Sweetapple Cove eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 268 pages of information about Sweetapple Cove.

Sweetapple Cove eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 268 pages of information about Sweetapple Cove.

We are now able to dispense with the nice old mariner who watched him so effectively the first night.  Daddy said the competition was too great for him to stand, and explained that he wanted a monopoly.  You will be delighted to hear that as far as we can tell the poor leg is doing nicely; at any rate the doctor seems to be pleased.  I had no idea that our patient would be so easily resigned to his fate.  He is just as good as good can be.

To console you for reading about the hardships I must tell you that I had one of the times of my life to-day.  An ultimate analysis of it would reduce itself to a trip from a dirty shore, in a dirty boat, to a dirty island, at least that part of it that was not daily scrubbed by the Atlantic billows.  Of course this may be somewhat exaggerated, but the places one departs from and arrives at are somewhat trying to sensitive noses.

That young doctor I spoke of is the responsible party, aided and abetted by Daddy.  Between them they just bundled me away, under some silly pretense that I needed fresh air.  It is possible, after all, that they may have been right.

We went down to the fish-houses and flakes that crop out like queer mushrooms on stilts all over the edges of the cove, and it was a shaky damsel who shuddered over the passing of a wobbly plank.  The crew of two waited below in the boat, and smiled encouragingly, so that I had to try and show more bravery than I really felt.  I had no desire to intrude among the squids; one sees them dimly through the clear water and they impress one, as they move about, as resembling rather active rats.  The cod are more partial to them than I ever shall be.  Then there was a rather rickety ladder down which I scrambled.  I am sure the crew had never seen silk stockings before, but their heads were politely turned away.  A large, exuberantly whiskered Frenchman in picturesque rags gave me his hand and helped me down with a manner worthy of assorted dukes and counts; and there was a little boy who sat on a thwart and looked wistfully at me.

“De leetle bye, heem want go, if mademoiselle heem no mind,” said the Frenchman, bashfully, with a very distinct look of appeal.

The little fellow also sought my eyes, and held his ragged little cap in his hands.  He was simply the curliest darling, clad in a garment of many colors made of strange remnants and sewed by hands doubtless acquainted with a sailor’s palm but unfamiliar with ordinary stitching.

Naturally I bent down and lifted him up and put him on my knees, recognizing in this infant the nicest discovery I have yet made on this amazing island.  His little pink face and golden curls imperatively demanded a kiss.  He is just the sweetest little fellow you ever saw, and looks altogether out of place among the sturdy urchins of the Cove.  Then I had to put him down, because of course I had flopped down in the wrong place.  I notice that in small boats one always does.  The child took his cap off again and said “merci,” and I had to smile at Yves, the Frenchman, whose grin distinctly showed that the way to his heart lies through that kiddy.

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Project Gutenberg
Sweetapple Cove from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.