Chapter X: A Land Breeze (1)

RIP! drip! drip! that was the sound that woke Sister Julia the next Saturday morning. It was the splash of water dropping from the eaves of the cottage on to the tin roof below. As soon as she heard it she gave a little half sigh, for what did it foretell but a rainy Saturday? and a rainy Saturday in that little cottage was likely to prove rather a sorry affair. In the first place it was a small cottage at any time, and doubly so on a rainy holiday, when three restless children must find their amusement within doors. In the second place, these three little people had a fashion of regarding a rainy Saturday as a sort of personal grievance, and accordingly indulged in considerable fretfulness.

On this particular morning Master Harry Murray hearing the ominous splashing, tumbled out of bed and flattened his gloomy little face against the pane.

“Is it raining?” called Nan, in a most woe-begone voice, from her bed in her own room.

“Raining? I should think so!” Harry called back. “It's raining cats and dogs, and it is not going to stop for a minute all day. Besides, there's an awful fog. It's pretty hard lines, it strikes me, to study all the week with the sun shining bright, and then have it rain on your only holiday. I just wish I could have the managing of things in this old world for a while.”

“I don't, then,” called Nan; “it would be an awful hard world for girls. You wouldn't think of a thing but just what would please the boys.”

Harry did not hear all of this, for he had flounced back into bed, drawing the blanket tight over his head, as though he meant to stay there for the rest of the day at any rate. Soon certain familiar odours, suggestive of a favourite breakfast, began to steal through his room, and his head gradually appeared above the covers, as though he were debating in his mind whether on the whole it would not be better to get up. A moment later the debate came to an end, for he heard his father's voice, and pricking up his ears it was easy enough to hear what he was saying.

“Look here, mother!” were the words that reached him, “the next time Harry is so late to breakfast he must go without it; I mean it, mother. The boy seems to be losing all regard for discipline. You can't manage a boy without discipline, no more'n a crew.”

So it was not strange that Harry no longer questioned the advisability of getting up, but springing out of bed and dressing in a jiffy managed to put in an appearance at the table just as everyone else had finished. Mrs. Murray dropped some cakes on the griddle especially for him, and the lazy little fellow fared much better than he deserved. Mrs. Murray had a very soft spot in her heart for this only boy of hers, and Captain Murray's threat that another time Harry should go fasting set that soft spot to aching, and made her anxious to fortify him against such an emergency by heaping his plate high on this particular morning.

“Now I propose,” said Sister Julia, after breakfast, when the children were moping and growling in the sitting-room, “that we have regular lessons to-day, and then you can take the first clear day as a holiday instead.”

“No, sir-ree,” answered Harry, decidedly. “You don't catch me studying on Saturday for nobody.”

He felt rather ashamed of this speech as soon as it was uttered, but this was not a day when he was going to ask any one's pardon, not he--not even Sister Julia's, though he was very fond of her.

“You ought to be made to study every moment till you learn enough grammar to know that you ought never to use two negatives in one sentence,” said Regie, indignant at the way in which Harry had spoken.

“What do you say to that proposition yourself, Regie?” asked Sister Julia. .

“Well, to tell the truth, I don't feel much like it,” said Regie; “my head aches a little.”

“And mine aches like everything,” and Nan threw herself on to the lounge and plunged her face into the sofa pillow, as though smothering itself were preferable to life on a rainy Saturday.

“Oh, dear me! what a disconsolate little trio,” cried Sister Julia; “the wisest thing doubtless for me to do will be to take refuge in my own room and write some letters. When your troubles grow insupportable, come up, and we'll all try to be as miserable as possible together.”

In their hearts that little trio must have felt very much ashamed of themselves, but they continued to mope and fret for another hour. By this time Mrs. Murray had gotten through with her morning work, and notwithstanding the rain, had gone in the buggy with Captain Murray to take some milk and fresh eggs to a sick woman down at the Branch.

“Oh, look here!” called Harry, wandering into the kitchen, and discovering that he was monarch of all he surveyed, “we've got everything to ourselves, we ought to have a regular good time, and do something unusual.”

“Let's play tag through the doors,” cried Nan, proposing a game they were seldom allowed to indulge in because of the general disturbance and racket.

“No,” said his little Royal Highness, in an authoritative way, “we'll have private theatricals. We'll act out a play,” he added, when he saw by Nan's puzzled frown that she did not quite take in his idea.

“Good for you!” cried Harry, “that'll be the greatest fun. But oh! what do you suppose?” he exclaimed, suddenly lowering his voice to an excited whisper,--“crouch! crouch down, both of you; this way, close to the window.”

“What--what is it, Harry?” Nan asked, frightened at this strange performance, and regarding Harry in much the same dazed, sympathetic fashion as she had watched her little kitten endure the horrors of a fit the day before.

“Drop, drop, both of you!” was Harry's hoarse answer. “Don't you see? the Croxsons are coming.”

Oh! that was it, the Croxsons were coming! Regie and Nan quickly obeyed Harry's order.

“How many of 'em?” asked Nan, from her prostrate position.

“The whole five,” Harry answered, hopelessly; “but I don't believe they can see any of us, and if Sister Julia only does not hear them knock, and come down, they'll go away again and think no one's at home. Now, don't let's say a word.”

There was the patter of two pairs of little feet without, and the scuffle of three pairs of others, and then there came a vigorous knocking at the kitchen door, again repeated after an interval of a few moments. The children held their breath.

“Guess they're all out,” they heard Joe Croxson say, disconsolately.

“I think it's kind of mean to keep them out in the pouring rain,” Nan whispered.

“And I know it is,” answered Regie. “I say, let 'em in,” and it was no sooner said than done.

Immediately the Croxsons crowded in after the manner of a rubber ball which may be forced through a very small aperture. They all contrived somehow or other to get through the door at once, but straightway spread out into so large a company that one could but wonder how they had managed it. None of them spoke a word till they were safely within doors, evidently deeming conversation of no importance in comparison with simply “getting in.”

“We made up our minds you were all out,” said Joe Croxson, at last, while the family were in the process of removing damp-smelling outer garments.

“We thought we'd fool you a while,” Harry answered, with a nonchalant air.

The Croxsons were too glad to have gained entrance to take such treatment much to heart. “We've c-c-come to spend the morning, and stay to d-d-dinner, if you want us,” said little Madge, who stuttered dreadfully.

“I'm pretty sure it won't be convenient to have you stay to dinner,” said Nan, who no sooner beheld the shabby little Croxsons disposing themselves about the room with a permanent air, than with charming inconsistency she straightway regretted her noble impulse to let them all in. That they were a shabby little company no one could for a moment deny. The three girls, the youngest little more than a baby, each wore a ragged dress, and for an out-of-door wrap a faded and colourless strip, which collectively had once formed a shawl of their mother's.

The mother herself had died five years ago, and since then the children had managed for themselves as best they could. Their father was fireman on one of the engines belonging to the local road that ran through Moorlow, and the children were alone from morning till night. A poor woman came in every morning to cook their oatmeal and “tidy up,” but being poorly paid, the tidying up was always hasty, and never thorough. They were rather a stupid-looking set of children, and no wonder! You would hardly expect to find much that was bright in their faces, with so little brightness in their lives; besides, none of them had ever been to school, and Joe, who was the oldest of them all, knew little more than his letters, although he had passed his eleventh birthday. Everyone felt sorry for the Croxsons; and no doubt they would have fared better in one of the large cities, where they would have been reached by some of the organised charities, than in a little place like Moorlow. The rich people, who came in the summer in search of rest and refreshment, did not interest themselves in the villagers, and the villagers themselves were mostly hard-working fishermen with little time or money to devote to others. Had it not been for the Murrays the Croxsons would surely have fared much worse. Mrs. Murray did them many a kind turn, and when Madge had a fever the winter before, Harry or Nan had trudged backward and forward every day with beef tea or some other nourishing food. So there was one bright spot in their lives after all. Indeed, there was more than one, for born by the sea they loved it dearly, and in warm sunshiny weather they romped on the beach the whole day long, keenly enjoying their perfect freedom, and pitying the children obliged to go to school. Nan always spoke of them as the “poor little Croxsons,” and it was this pathetic side of their history which made her second Regie's motion to open the door.

“Of course we can't play that game now, and all our fun is spoiled,” said Harry, seeming to utterly disregard the feelings of the Croxsons. Fortunately they were not sensitive, and their stolid little faces showed no signs either of pain or resentment.

“Oh, yes, we can,” answered Regie; “they'll be the audience.”

“The very thing!” cried Nan, enthusiastically. “Now, children,” turning to the Croxsons, “we are going to have a play, and you'll be the audience, won't you?”

Each little Croxson nodded in the affirmative, though they had not the remotest idea what it was they were to be. They were literally clay in the hands of the potter when they were at the Murrays'. They did not care what was done with them, or to them, so long as they were simply allowed to stay. Harry fancied the idea of an audience, and preparations were at once begun.

The clothes-horse was converted into scenery by covering it with a green plaid blanket-shawl,' the ironing table was pressed into service as a settee for the audience, and the five Croxsons were packed into it in one tightly wedged row. From the commencement of the performance to its tragic end they sat staring in open-eyed astonishment; for they had never seen anything like it before--nor had any one else, for that matter. The plot of the play beggars description. Suffice it to say that Nan figured as the heroine, with a blue gingham apron for a train and a dish towel for a turban. Harry, muffled in a red table cover, was terrible as a sort of border ruffian, and Regie played the part of Nan's gallant brother. In a greater part of the performance there was so much action, so much rushing on and off the stage, that it was difficult to gain a clear idea of what was really intended; but matters culminated in a hand-to-hand scuffle between Harry and Reginald--a wooden spoon and a toasting fork doing service as weapons. Finally Harry succumbed, and fell to the ground with the rather inelegant exclamation, “Stabbed! stabbed to the liver!” and Nan falling in a swoon to the floor was enveloped in the green plaid shawl, which she accidentally pulled down with her.

“Oh, Harry! why did you give out?” cried Joe Croxson, never more excited in his life.

“It was planned for me to die,” Harry answered, still lying motionless on the floor. “I was Regie's sister's lover, and I'm a fraud and a wretch.”

The play had lasted almost an hour, and to the great delight of all concerned.

“P-p-please d-d-do it again!” begged little Madge. Rex and Nan were in favour of a repetition, but for Harry the novelty was gone, and novelty was everything with him.

“No, I've had enough,” he said, decidedly, and so the project had to be abandoned. Meanwhile Harry's assertion that it was going to rain all day was fast being contradicted, for it had stopped raining, and now and then the sun shone out bravely through a rift in the clouds. With the sunshine came a distaste for indoor fun, and there was a rush for hats and coats preparatory to a rush out into the November air. Nan, with tender thoughtfulness, had hung the Croxsons' wraps on chairs near the fire, and now they were dry, and as fit for use again as it was possible for such sorry clothes to be. At last all were ready, and Regie hurrying to open the door that led to the porch from the kitchen, found it locked and the key gone. The little party stared at each other. Harry was missing, and nowhere to be seen. Of course he was the guilty one. Then there was a stampede for the sitting-room door. Locked, too, and minus the key. A suppressed titter from the head of the stairs made them all look up.

“Why don't you go out?” Harry giggled; “I'd be ashamed if I couldn't open a door.”

“Come down and give us those keys this minute,” demanded Nan, in a tone most unlikely to accomplish her object. Harry only smiled provokingly. All in vain the children begged and coaxed. Finally they scrambled up the stairs to gain possession of them by main force if possible. Meanwhile Nan, evolving a little scheme out of her own head, slipped into Harry's room, appearing again in a trice with his Sunday suit in her hand. Harry had great regard for that Sunday suit, and Nan knew it.

“Look here, Harry!” she cried, “I will throw this downstairs if you don't give up those keys right away.”

“You dare!” called Harry, still engaged in a scuffle with the boys, “and I know what I'll do.”

Alas! Nan dared, and the precious suit fell in a crumpled mass to the floor below. By a sudden jerk Harry freed himself from his captors, and rushing into Nan's room, dragged pillow and bed-clothes from the bed, and then pitched them over the banisters. In a second they were followed by bolster and mattress. The little Crox-sons and Regie looked on in speechless astonishment The general encounter had reduced itself to single combat between Harry and Nan.

“Well!” said Nan, “mother will soon be home, and then we'll see what will happen. Harry Preston Murray” (Nan always called Harry by his full name when out of patience with him), “you have an awful temper!”

“I'll teach you not to touch my clothes again, any way,” Harry answered, carefully shaking and folding the precious trousers.

“But you don't know when to stop, Harry,” sighed Nan, coming down the stairs and surveying the havoc wrought with real dismay. What would her mother say and do about it? Harry began to have some misgivings of his own on the subject.

“You will have to carry all those things up again,” she said, in a half-pleading tone.

“And I'll help you, though you ought to be made to do it all yourself,” added Regie.

Harry came to the conclusion that he _would_ have to carry them up again sooner or later, and deemed it wise to commence before any one arrived on the scene. Besides, there was an ominous sound of wheels down the road. It might be Captain and Mrs. Murray. Joe Croxson had his own fears regarding this possibility, and beckoning his brothers and sisters into a corner, confided to them that he thought they had better take their departure. “There's going to be a row,” he whispered, “when the old 'uns come home. Harry 'll catch it, and if we don't look out we'll catch it too.” To the little Croxsons a hint was sufficient. Owing to certain personal experiences of a painful character, they seemed to live in a constant dread of what they termed “catching it.” The keys had fallen from Harry's pocket in the confusion, and hurriedly unlocking the door, the whole five slipped out and stole noiselessly away, without so much as saying “by your leave,” or “good-bye,” either to host or hostess. Harry and Rex and Nan, toiling, tugging, and shoving the unwieldy mattress upstairs, did not miss them till many minutes afterward. Indeed, they were each too much absorbed with their own thoughts to notice anything. Regie was the only one who saw any funny side to the proceeding, and the corners of his mouth twitched a little. Nan was on the verge of actual tears. The sight of her dainty little pillow shams and coverlid so sadly rumpled was almost too much for her. Harry was indignant over having to undo his own mischief, and did everything in a jerky, disagreeable way. Finally the little bed was in some sort of order, but as Nan was adjusting the pillow, Harry, giving her a shove which sent her into the middle of the bed, exclaimed, “You are enough to try the patience of a saint, Nan!”

It needed nothing more to bring Nan's threatening tears to the surface, and lying just where Harry had pushed her, she burst into sobs and tears. If there was one thing Harry hated more than another it was to have Nan cry, and to add to his discomfort Sister Julia came hurrying into the room. She had heard the romping in the hall, but never dreamed that it needed investigation till Nan's crying reached her.

“Why, what is the matter?” she questioned.

“There's a great deal the matter,” Regie replied, calmly; “and I should think Harry would be ashamed of himself.”

“Nan began it,” said Harry, with Adam-like self-excusing. “Harry got so mad,” explained Regie, excitedly, “that he threw----

“Wait a minute, Regie, let Harry tell me himself.”

“Yes, I got so mad,” said Harry, using Regie's own words, “that I took everything from Nan's bed and pitched it downstairs. Nan threw my Sunday suit down first, or I would never have thought of it. But I helped bring all the clothes up again, so I don't see what she wants to cry about it now for.”

“I am not crying about that at all, Sister Julia,” sobbed Nan, without raising her head; “I'm crying because he said 'I was enough to try the patience of a saint.' I don't know what it means, but I think it's an awful unkind thing for a brother to say.”

Sister Julia could hardly keep from smiling at this unexpected turn of affairs. Harry and Regie laughed outright, which did not help matters much.

Sister Julia motioned the boys from the room, and sitting down by Nan, on the side of the bed, stroked the brown curls till the sobs grew few and far between. Then she explained that “she was enough to try the patience of a saint” was not such a very dreadful thing for Harry to have said, and finally induced Nan to admit, smiling through her tears, that both she and Harry were to blame, and that on the whole they had had rather a funny time of it Presently Captain and Mrs. Murray came home, finding everything in order about the house. Only you and Sister Julia, little reader, ever heard the full history of that rainy Saturday morning.

XI.--A NEW FRIEND

T was early in November, but if you had lain by Nan's side on the beach basking in the sunshine you would scarcely have guessed it. The air was mild and warm, and there were no trees near to betray what sad havoc blustering fall winds had made with the foliage. Old ocean was as blue and still as in midsummer, with just a single line of breakers falling at regular intervals on the hard white beach. Nan was fairly glorying in the June-like day, feeling there could hardly be such another till June herself should have come round again. The boys had gone off for the afternoon on some sort of an expedition, never so much as asking her to accompany them, but she was not sorry to be left at home. She was one of those little people who, like some big people, loved to have a chance for a quiet think now and then, and lying there by herself she was supremely happy and tranquil. She had been there fully an hour, and for a while had been busy building a little castle in the sand, making a foundation of clam shells, and using an old bottle for a tower.

Most of the time she had been “just thinking,” and thinking so hard that she did not notice some one coming nearer and nearer until, suddenly looking up, her eyes met those of a stranger. She was a pretty little picture lying there flat on the sand, with her dimpled face propped comfortably between her hands.

“I wonder what you are thinking about, my little friend,” said the new comer, kindly. “I know from your face that your thoughts are happy thoughts?”

“Pretty foolish ones, I guess you'd call them!” laughed Nan, for there was something about the stranger that at once won her confidence.

“I'm not so sure of that,” he answered; “but a stranger has no right to ask you what they were, so good-bye, my little dreamer.”

“I wish you would not go,” said Nan, sitting up and smoothing out her dress; “I would like to talk to you, because I think you look like a minister, and I never spoke to a real minister before.”

“Well, you shall now,” he answered, sitting down beside her, “for you have guessed rightly, and for that matter there is nothing the minister would rather do than talk to you for a while.”

There was a little pause, and then Nan asked hesitatingly, as though she feared to seem rude, “You don't belong about here, do you?”

“No, but I almost wish I did. I love the sea with all my heart, so that I have hard work to keep from saying something about it in every sermon I preach. But if I do not belong about here, it is very certain that you do. You must have lived by the ocean week in and week out, to get that shade of blue into your eyes.”

“That's what Reginald says!” laughed Nan.

“And who is Reginald?”

“Why, Reginald Fairfax; he's staying with us while his father and mother are in Europe. The poor little fellow broke his leg last summer, and Sister Julia is here too, to take care of him, but he's almost well now. I wish you knew Sister Julia. She comes from one of the great hospitals in New York, and she is the loveliest person you ever saw.”

“Well, I should say I did know her,” answered the minister. “She goes to my church in town, and so do Mr. and Mrs. Fairfax; and Regie and I are the best of friends.”

“Why, are you Mr. Vale?” queried Nan, astonished, for the name of the young minister had often been on Regie's lips.

“Yes, I am,” he answered, laughing, as though he must own up to the truth.

“But what are you doing here?”

“Well, I'll tell you. Do you see that red-tiled cottage yonder?” pointing down the beach.

“Do you mean Mr. Avery's?” for Nan knew the name of every resident in the neighbourhood of Moorlow.

“Yes; Mr. Avery is a friend of mine, and stays down here, you know, quite late into the fall, so he asked me to bring my sister, who is quite an invalid, to his cottage, thinking the change would do her good. So here we are; we came this morning, but I am obliged to go back to the city again this afternoon.”

“Oh, dear! I'm sorry for that,” said Nan, regretfully, “I would so much have liked to hear you preach.”

“Well, that is very kind of you. Perhaps you can some time, when you come to New York to visit Regie. By the way, where is he?”

“Oh, he's off with my brother Harry this afternoon, and I don't believe they'll be home before supper time.”

“That's too bad, but I shall probably see him the next time I come.”

“Oh, you are coming again then!” exclaimed Nan, her face brightening.

“Yes, surely. Once a week, at least, so long as my sister stays. And now, suppose you tell me something about yourself. Your name is----”

“Nannie--Nannie Murray,” answered Nan.

“And you live----”

“In that brown cottage behind us there on the bluff,” nodding her head in the direction of the house.

“And you have lived there always?”

“Yes, sir,” she replied, proudly.

“Then you are a fortunate little maiden. To have grown up by the sea is something to be very thankful for. It seems a pity to live in town when one loves the sea and open country as much as I do.”

“Why don't you come down here?” urged Nan. “There are plenty of houses.”

“But the bother of it is there are plenty of people in town, and the preacher must stay near the people. It is more beautiful and wonderful, you know, to be able to help a soul struggle up toward high-water mark, than even to watch the tide come in as we are doing. But I think I must be talking quite over your head. Now that we are friends, perhaps you will not mind telling me what you were thinking about when I so rudely interrupted you?”

“Do you see that schooner, away off there?” Nan answered. “Well, when you came it was right in front of me, and I was pretending it was sailing away to a beautiful island with a crowd of poor city children on board, who had never been very well, or had a very happy time, and I pretended they were already beginning to look fresh and rosy with the salt breeze blowing in their faces; and I made believe that some of the children had a glass, and were looking here at me on the beach, and that some of them thought I was a mermaid, and others a queer sort of a fish. Now I suppose you think those were pretty foolish thoughts, don't you?”

“Not a bit of it. It is like a fairy story, only better. But before you began to build a castle in the air, I see you built a little one here in the sand. I suppose you have peopled this with a lot of queer little people of your own too.”

“No,” said Nan, honestly, “I don't make up things much, except when I am just looking out to sea.”

“Have you ever thought, Nan,” said Mr. Vale, earnestly, as he banked up a falling wall of her castle with his hand, “that your own life is a sort of little castle, wonderfully made, richly furnished, beautiful and hopeful to look upon? It is fitting that only One should live in that fair house--He who is purity and goodness and truth Himself. Ask Him to come and dwell within you, to look out of your eyes, to hear with your ears, to speak through your lips, to guide your hands and your feet.”

“You mean Jesus, don't you?” asked Nan, looking frankly into his face with sweet simplicity.

“Yes, my little friend, I do.”

“Well, it is just like a sermon.”

“But you said, you know, that you would like to hear me preach.”

“Yes, I did,” answered Nan, thoughtfully, gathering up a handful of sand and letting it sift through her fingers, “and I like your preaching; I like it very much indeed.”

“Thank you,” and Mr. Vale looked as though he deeply appreciated Nan's honest praise; “but it is high time the preacher was off. There is the train whistle now! give my love to Regie, and I shall surely run over to see him next week when I come down.”

Nan watched her new friend hurrying away to the station, and stood transfixed till a low sand-hill hid him from sight. Then she scampered to the house to tell of her good fortune.

As soon as Regie came home, and while he was making a hurried toilet for supper, Nan ran into his room, and curling herself up on the window-box, commenced, for the third time (for Sister Julia and Mrs. Murray had already been favoured), to give an excited narration of the afternoon's experiences.

“Oh, Regie!” she began, “I've had the most splendid time--a good long chat with a real live minister. He came from the city, and he told me the nicest things, sort of preached, you know; and he loves the sea just as much as I do, and his sister is staying up at the Averys', so he's coming again. He's a young minister, Regie, and he has the loveliest face.”

“I don't like men with lovely faces,” said Regie, scornfully.

“Well, you'd like his face, Regie. It was like a great strong angel's face, and he told me he knew you, and for me to give you his love, and to tell you that when he came again he would surely come and see----”

“You don't mean Mr. Vale, do you?” cried Regie

“That's just who I do mean,” Nan answered, complacently.

“Oh, dear me! why wasn't I round? Are you sure he's coming again?”

“Sure,” said Nan, wondering if it was selfish to be glad that just this once Regie had not been “round” at all, and that she had the young; clergyman quite to herself.

XII.--THE STARLING RUNS ASHORE

ERTAIN unmistakable signs were in the wind by which anyone could have told that, Thanksgiving Day was comparatively close at hand. There was a vigorous stoning of raisins on the part of Mrs. Murray, an odour of cider in the air which pointed plainly to the concoction of mincemeat, and Nan was confident she detected the largest turkey scratching round the yard in a nervous, timorous sort of way, as though he knew his days were numbered. By the calendar the eventful occasion was still ten days off, when one cold and blustering afternoon Captain Murray came home from the Life-saving Station, and into the cosy kitchen.

“If I'm not very much mistaken,” he said (and in the matter of weather Captain Murray seldom was mistaken), “we are in for a pretty heavy storm. We shall need to be on the look out, every man of us at the Station, the whole night through. Give us a hearty supper, Mollie, that'll keep a fellow well braced till morning.”

“Do I ever put you off with a poor supper, Epher?” asked Mrs. Murray, reproachfully, pausing a moment in her mixing of some gingerbread in a large yellow bowl.

“Never with a poor supper, mother, only you know what I mean. Give us sort of an extra touch to-night.”

Mrs. Murray knew as well as could be what her good husband meant by “an extra touch,” and soon the waffle-iron was taken from its hook and Harry was on his way to the cellar to fill the maple syrup cup. It was one of those nights when a cosy, comfortable home seems doubly comfortable and cosy, and very reluctantly Captain Murray put on his great coat to go back to the Station as soon as supper was over. The rain was falling in torrents now, and as he opened the sitting-room door, a gust of wind whipped in, sending the papers on the table whirling to the floor and overturning the lamp, which fortunately went out as it fell. When order was again restored, Sister Julia began reading a bright little story aloud to the children by way of cheering them up a bit. Even Harry was quite overawed by the violence of the storm, for by this time it was violent. The wind was blowing a gale now, and it had grown so cold that the fire had to be constantly replenished to keep the room comfortably warm. At nine o'clock the children went upstairs, and were glad enough to hurry into bed, for on such a night as this it was impossible to heat the upper story of the little cottage.

“I'm glad there's a great big lighthouse at the Highlands,” Regie called out after he had gotten into bed.

“So am I,” answered both Nan and Harry, and with this comforting thought in mind they all fell asleep. But Sister Julia and Mrs. Murray scarcely closed their eyes the whole night long. Sometimes it seemed as though the little cottage could not hold its own against such a terrific blow. At daybreak Mrs. Murray came up to Sister Julia's room, to find her already dressed.

“I think there's something wrong at the Station,” she said. “Hereward and Ned have been barking and bounding about in the most excited fashion for the last half-hour. Then, when the wind dies down for a second, I think I can hear the voices of the men calling to each other.”

“Yes, and look here,” answered Sister Julia, pressing her white face close to the pane; “I imagine I can discover the masts of a schooner near the beach.”

“Yes, surely; there must have been a wreck,” and Mrs. Murray threw open the window to see more clearly. “Hark!” she added, “now don't you hear the men?”

“Of course I do,” cried Sister Julia; “and I can stand it no longer. I must bundle up and go down and see for myself.”

“Oh! my child, you ought never to go,” exclaimed Mrs. Murray, but at the same time she helped her to hurry into her heavy ulster. “Oh, dear! I've a good mind to go with you; but no, it will not do to leave the children. Send one of the men up though, as soon as possible, to let me know what has happened, and that you have reached the Station without being blown away.”

So out into the storm went Sister Julia, and Hereward and Ned were at her side in an instant. The rain had ceased falling, but the wind still blew a hurricane, and in walking from the cottage to the station all her strength was needed to bear up against it. She had gone but a little way before she discovered that a schooner _had_ run ashore, and she tried to quicken her steps, fearing and yet anxious to know the truth. Just here I would tell my young reader that this story, so far as it relates to the work done that morning by the Life-saving crew, is every word true. Somebody, whom I choose to call Captain Murray, could show you a letter, sent, in company with a gold medal, from the Government at Washington, and written in appreciation of his gallant services and those of his brave crew, and in which you could read a graphic narration of all that happened that eventful November morning.

As Sister Julia neared the Station she heard the men shouting to each other in such cheery tones that she felt sure no lives could have been lost, and her heart grew lighter. The crew were at some sort of work down on the beach, and unnoticed by anyone she entered the Station from the landward side. The large room was empty, but the door stood open into the kitchen, and there what a strange sight met her eyes! Four men were huddled round the stove trying to get a little warmth into their half-frozen bodies. On one blanket on the floor, covered by another, lay a poor woman, who looked half-dead; and seated on a stool near her was Captain Murray, endeavouring to remove the dripping clothing from a screaming baby lying across his knees.

“God bless you!” he exclaimed, looking up and discovering Sister Julia, “you've come in the nick of time. We've just brought these poor wretches in from the wreck yonder, and I've sent Burton up to the house to get some dry duds for the woman and this baby,” and he laid the soaking little specimen of humanity in Sister Julia's arms.

“Now, my hearties,” he said cheerily, turning to the men, “hurry up to the loft, strip off your wet clothing, wrap yourselves in the blankets you'll find there, and turn into the bunks. You'll have to stay there till your clothes are dry, but I reckon you're tired enough to be willing to. We'll get you up some breakfast as soon as possible. Now I'm off,” he added, turning to Sister Julia. “I am needed on the beach more than here.”

The shivering little company about the stove promptly and gladly obeyed Captain Murray's orders, and Sister Julia, having succeeded in quieting the baby, began to remove its draggled clothing. Just then someone came in from the large room.

“There were no lives lost, were there?” she asked, eagerly, without looking up, presuming it to be one of Captain Murray's crew, and in the same instant the newcomer asked the same question of her.

“No, no lives lost,” answered the woman on the floor, in a weak, exhausted voice. The new comer was Mr. Vale, who had come down to Moorlow the night before, and Sister Julia was glad enough to welcome him, for she needed someone to aid her.

“My poor woman, you ought to get that wet clothing off at once,” said Mr. Vale, bending over her.

“I know it, sir, but I'm that weak.”

“I can attend to her now, if you'll take the baby,” said Sister Julia.

“With the greatest of pleasure,” and Mr. Vale took the blanketed baby into his arms, with a knack that showed his love for children. Straightway he went up aloft, with the little stranger gazing comfortably over his shoulder, to enquire for the welfare of the men. No sooner had he gone than Burton came hurrying in with the bundle of clothing which Mrs. Murray had gotten together. Quickly and skilfully Sister Julia helped the woman to make the change, and had but just finished buttoning a warm flannel wrapper about her when, overcome by fatigue, she fell asleep in the chair in which she was sitting.

“These good people had better have something to eat as soon as possible,” said Mr. Vale, returning down the narrow stairway, “and if you can show me a place to put this baby, for it is fast asleep, we'll see about getting some food ready for them.”

“Here's a good place for it,” and Sister Julia let down a wide shelf that was fastened against the wall, and with her ulster rolled up for a pillow, made the little waif very comfortable, for it was too young a baby to be in danger of rolling off. Captain Murray put his head in at the door just then with a most anxious face.

“It is raining,” he said, “and the storm is increasing every moment. I can't spare one of the men, for we must lose no time in getting the life-saving tackle in order, though it is not probable we shall need to make use of it twice in one morning. Do you think you can manage to get a breakfast together, Sister Julia?”

“Aye, aye, sir,” answered Mr. Vale, cheerily, “we'll attend to that.”

“That must be Nan's new friend,” thought Captain Murray, but he could not take the time to find out, and hurried away, feeling that he had left his shipwrecked party in good hands. Then Mr. Vale and Sister Julia set right away to work to investigate the supply of provisions in the Station. Mr. Vale peered into boxes, and Sister Julia lifted covers of crocks and dishes, and then they looked at each other rather blankly, for they were disappointed at the result.

“I have it,” said Sister Julia, after a moment's thought. “The best thing, I think, would be for you to put on your coat and make your way as best you can to Mrs. Murray's. She will have the oatmeal on the fire by this time,” glancing at the clock on the high shelf overhead, “and it would be just like her, remembering the hard work going on down here, to have made a larger quantity than usual.”

Mr. Vale was off in a moment, and then Sister Julia made preparations for boiling the coffee, carrying the coffee-mill into the larger room, so as not to wake the baby and its mother with the clatter of the grinding. Afterward she set the little table as best she could, and slicing some stale bread she had found in the closet, placed it at one side ready for toasting. So she busied herself about one thing and another till there was nothing more to be done. It seemed to her as though Mr. Vale would never come back, but in a really marvellously short space of time there was a tramping outside the door, and in came a little party, well laden with tin pails and baskets. They were all there--Mrs. Murray and Nan, Reginald and Harry; and indeed all were needed, to carry safely through such a storm as that the generous breakfast which Mrs. Murray had prepared; and the whole family at once set about serving it. The children trudged up and down the steep stairway, carrying the steaming coffee and oatmeal to the men in the loft.

“Bless your little heart!” said one of the men, as he took a brimming cup from Nan's hand; but the others seemed too hungry to take time to say so much as “thank you.” Sister Julia woke the tired mother, who fell asleep again as soon as she had eaten a little, and then she quieted the baby, who had begun to cry lustily, with a breakfast of warmed milk served in a ginger-ale bottle. As soon as she could be spared, Mrs. Murray put on her cloak and hurried down to the beach to see how that good captain of hers was enduring all this excitement and fatigue. For the captain, as he himself said, “was not so young as he once was,” and could not stand up as well as in other days against wind and weather.

“Oh, Mollie!” he called, as soon as she came near enough for his voice to reach her, “go back to the Station; you'll catch your death o' cold in this driving wind.”

“No fears for me, Epher,” she called back, “but you must go right up to the Station yourself, you and the men, and get some breakfast, or you'll be down sick, every one of you.”

All hands were only too glad to obey this order, for the lifesaving apparatus was again intact, and they were very hungry. Filing into the big room, they laid aside their tarpaulins, and then sat down to a better breakfast than ever before graced their mess table. It did Mrs. Murray's heart good to see how thoroughly they enjoyed it, and when the captain said, “I'd like to see the wife that can compare with Mollie Murray,” the colour flushed proudly into her face.

It was eight o'clock when the hungry party finished breakfast, and they were just pushing their chairs back from the table when one of their crew, who had been left on the beach on patrol duty, threw open the door and called for aid.

“Can it be possible that we are to have another wreck this morning?” thought the captain, as he and his men hurried into their tarpaulins, and rushed out of the Station. But alas! it was possible, for a short distance up the beach another vessel was stranded. In a moment the little house was quite deserted. Calling for their clothes, the men who had been rescued from the _Starling_ got into them, wet as they were, and, accompanied by Mr. Vale, hastened to render what service they could. Notwithstanding the commotion the mother and baby still slept quietly on in the kitchen, while Sister Julia, Mrs. Murray, and the children crowded into the seaward window of the loft, to watch as best they could the terribly exciting scene taking place below them on the beach.

XIII.--THE WRECK OF THE SPANISH BRIG.

HE storm that culminated on that November morning was the worst that had been known on the Moorlow coast for years. The wind, which was north-east, blew a hurricane averaging eighty-four miles an hour. The beach was flooded by a furious surf, and, strangely enough for that time of the year, the weather was freezing cold. In less than ten minutes after the second vessel stranded Captain Murray's crew was abreast of her, but in the meantime she had worked to within a hundred yards of the beach, and Joe Burton, running down behind a receding wave, cast a line on board with a vigorous throw of the heaving-stick.

“Hurrah for Burton!” cried Harry. “He's a fine fellow, I tell you.”

As soon as the line reached the ship, the sailors on board of her tugged away at it until they had pulled up the larger line, on which Captain Murray purposed to send out the breeches-buoy. But before the buoy could be rigged up, the sailors, ignorant of his purpose, showed that they were going to endeavour to reach the land by coming hand-over-hand along the rope. Captain Murray and his men shouted from the shore, and wildly gesticulated, for it seemed impossible that any of them could reach the shore alive in that way. The surf was very violent, but the greatest danger lay in the fact that the position of the brig in the set of the strong current caused an enormous swirl of water between her and the beach, which retained eddying masses of wreckage, mainly cord-wood from the wreck of the _Starlings_ and which masses were continually swept out by the undertow, and hurled in by the breakers.

“Oh, those foolish men! those foolish men! why don't they understand and see their danger?” cried Sister Julia, attempting to draw the children away from a sight so distressing; but the boys were immovable. Mrs. Murray, Sister Julia, and Nan went down to the little kitchen to wait, since they no longer had the heart to watch.

“There, one of the fellows has started!” cried Harry, with long pauses between his sentences, “and he's all right so far. No; my goodness, there he goes! a wave has flung him over the rope, and his head is caught between the cords of the whip-line. He will choke to death. No! there goes Burton again right into the surf holding on to the line. There! he's got him, he's got the sailor; but how can he ever bring him to land? See, Rex, he's clinging to a piece of driftwood with one hand, and holding on to the sailor with the other.”

“Oh! but another man is trying it now!” exclaimed Rex. “Oh! why don't they wait? Look there--and another one of the crew has plunged in after him; but, goodness! the driftwood has knocked him completely under. Ah! there go two more of the men in to his rescue, and Burton is in the breakers again, too. Who's that with him, Harry?”

“I can't make out, but--hurrah! they've reached the sailor; they'll save him, I know.”

And Harry was right; they did save him, and five others besides, all of whom attempted the same foolhardy method of reaching the land, and all of whom were rescued by the same hand-to-hand struggle in the surf on the part of Captain Murray's gallant crew.

“I never saw such bravery, never!” called Mr. Vale, and it could plainly be seen that his enthusiasm cheered the men wonderfully in their perilous work. He longed to plunge in with them, but he knew that he would be powerless to render any aid. It was their long experience that was standing the crew in such good stead. By this time a crowd had gathered on the beach, that is, every able-bodied resident of Moorlow was there, and as the last sailor was brought safely to shore a hearty cheer went up that, for the moment, even rose above the pounding of the breakers on the shore. Stretched on the sand, in such shelter from the wind and rain as the side of the surf-boat afforded, the disabled seamen were laid. They were all Spaniards, and only two of them were able to stand upon their feet.

“Which of you is captain of the brig?” asked Captain Murray, looking kindly down upon this second group of shipwrecked mariners.

“He no here,” answered one of them who had been the least hurt, in broken English; “when he think his ship go to pieces, he go below and make hisself dead;” but the man's gestures told more plainly than his words that the captain had shot himself in the head.

Captain Murray turned to his men with a look that meant, “Our work is not over yet.”

“What shall be done with these poor fellows?” ventured Mr. Vale, when he saw that the thought of how he should reach the man still on the brig had driven all other thoughts from the captain's mind.

“Lord knows!” answered Captain Murray, sorely puzzled. “It'll be more'n a week before some of them will get out of bed, when they once get into it. There's some ugly bruises among 'em.”

“Do you think we could make them comfortable in the chapel on the beach yonder? It would serve splendidly for a hospital.”

“The very thing! I'll leave the arrangements to you, sir,” said Captain Murray, confident now that this really was Nan's new friend, the minister, about whom she had talked so much.

The first thing to be done was to get the exhausted Spaniards up to the Station, where Rex and Harry and Nan, with excited, earnest faces, waited to receive them. Over and over again the children had begged and entreated to be allowed to run down to the scene of the wreck, but Mrs. Murray had thought best to refuse them.

Captain Murray could not have left the preparation of the hospital in better hands than Mr. Vale's. Won by his handsome face and simple manner, the villagers crowded about him, eager to do his bidding. The sexton of the little church hurried home for the keys as fast as his rheumatic old limbs could carry him, and with the aid of Joe and Jim Croxson, he soon had a roaring fire blazing in the big chapel stove. Two men, harnessing up Captain Murray's Dobbin with all possible haste, drove to the Branch for doctor and surgeon, for both were needed. Two others, borrowing the largest waggon the town afforded, went off for a load of cots. There was something for every one to do, and every one was happy in doing it.