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The look on his face attracted every eye. Pausing for a moment, he turned to Polhemus and spoke to him for the others: "Isaac, I got a letter just now. Fogarty brought it over. You knew my boy Bart, didn't ye, the one that's been dead nigh on to twenty years?" The old surfman nodded, his eyes still fastened on the captain.
Uncle Isaac shook his head when he swept his eye round at all this loveliness; then he turned on his heel and took a look at the aneroid fastened to the wall of the sitting-room of the Life-Saving Station. The arrow showed a steady shrinkage. The barometer had fallen six points. "What do ye think, Captain Holt?" asked the old surfman.
He was often to be seen now in the park, the centre of an admiring and appreciative group, to whom he related thrilling adventures which were his own experience as a sailor and a surfman, holding his audience spell-bound, not only by their interest in the subject, but also by his quaint and simple manner of telling.
With head bent low in deference to the force of the blast, and eyes narrowed to slits, the surfman searched the seething sea for the shadowy outlines of a vessel in trouble. Perchance as he looked his eye caught the dark bulk of a ship in a sea of foam, or the faint lines of spars and rigging through the spume and frozen haze the unmistakable signs of a vessel in distress.
Two of the crew were to make the tramp of the beach, separating opposite the Station, one going south two and a half miles to meet the surfman from the next Station, and the other going north to the inlet; exchanging their brass checks each with the other, as a record of their faithfulness.
Deep water lies on both sides of the bar, and after the shoal is passed the broken water settles down a little and gathers speed for its rush for the beach. These conditions were favourable for surf-boat work, and as the surfman told his tale the keeper or captain of the crew decided what to do.
But the loquacious surfman had moved out of earshot and they heard no more of his tale. Another voice was speaking now, a crisp voice that held a note of impatience. "No conveyance available to take me to St. Pierre? How annoying! How far did you say it was? Two miles? In this wind " The voice broke off, but the speaker moved forward toward the little group behind the bluff.
Archie kept on to the house, and the captain, after another sweep around, turned on his heel and reentered the sitting-room. "Green!" "Yes, captain." The surfman was on his feet in an instant, his ears wide open. "I wish you and Fogarty would look over those new Costons and see if they're all right.
This served to warn the crew of the vessel of their danger, or notified them that their distress was observed and that help was soon forthcoming; it also served, if the surfman was near enough to the station, to notify the lookout there of the ship in distress.
"I've often heard of your son, and of his going away and of your giving him up for dead. I'm mighty glad for you," and he grasped his chief's hand and shook it heartily. As the lad's fingers closed around the rough hand of the captain a furtive look flashed from out Morgan's eyes. It was directed to Parks they were both Barnegat men and was answered by that surfman with a slow-falling wink.
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