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Updated: May 6, 2025
His arms hung slack at his sides, but the muscles stood out on them like ropes. The coxswain of the lifeboat gave his head a brief, upward jerk without looking at him. "That curly-topped chap staying at The Ship," he said, "he came messing round after me this morning, wanted to know would I take him out with the nets one day. I told him maybe you would." "What did you do that for?" said Rufus.
You leave it to him, and be thankful that curly-topped chap has sheered off at last!" Mrs. Peck had no choice but to obey, but her anxiety regarding Columbine did not diminish. The girl was so listless, so unlike herself, so miserable. It was many days before she summoned the energy to dress, and even then she displayed an almost painful reluctance to go downstairs.
She seemed to live in continual dread of some approaching ordeal. "I believe it's Rufus she's afraid of," was Mrs. Peck's verdict. But Adam scouted the idea as absurd. "What will you think of next, woman? Why, any one can see as he's quiet and well-behaved enough for any lass. She's missing the curly-topped chap a bit maybe. But she'll get over that. Give her time! Give her time!" So Mrs.
Adam had never been the man to leave a thing half done. "Go to it, Rufus!" he said, dropping his voice confidentially. "Don't be afraid to show your mettle! Don't be crowded out by that curly-topped chap! You're worth a dozen of him. Just you let her know it, that's all!" He dug his hands into his trousers pockets with the words, and turned to go.
And he's a good man, too, missus, a long sight better than that curly-topped chap. Him and me's partners, so I ought to know." "To be sure you ought," said Mrs. Peck tolerantly. "And it's to be hoped that Columbine knows it as well."
And yet Adam continued to call him "the curly-topped chap," and turned him over to his son Rufus when he requested permission to go out in his boat. And Rufus Rufus turned with a gesture of disgust after the utterance of his half-veiled threat, and spat with savage emphasis upon the sand. Adam uttered a chuckle that was not wholly unsympathetic, and began deftly to coil the now disentangled rope.
But no matter how much the old tub tossed about and battered the waves, we were on deck every day, not in the least seasick, watching the sailors at their rope-hauling and climbing work; joining in their songs, learning the names of the ropes and sails, and helping them as far as they would let us; playing games with other boys in calm weather when the deck was dry, and in stormy weather rejoicing in sympathy with the big curly-topped waves.
They had been inclined to resent his presence at first it was certainly no charitable impulse that moved Adam to call him "the curly-topped chap" but now they were getting used to him. For there was no gainsaying the fact that he had a way with him, at least so far as the women-folk of the community were concerned. He could keep Mrs.
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