od
what I asked I should not have said: "Scud, won't you go? They are
drowning. See, Scud! _Go!_"

The doomed sail was beaten here and there in the fierce wind; the jib
was blown to tatters. The boat took in water, righted, and careened
with every riotous puff. A hundred times men turned their faces away and
women shrieked, expecting it to go down. A hundred times repeated
miracle protected the helpless boat.

Scud walked slowly down the heaving gangway that connected the rocks
with the float. The man who came down to see the boat capsize followed
with his hands in his pockets. He balanced himself on the railing with
his elbows as the gangway jumped beneath him.

"What yer up ter, Scud?" he yelled above the tempest. "They're driftin'
on yer trap. That'll fetch 'em."

Scud looked up. His feet were washed in the water that flooded the float
at every surge. To strike the trap meant instant overturn. To become
entangled in and driven on to the meshes of the broad, deep net meant
inevitable death.

"I guess I'll go. Help me shove the dingy off." So spoke Scud,
deliberately.

"You--" The rest of the expletive was lost in the gale. The breakers
made sport of Scud, and spat at him with their white tongues. "Your
childer! The twins! Betty!" thundered his friend.

Scud hurriedly put in the oar-locks. As he bent, the wind caught his
cap and dashed it on the rocks. Scud shook his brown hair to the furies.

"Ye see!" yelled his companion significantly. "Now get in, will ye?"

"Shet up, Steve! Gimme them oars. Don't ye see I'm goin'? I wish I hed
my dory."

A murmur of applause went up from the crowd as the fisherman shoved off.
The light tender was twisted about and all but cast upon the cliffs
before he could gain his first stroke.

And now the man of the sea set his weak mouth into petrified resolve.
The wind and the water attacked his boat like assassins. They meant to
kill. Scud knew this. He rowed guardedly, mistrustful of a cowardly
feint, of an underhand lunge. The tender quivered beneath each dash of
the waves, each onslaught of the squall, each hurried stroke of the
oars. Scud rowed warily, lest he be over-turned and buried between the
trough and the height of the waves. The wind howled at him. The bay
showered upon him. The gale clutched him and turned him about. How now!
Whence came these muscles of steel that subdued such powers arrayed
against lazy Scud? How now! Whence came that indomitable judgment that