? I cal'late you _won't_ go hunting at your time of life!"

"I dunno. I may be forced to load it up for protection. But maybe rock salt will do instead of shot," said Cap'n Ira, still with soberness. "A feller has got a right to protect himself and his family."

"Against what, I want to know?"

"I can see the Ball place is about to be overrun with a pa.s.sel of young sculpins that are going to be more annoying than a dose of snuff in your eye. That's right."

"Why, how you talk!"

"Didn't ye see 'em all standing around as we drove away from the church, casting sheep's eyes? And they're hating each other already like a hen hates dishwater. I swan!"

"For the land's sake!"

"No. For Ida May's sake," chuckled Cap'n Ira. "That's who I've got to defend with a shotgun."

The girl flushed rosily, but she laughed, too.

"You can leave them to me, Uncle Ira. I shall know how to get rid of them."

"Maybe they won't come," said Prudence.

"They won't? I swan!" snorted her husband. "They all see she's more'n half Honey. Couldn't keep 'em away any more than you can flies."

It was quite as Cap'n Ira prophesied. The path from Big Wreck Cove across the fields to the Head, a path which had become gra.s.s-grown of late years, was soon worn smooth. It was a shorter way from the town than the wagon road.

The errands invented by the youthful and more or less unattached male inhabitants of the port to bring them by this path through the Ball premises were most ingenious indeed. Early on Monday morning, while Sheila was hanging out her first lineful of clothes, Andrew Roby, clam basket and hoe on arm, appeared as the first of a long line of itinerant pedestrians who more or less bashfully bade Cap'n Ira good day as he sat in his armchair in the sun.

"What's the matter?" asked the old man soberly. "All the clams give out down to the cove? I heard they was getting scarce. You got to come clean over here to the beaches, I cal'late, to find you a mess for dinner, Andy?"

"Well--er--Cap'n Ira, mother was wis.h.i.+ng for some big chowder clams," said young Roby, his eyes squinting sidewise at the slim figure of Sheila on tiptoe to reach the line.

"Ye-as," considered the old man. "You got that cat still, Andy?"

"The _Maybird?_ Oh, yes, sir!"

"And there's a fair wind. She'd have taken you in half the time to the outer beaches, and saved your legs," said the caustic speaker.

"But exercise is good for you, I don't dispute."

A match, one might think, could easily have been touched off at Andrew's face. He had not much more to say, and went on without having the joy of more than a nod and smile from the busy Sheila.

Then came Joshua Jones. Joshua usually was to be found behind his father's counter, the elder Jones being proprietor of one of the general stores in Big Wreck Cove. Joshua was a bustling young man with a reddish ruff of hair back of a bald brow, "side tabs" of the same hue as his hair before each red and freckled ear, and a nose a good deal like an eagle's beak. In fact, the upper part of his face--Cap'n Ira had often remarked it--was of n.o.ble proportions, while the lower part fell away surprisingly in a receding chin which seemed saved from being swallowed completely only by a very prominent Adam's apple.

"I swan!" the captain had said judiciously. "It's more by good luck than good management that Josh's chin didn't fall into his stomach.

Only that k.n.o.b in his neck acts like a stopper."

But when the lanky young storekeeper appeared on this occasion, Cap'n Ira hailed him cheerfully before Joshua could reach the back door.

"Hi, Jos.h.!.+ You ain't goin' for clams, too, be ye?"

"No, no, Cap'n Ira!" cried young Jones cheerfully. "I'm looking to pick up some eggs regular. We want to begin to s.h.i.+p again, and eggs seem to be staying in the nests. He, he! Has Mrs. Ball got any to spare?"

"I don't cal'late she has. You see," said Cap'n Ira soberly, "we got another mouth to feed eggs to now. Did you know we had Ida May Bostwick visiting us? A young lady from Boston. Prue's niece, once removed."

"Why--I--I--ahem! I saw her at church, Cap'n Ira," faltered Joshua.

"Did ye, now?" rejoined Cap'n Ira, in apparent wonder. "I didn't suppose you would ever notice her, you not being much for the ladies, Joshua."