Wits' End
9781465681348
213 pages
Library of Alexandria
Overview
The tide was half way out, and the rocks were already showing strange shaggy shapes as the water retreated from their weed-draped sides. A man, who had just beached his dory and had loaded his wheelbarrow with gaping cod and shining mackerel, stood looking off toward the cliffs for a moment before he should trundle his burden up the slanting path which led toward a group of white houses. "Look like buffaloes," he said to himself. "That furthest one's most like a lion." He turned his gaze from the rocks to the pile of fish in his barrow. "You poor miserable wide-mouthed critturs," he said. "There's nothing I know of that can look so down-at-mouth as a fish out of water. Every day I think I'll give up, and I don't. What would I do if I did? I guess it's good for me to see something unhappy-looking: it makes me feel as if I weren't the sorriest wretch in the world. Maybe I'm not, either." He took up the handles of his barrow and started along the path, which led past clumps of bayberry bushes and thickets of wild roses, into a grove of pines, and at last emerged before the door of one of the white houses which, at intervals, dotted the island. It was early morning and as Luther Williams came into the open, he met a party of workmen swinging along, dinner pails in hand. They hailed him cheerily. "Good catch, Mr. Williams?" "Pretty fair," was the response. "What's going on to-day, boys?" "We cal'late to start Miss Elliott's cawtage," said the foremost. "Another cottage?" Luther Williams frowned. "Where is it going to be, Thad?" "Oh, down along. Sot right on the rawks, she cal'lates to have it. What she wants to be down there where she'll hear all that bellerin', is more than I know, but women-folks are cranky." They passed on, through the stile and over the hummocky ground toward the sea while Luther stood still. "Elliott," he said, "Elliott." He watched the men till they finally stopped on a knoll a few feet from the shore line, when he trundled his barrow around the corner of the house and was lost to view. The men on the knoll stood for a few moments looking off at the blue waves which sparkled and danced in the morning light. White-sailed ships, like pale moths, poised on the water. A line of foam curled along the edge of the crags, and the murmuring ripples sang a gentle plaint as they stole in upon a small stretch of shelly beach.
