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Updated: May 17, 2025
Ned leaned against his friend, looking soberly at Trafford's rapt face, and wondering where all the man's grimness and gloominess had gone. And just then a sudden thought came into Noll's heart, and he said, looking up brightly, "It's a year this very night since I came to you, Uncle Richard! Don't you remember? What a long, long time!" Trafford said, "Yes, I remember.
Why, lad, 'tw'u'd be like throwin' yer silver into the sea to spend it on them good-fur-nothin', shif'less critters. An' what be the like o' them to you?" "Why," said Ned, coming to Noll's relief, "he want's to do them good. Can't you see through a ladder, Ben? And what we want to know is whether you will do the business?" The skipper was silent for a time.
They were shivering in their thin raiment, for the rain was heavy and cold. Noll's teeth were all but chattering. "I don't believe the gully is guarded at all," whispered young Overton in his friend's ear. "This place looks so like a trap that few military commanders would ever think of leading men into it in the dark. I figure that the datto thought this gully not worth guarding by night."
"Don't, don't say that, Uncle Richard!" cried Noll; "I couldn't mind you if you did! It wouldn't be right, when they're all sick and almost starving, and I couldn't do it, and it is not as papa told me to do! And " Trafford endeavored to release Noll's hold, but the boy only clung the tighter, exclaiming, "No, no! don't say it, Uncle Richard, for I couldn't mind you! Papa never would wish me to!
The warm, eager color rushed into Noll's face, and he cried, "Do you mean that that a teacher might take my place, Uncle Richard? Do you really mean it? Were you in earnest, and shall I answer?" "To be sure," said his uncle, gravely enough. "Oh, Uncle Richard!" cried Noll, "I knew the time would come some day! I knew it! I knew it! And will you hire a teacher for those Culm children?
"Perhaps I might aid this misery, Uncle Richard, if you'll let me try. Will you?" "You will have more than your hands full if you are going to look after these Culm people," said Trafford, coldly; "you had better not begin." Noll's face grew graver and graver, and he made no reply to his uncle's last remark. "Well," said Trafford, after a long silence, "do you wish anything more, Noll?"
A keen, chilly wind swept fiercely over the rocks and along the shore, and the dark, foam-fringed waves rode grandly in upon the beach with a thunderous shock as they flew into spray. Some of the spray mist wet Noll's face, even as he stood upon the piazza steps. But, warmly clad, and loving the sight of the wild tumult, he started with a light heart for his walk up the shore.
The nephew hesitated, looked down in some embarrassment, then gathering sudden courage, looked up and answered, brightly, "Yes, Uncle Richard, I know all about it." It was all plain to Trafford then. For a moment his own eyes faltered and refused to meet Noll's, and he showed some signs of emotion. But his voice and tone were as calm as ever when he said, a few minutes after, "You did this?
Ben prevented such a disaster, however, by picking up the roll and placing it in Noll's hand, with, "It's worth savin', lad, fur 'tain't every bush that grows sech blossoms, eh?" "I should think not," said Noll, still full of amazement, and hurriedly opened his letter to see where this bounty hailed from, while Ben walked off to assist in his craft's unlading.
Noll's bright fancies had all fled, and his heart was suddenly very heavy. He looked back across the sea toward Hastings, longingly, and thus verified the skipper's prediction. If Uncle Richard had only been there to greet him, he thought, chokingly, it would not have mattered so much, but now, it was all forlorn and dreary enough. "'Tain't much uv a town arter all; is it?" drawled Mr.
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