The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, December 25, 1904, Page 8

—her had bad and sh E ate crank s, the ded from - faith craved to The silver rippled with old zled the eyes of Job Luff. ngth of calico for the lit- were molasses and tea than one. gleam over scales in h The catch shot silvery back at the sun. This was a acco; that one would go ose for breakfast; this pane in the loft window >w flew; that would give a new spade. There was f the man. It was the ch a catch it was. more for three days. in the sun of the hillside. He would climb the cliff and watch the gu rcle over the gea. It was a gun- S load! The sea had been plun- dered while she si-pt. “Thg ficet do be runnin’ hoame, zur,” Billy Luff. “They be scootin’ for easter tickle.” the It was not yet night. “Hoame, b'y! exclaimed Job. Iss, zur. eazar Manuel do be in the lead. He've a reef to his mains’l. They be goain’ fast, zur. Jacob Sevior do be reel his sall now.” sea, as visible from the cove, was was an unruffied biue. must be wind t'other side o’ the * said Job. “Pull out, b’ Billy Luff pulled out, with his heart a flutter of fear. It was the e from the northeast— the raging of the sea; it had burst from those moody distances which are be- yond the ken of the coast; wherein, in the experience of the men of the placse, peril 'urks always. It had come like & force bent on ravagf. There had Head in been no premonition in sea or sky; it had caught the little fleet of RagZed Harbor napping off Mad Mull. The zenith was overcast with thin clouds, which the wind had torn to shreds. mselves quickly over they raced to ¢y clouds, with ¢y from the spread the blue in t the sun. W rose was black W cotched, zur i Billy Luff. w Cove is narrow and precipi- tous. Above and below the cliffs rise er. There is surf in every part. The is spread with foam. with the crash of wa is no harbor th a gale fr shuts full force placs hoisy strikes with “We he cotchec It was a que punt-and ca wind ch, ashoarc, b'y, The pu He pushed .the tak sald be too up to leap inded a mus: e had H <ure rock athless wh 1 3% he wrested Oh, faw y er the ome solic g by that ter- the cove. The sea water seethed about the punt. The spume covered' the man. Noise confused him—noise compounded and re-echoing, as in a caverr. It was as though the wind tried to push him into the depths of the cove, where the breakers could grasp him to his un- doing. The wind swept from a wide place into a nparrew. It was like water rushing through a straighteped channel. In confusion he could ‘ot prevail against that force. He drifted back. The distance between the punt and the breakers diminished by inches. The space lessened visibly. The punt had no part in this fight. She was the prize. It was the wind pitted against the man’s spirit and the sheer strength of his arms and back. The wind veered of a sudden. It caught the punt on the port bow and struggled to turn it broadside. This was the crisis. Hed the right arm of the man weakened the wind would have won mortal ad- vantage in the increased surface ‘ex- posed to its force. Job perceived the imminence of disaster. He concen- trated his strength in his right arm and forced the bow back into the wind’'s eve. His muscles were sore of the strain put upon them; and he was now bleeding at the nose. But the momen- tary gain steadied him. He exerted his strength intelligently. He pulled with craft, taking advantage of every lull to creep up. Thus he drew away from the breakers. “Now for it, lass!” Job cried. Thus the first stirrings of the joy of conflict expressed themselves. The escape was into new peril. The gale had trailed wet dusk over the har- bor and the sea between. The tickle, through which the fleet had now fled to the sanctuary of the harbor basin, was marked by its breakers. It was but a spiash of white in vague distance. The sea was a gr: tossing waste, with chadowy limi The surges n the municated their restless- The shallow surface y direction with the d themselves to be- tional force and vel- attack was delivered and front simultancously. was laden with the catch. mpiain of the load? She call- 4 There’s a brave heart northeast co s to its depth v 1us the upon flank 1 nunt d she each ia its they y came in infinite on tite heels of rank, ng host stretch- expanse. king of her cld timbers be In that spirit inably the waters Sha sprang at to gather force; fair; she shattered she ghook herself free turn 4 to ea she attacke engulf , faiterir struck them into spray only of the clogging fragments and plunged on with such grit and strength as swells the heart to see. The folk of Ragged Harbor—the two hundred souls—were gathered on Look- out Head to watch Job Luff beat in, as they had gathered many times before. They were standing full in the wind on a slope of rock high above the sea. Job’s wife was there, with her brood hanging to her fluttering skirts. The rajn had ceased. The alf was washed clean. The sea was suffused with gray light. The punt was clearsto the patch on her sail “Why doan’t he heave his catch over?” cried Jim Rideout. “She’ll swamp when he fetches about,” sajd Eleazar Manuel. “1 mird me he've weathered warse galltes, Eleazar Manuel,” said Job Luff's wife, “She’ll swamp like a flash, woman.” tood off to the south. The new s cleverly taken. The punt was now almost broadside to the rock. “What’s he to?” “Runnin’ for Boot Cove, b'y.” “He've Jost hisself. The lop do be too heavy t' land.” “Do he be heavin’ his fish over, Elea- zar?” This was Sammy Arnold, who was near blind of old age. “He be's comin’ about.” Y “'Tis a clever hand with a punt,” said Jim Rideout. “He be's comin’ in on this tack.” “Do he be heavin’ his fish over, Yy Sammy Arnold demanded. “Noa, b’y. Not Job Luff!” The punt came tearing in through a head sea, reeling, plunging. Job held her up to it with that rag of a sail. “Do he be 'shippin’ water, Eleazar?” rammed the black, spume-, Again Sammy Arnold. “He do be bailln’ now.” % ‘“‘Have he his sheet fast, b'y? be blind this day. “Ies, sure; 'tis tied to his foot.” Job managed the sheet with his foot. He worked the steering oar with his right hand and bailed- with the other. “'Tis a stiff punt,” said Sammy Ar- nold. “'Tis that.” The punt was coming to her own. Ragged Harbor watched her keenly as she reeled through that head sea. In all the vears of her unhonored life not so much had been said before. “’Tis a gran’ punt,” sald Eleazar Manuel. I do (he best punt t' Ragged Har- bor. There was no one to gainsay it. In the end the ill-favored craft had found honor. Job wae under the Head. The tickle stretched from before him to the catm of the harbor basin. The punt's fight was won. It was for the man to sweep through to placid water; but net through placid water—through ngise and tumultuous waves, a narrow place where the breakers reach from the rocks on elther side like claws. It was for him to sweep through to placid water; then he must pull to the stage and land the fish. The sure path was the middle. Deviation meant wreck. inevitable wreck if the breakers so much as laid a finger on the boat. It was but sport for a sure hand and an eye-alert. So be it; the hand must be continuously sure and the eye alert always. In response to the oar the punt veerad and sped like an arrow for the middle. Job ran his eye over the catch. Then, madly exultant, he look- ed up to the people on the rock. He had won! It was a triumph for courage and the punt. But in that vaunting glance he betrayed the punt. A puff of wine caught the rag of a sai sewhere breath to be disregarded; here and now with an ynwatchful hand on the she a transcendent peril. Job's eyes were on the people. Every faculty was sub- merged in his exultation. Two things followed; for one, the hand on the oar was lax; moreover, his perception of the tuation of the punt —the immediat> formation of the waves, and the sphere of the breakers —was, for the instant, suspended. Hence, when the wind caught the sail its influence was not instantaneously counteracted. The moments of grace flashed past while the man rallied his faculties to meet the danger; while, too, he possessed himself anew of his immediate surroundings. His impres- sion of the waves and breakers had to be destroyed and reconstructed. Those waves which had been photographed on his brain when he looked up at the peovle had now subsided; new on®s had replaced them—waves of different form and place. Those breakers which had been.gnlhermg force to dash against the rocks had delivered their attack, had broken and fallen, and were now gathering for a new rush. The face of the tickle was a new face. He was dazed. Time was consumed, also, in determining upon a course of action. It took time to transmit directions to the hand on the oar, time for the hand to comprehend, to summon its strength and to exert it. These were supremely momentous periods. Job had betrayed the punt. The puff of wind had swerved her from her course. A long, lean breaker, reach- ing far out from Black Rock, had laid hold of her and fixed its clutch. She was swept in. Her motion was like that of a failing stone—imperceptible at first, gathering speed, accelerating to a rush. The man felt the new influence in the beginning. Then he perceived that all his strength—which he now furiously exerted—could not take her to the placid water of the harbor, a few fathoms beyond. She had been carried out of her course. She was caught. She was doomed. Hence he diverted his strength to swerving her bow on to the rock, that he might save himself. The possibility of his escape was con- tained in seven seconds of time. He dropped the oar and leaped forward; then crouched in the bow for a spring. His eves swept the face of the rock for a foothold while the punt ad- vanced. There was but a flash of time for discovery'and decision. The glance was swift, sure, eager. It fixed itself at the last on a narrow ledge. The sum of all those things which are im- portant to a man hung upon the pos- #Mhility of reaching that ledge. Job made the leap when the* punt overhung the abyss, but from sinking ground; for the wave, as though of craft, pulled the boat from his feet as he sprang. It must be said that Black Rock is at that point near sheer. The cliff 1s weather-broken and rotten; frost and wind have fretted narrow ledges there- in and left a crumbling surface, which latter scales off, in most ,. under a violence no greater than the bent of a child’s strength. Now, the sudden descent of the punt had disturbed the man’s’leap. For that reason he missed his hold with one foot. The toe of his right boot struck the rock below the ledge. That foot found ne place. Hence he tottered. His full weight was upon the other foot, which was firm fixed from toe to instep. Supreme re- sponsibility centered, momentarily, in the muscles of that leg. But he was toppling backward; he would fall to the wave which was then erunching the punt and he would be cast up with splinters. He clawed the rock for a andhold. His right hand caught a projection; this erumbled in his grasp. Even so he had brought himselt back to within a hair's weight of a balance; but the weight of the hair was against him. If the left hand should fail in its search, that differ- ence would sure revail. The third finger found a crack with a frayed edge; the nail caught a scale of rock— a loose scale, which trembled under the strain. Upon that scale—upon its tender, slender connection with the great body of rock—the issue now de- pended. Here all the struggle cul- minated—the mighty exertion of the cove, the skill and courage of the at- tack upon the waves, the little punt's stanch repulse of high seas, all ended in the strain the finger nail put upon the scale of rock, and that strain was not greater than a thread might sus- taingnor longer than a breath, The scale held. The finger nail did not break. The man drew his body forward. The wavgrose to his boot tops and washed with expiring strength about his feet. It left him safe. The punt was a splintered wreck below. Some e-nvulsive effort of the gale az it tore iuto the distance rent the thick, low clouds in the west. ' The tat- ters of the rift glowed crimson and gold; black was elsewhere. The sun, shooting through, gilded the crests of the waves; the sea flashed from ex- panse to-expanse. The breakers threw Iridescent spray at the skf. Hills and recks took on their sunset garb of purple and red. Shafts of sunlight struck the bellies of the catch and Were radiantly reflected. The of the gunwale load gleamed for a space, where they floated with the splinters of the punt that had gone to wreck in all honor. They shone like burnished silver while they sank, futtering into the black. hidden depths of the tickle. Night advanced with sSwift feet. Heavy clouds covered the Sun as it sank. Dusk enshrouded the Pillar and the Staff. The wind sighed and died. Silence descended. From the summit of Black Rock Job Luf locked out over:the sea to the edgs of the world. There a streak of Murid red separated the sea from the sky. It was a tragedy of that coast!