Tom Tiddler's Island, стр. 2
Colin Trent pricked up his ears at the name of Northfleet.
“Used to know a man called Northfleet,” he interjected. “What’s his first name, d’you know?”
“His initial iss C, sir,” Dinnet explained. “I collect his letters for him at Stornadale, and I have noticed some of them were addressed to Mr. C. Northfleet.”
“H’m! My man was Cyril Northfleet. Might be the same. But when I knew him, he’d no interest in birds.”
“I do not think that he has a very great knowledge of birds, sir,” Dinnet volunteered cautiously.
“No?”
“No, sir. I have seen him mistake a solan goose for a gull in the twilight. It was too far off to see the shape, of course; but it was quite easy to see the beat of the bird’s wings. Nobody who knew birds well could have taken the one for the other, sir, as probably you know.”
“Solan flaps faster than a gull, you mean?” Colin suggested, airing one of his few scraps of ornithological lore.
“That iss one difference, sir,” Dinnet conceded.
Jean made a gesture to attract her husband’s attention.
“Look, Colin! Isn’t that pretty? You’d almost think these boats were sailing in the air.”
On their port bow a score of light-brown hulls with steeply-raked masts were emerging from the haze; and the lack of a visible horizon lent them the appearance of hanging midway between sea and sky. Beyond them, phantom-like in the mist, a grey-painted vessel clung on the fleet’s flank.
“What funny pillar-things they’ve got on them, Colin. What are they for? I can’t see them clearly in this haze.”
“Never seen a herring-fleet before, dear? Now you know where the bloaters and finnan-haddies come from. Smoke-boxes, these things are. Modem speeding-up, you know. Catch your herring, smoke ’em in these fitments on the way back to port, and dump ’em on the quay, all cured and ready for market. See?”
But by this time one of the fleet was near enough for Jean to see the contents of the towers.
“Thanks, dear. And I suppose that man at the wheel is turning them round in the smoke to cure them all over,” Jean said ironically. “What are those black rings along the boat’s side?”
“Lifebuoys,” said Colin, promptly. “Must have two lifebuoys for each man in the crew. Government regulation, so that if everybody falls overboard on one side they don’t have the trouble of swimming round the boat for a lifebuoy. That’s why they’re hung at the waterline, of course.”
Jean scanned the nearest craft. At a distance the things had looked like lifebuoys, but a nearer view proved them to be old motor-tyres.
“Now I know what they are. They’re fenders to prevent the boats bumping into each other. Aren’t they?” she demanded, turning to Dinnet.
“Yes, mem. In harbour the boats are sometimes tightly packed.”
“And what’s the grey ship beyond them?”
“Fishery protection boat,” Colin suggested. “She dodges up and down the coast to see they don’t use more than one hook on a line.”
“I can see the nets on deck, dear, thank you.” She turned and interrogated Dinnet with a glance.
“Mr. Trent iss quite right about the boat, mem. She iss a Government boat to look after the fisheries. Bat what her exact duty iss I am nut just sure,” he concluded, diplomatically.
Then, apparently glad to have escaped from a direct contradiction of Colin’s outrageous assertion, he pointed to where a low, dim shape was emerging from the haze.
“That iss Ruffa, mem. We shall soon be in now.”
As the little motor-boat throbbed onward, Jean turned eagerly to examine the island. Soon she could make out a coast of low cliffs against which the tide washed languidly. Above them rose slopes of grass and heather in bloom, broken here and there by dark patches of bare rock.
“Are these white spots sheep?” she asked.
“Yes, mem. Mr. Craigmore has some very good sheep on Ruffa.”
“So we won’t starve, eh? Even if communication with the mainland breaks down?” Colin suggested.
“No, sir. You are quite safe, so long as you can eat mutton. And it iss not altogether a joke, either. We have often very sudden storms here; and this little boat would not be safe in them. We have been cut off completely, whiles. But Mr. Craigmore makes us keep a big stock of tinned things, and we have always mutton to fall back on.”
“What about milk and butter?” demanded Colin, who was not uninterested in food.
“We have some cows, sir, as well as the sheep. Mrs. Dinnet and I look after them and make the butter.”
“It must surely be very lonely in the winter-time,” Jean put in. “But perhaps you don’t stay here all the year round?”
“It is rather lonely, as you say, mem. Most of the winter we are quite cut off from the mainland. But we prefer to stay on Ruffa. And the wireless is great company for us, too. Mr. Craigmore has put in a very good set indeed, and he allows us to use it when there iss no one staying at Wester Voe. He ordered fresh batteries for it so as to be ready for your coming, men, and I coupled them in this morning.”
“Mr. Craigmore seems to have thought of everything to make us comfortable,” Jean answered. “It was very kind of him to lend us Wester Voe while he’s away. But where is the house? I don’t see it.”
“It iss on the far side of the island, mem. There iss no landing-place on this side. It iss all rocks here. The house is beyond that hill that you see on your right, and the pier iss just below it. We have to round the point, yonder, and then you will see it, mem.”
A faint breath of wind broke the mirror of the sea. The heat-haze drifted before it; and by the time they had turned the point