On that second day of June it befell that I was stirring early, and I was out at dawn, for I had much to do; but I did not do it then, as I had meant. When I was come out into the fresh breath of morning, and was walking over the dewy grass to my shed, of a sudden my soul was drenched with the sense of a great truth, even as my feet and legs were drenched with dew. And the truth was this: All work is useless. It is but a waste of time that might be better spent in watching the sun come up through the mists of morning to rule over his kingdom; or in seeing him sink behind the bearded hills in the golden haze of evening. At eithertime the old earth is at peace, and the waters stilled or just waking, but the dawn is the better. I would contemplate the majesty of the sunrise and consider upon it. It restoreth my soul.
So my cares slipped from off my shoulders as a garment, and I turned my steps to the steep path, and came to the shore, and over the sand and pebbles to my clam beds at the point; and I hurried, for I would not miss the rising of the sun. But I did miss it, and saw the sun shining through a thick haze, with his lower edge just risen out of the sea. The tide was high, and the waters whispered gently at my feet, and stretched away in all manner of opalescent colors until, toward the south, they were lost in a tender pearl-gray that seemed to cover everything.
One needs to be alone at such a time; alone or with one other. And Eve had not divined my intention any more than I had, but she had been sleeping sweetly, with one white arm curved above her head upon the pillow, and she had smiled in her sleep, and I had withdrawn cautiously and quietly. She supposed that I would be working at my preparations. Working! And I laughed silently to myself. But I wished that I had known what I should do. Perhaps she would not have minded being waked.
So I stood there, scarcely moving, looking out into that tender pearl-gray, until the sun was half an hour high or more. Some of the magic was gone, and I knew that it was to be hot; hot and moist and sticky. Anda fisherman crawled out into the bay, and then another, their sails hanging in wrinkles. They were not afraid of submarines. Who could be afraid of submarines in that quiet, opalescent water, that pearl-gray haze? Submarines there!
I laughed and turned away. Work no longer seemed so useless a waste of time. I must be at mine. There are many things to be seen to besides the digging of clams. I marched back along the shore, and up the path, and through the wet grass. The grass must be cut. Usually I keep it cut, but there is a dearth this year of men who work by the day, and I can get no man to help me. What is done I shall have to do myself.
So I came to the hole scooped in the ground just without the shadowof my pine, and I cleared it out, the accumulation of the winter, down to the lining of great stones. And I brought out the plain wooden benches, and the great pine planks laid on wooden horses, to serve as tables, and I set them in their places, and I rubbed the tops of the tables till they were all shining white. And a big wagon came with a load of seaweed—rockweed—all fresh and wet and dripping, its little brown bladders soft and swollen, and the load of wet weed was dumped in a slippery pile. There were chickens also to come, and lobsters, and fish, whatever kinds the fishermen brought in, but no bluefish caught in the bay these many years; and many loaves of brown bread. But all those things would come later, and I had noconcern with them save to bake them—but not the brown bread. So I looked about, and seeing all things done that were to do at that time, I went in to breakfast.
I was restless, and dragged Eve out, and we went prowling along the shore, although it yet lacked an hour of the time set for the assembling of our company; but there was Old Goodwin leaning against a tree above the clam beds, gazing out over the water.
I followed his gaze, and I saw his ocean steamer lying there, at anchor. She had come in since sunrise, for the water then had been empty of steam yachts. And men were swarming over her rail and were getting settled upon stagings—planks—that hung there.
Old Goodwin turned to us. "Good-morning," he said, smiling his quiet smile of peace.
"Good-morning," I returned. "It seems like afternoon to me. It is a long time since sunrise. Your boat wasn't there then. What are they doing to her? Painting a gold band around her?"
He smiled once more. "No gold," he said. "She needed paint. I thought that gray would be a good color. It wears well, and doesn't show bruises."
"He has given her to the navy," Eve whispered. Her eyes were shining.
"I thought I might as well," said Old Goodwin as if apologizing. "I have given up New York—for a time anyway—and shall not need her.That is the matter I spoke of. I shall want your advice, Adam."
"Now?" I asked. "It is rather sudden."
He laughed. "Not now. There is hardly time. There comes the Arcadia."
I had seen her looming through the haze. She seemed to be coming rapidly, and there was little wind. I mentioned it.
"Fergus had a motor put in her this year," Old Goodwin answered. "He hated to. Said it was spoiling a beautiful boat, but he had to do it."
Then there was a noise up the path, and Tom Ellis appeared with Cecily.
"Hello, people," he said. "Are we the first? I was afraid we would be, but I couldn't hold Cecily any longer."
Cecily smiled. "Don't take any notice of him, Eve, and he'll run down pretty soon."
"And," Tom went on, "Cecily could have painted for another half hour and earned fifty dollars more. You see what a sacrifice I have made for you."
"And your country."
"Country comes first, doesn't it, Adam? Ought to, but I'm afraid the clams had a good deal to do with it. What do you think of my uniform?"
Tom had on the worst looking clothes that I have ever seen on a respectable man who did no work. They were soaked with a mixture of oil and grease and dirt, and spattered with mud, which covered them in great patches here and there, andone sleeve of his coat was torn nearly off. It looked as if a machinist, in his oily jumper, had rolled in wet clay. His rubber boots were those of a mixer of mortar and concrete.
"I am lost in admiration, Tom," I said. "The others will hardly be able to equal that."
"No," Tom returned proudly; and he threw down his rake. He had brought an instrument very like a potato digger, a short-handled rake with huge tines. "The only private, you know. I thought my uniform ought to have distinction. Cleaned up Mr. Goodwin's cars for the purpose." Old Goodwin laughed suddenly at that. "Then I whitewashed the henhouse, with this artistic result. It's quite fun whitewashing henhouses. Ever try it, Adam? Did itwith a pump and hose. Whitewash on the windows is an inch thick."
I laughed. "I have had that pleasure in the distant past, and I don't want any more of it. But you have not accounted for the mud."
Tom surveyed the mud and shook his head.
"Can't account for it," he said. "Haven't been near any mud. I can't imagine how it got there, unless Cecily borrowed the clothes. But this party, Adam, is a sort of farewell party for me. I've enlisted. I go to-morrow."
"Go to-morrow!" I cried. "Where? And what have you enlisted for?"
"That is somewhat ambiguous as a question, but I will answer all its meanings. I've enlisted because my country needs me. All the posterssay so. That one of the old gentleman in the star-spangled hat looking right at you and pointing right at you, and saying, 'Your country needs YOU,' or words to that effect, was what got me finally. I couldn't get away from it. He was pointing at me and looking at me, wherever I went. And I've enlisted for four years, and—"
"Fouryears!" gasped Cecily, wide-eyed. "You never told me that, Tom."
"Didn't I? It must have been an oversight, Cecily. You won't mind, will you? And I've enlisted to go to Newport and drive some admiral or other around in a large gray car. Oh, it's not half bad. When the submarines begin to school off Nantucket, perhaps they'll let me go out there once in a while and get a load."
"Tom," said Eve, patting his arm, her eyes shining again, "I think it's splendid. I could kiss you for it."
"Wait, Eve, until Cecily's not around," Tom whispered; "and perhaps Adam could be spared.Then, if you like—"
"I'm going to Newport to-morrow," Cecily broke in decidedly. "I'm going tolivethere."
"Oh, I say!" said Tom. And Old Goodwin offered to take them both over next day in his new car, and let Tom drive. And he offered further to ferry Cecily back and forth as often as she liked, and to lend them a car if they wished.
So everybody was happy,—excepting perhaps Tom and Cecily,—and the Arcadia was just rounding to her anchorage, and we watched whilethe shining mahogany launch put off. But, before coming in, the launch went slowly along the whole length of Old Goodwin's ocean steamer. I could see Captain Fergus looking at the work as though he were inspecting it, and once he boomed forth a question, which was answered as if he had a right to ask it, and then the launch made for the landing.
I wondered at it, but I wondered more at Eve. For Eve has pacifist leanings, as I have reason to know and as I have said before; and here she was with all the signs of approval for Tom's action, and ready to kiss him for it. It might be that Eve was entirely willing that the war should be fought vicariously, and that she would sacrifice all her friends in the cause—but not her family. Thatwas not like Eve. I refused to believe it of her. And I turned away and was musing upon this matter when there came down the path Captain Fergus and Mrs. Fergus, and Jimmy Wales and Bobby and Ogilvie; and, some distance behind them, Elizabeth and Olivia. And that was strange, too, that those two girls should be coming by themselves when Bobby and Jack Ogilvie were just ahead; but I could not be bothering myself about all the queer things that people did—or did not do. They did not concern me. There were enough things that did concern me to bother about.
All the company were there. I drew near to Eve.
"If Alice Carbonnel were here now," I said, "and Harrison, we should be complete."
"Alice!" Eve returned. "I wish that I knew!"
Alice Carbonnel was in Belgium, the last we knew, and Harrison Rindge, her husband, was hunting for her. I hope he has found her—safe. We are very fond of Alice Carbonnel, Eve and I.
"There is somebody else to come, Adam," said Eve. "You would never guess. It is my mother."
I smiled, remembering another day when I had met Eve just at that spot to take her to another clambake; a smoking dome upon a point, beneath a pine.
The point and the pine belonged to a queer fellow that I knew—knew well, I thought sometimes, and sometimes not.
And so I smiled, remembering."Eve," I said, "do governesses have mothers?"
And she smiled too, and she slipped her hand within my arm, and looked up at me with that light in her eyes that makes them pass all wonders.
"Oh, Adam," she said, "that was a happy day—for me. Oh, but it was hard, and I was afraid."
"A happier day for me," I said, pressing her arm close to my side. "But here comes your mother."
And Mrs. Goodwin came sailing down the path, with our little daughter skipping beside her, and she smiled as she came, which was not what she had been used to do in that time that I remembered. And our company being all assembled, and the beds being uncovered, although the tide was not yet at its lowest, I gave the orderto dig. So we dug, even Mrs. Goodwin digging three clams, and she was not clad as a clammer should be clad, but she had some rubber boots, new ones and thin as gossamer, which a clamshell cut through. And thereafter she sat upon the bank and cheered us on, and gibed at our raiment; as if the body were not more than raiment.
We dug for an hour, and got clams enough for a regiment. All the baskets were filled to overflowing. And we stopped digging, one by one, and straightened our backs slowly, with many creaks and groans, and we drifted to the bank and in and out; and when the drifting process was over, I found myself next to Eve, with Elizabeth on the other side of her, and Ogilvie completing the circle. Bobby stood afar off, looking outover the water as if he were seeing his best friend swallowed by a submarine; and Olivia watched him from a distance.
"I notice, Jack," Elizabeth observed, "that Olivia has a lonesome look."
Ogilvie turned and looked, and turned back again and smiled.
"She has, hasn't she? Bobby too."
Elizabeth never quivered. "Don't you want to relieve her loneliness?"
He shook his head. "Icouldn't relieve it. I told you. I'll try later—her last chance."
Elizabeth laughed. I was picking up a bushel basket filled with clams. Clams are a heavy fruit. Ogilvie seized one handle.
"Here!" cried Elizabeth. "I'm going to take that side. I want to helpAdam. You go with Eve, Jack. She has something for you to carry."
Ogilvie protested, and so did I, but she was firm.
"I want to go with you, Adam. You needn't think I can't carry my side, for I can."
So we set off, Eve and Jack Ogilvie with a market basket of clams and various hoes, and Elizabeth and I carrying that bushel of clams between us. Elizabeth was strong, I found, and sure-footed; surer than I. The others came straggling after, carrying their loads.
"Elizabeth," I began, "what is the matter with Bobby?"
She smiled and turned to observe Bobby. "I'm sure I don't know. He seems to be well occupied with Olivia." Then she changed suddenly."That was not honest, Adam," she said. "I do know, but it is nothing that I can help. He will get over it in time—perhaps. I wish he would, for it is not amusing as it is."
And she sighed softly, and then she smiled up at me. It was a brave attempt, and almost a success.
"And Ogilvie?" I asked softly.
She laughed, and spoke low. "Jack has found a little yeogirl. He was telling me about her. She is the loveliest thing that ever was, and the sweetest and the gentlest. She may be all that, of course, but there are some lovely, sweet, and gentle girls of his own kind. But, at any rate, Olivia is nothing to him now. It has done him that much good already."
I was silent, thinking. I wondered how I should like it if Pukkie, beingof age and his own master, should elect a yeogirl to the high place in his regard now held by his mother and me; should elect the yeogirl to a higher place. It would be a blow. I could not deny it. But we had been ascending the steep path, and we set our bushel of clams beside the hole lined with stones and the slippery pile of brown rockweed. I sighed as we set the basket down, and so did Elizabeth. Then we both laughed.
"I'm glad that's done," said Elizabeth.
"Amen!" said I.
Then came Tom Ellis and Cecily, and set their basket down; and Tom, without stopping, went to my pile of cordwood, and brought an armful and laid the sticks in order on the stones.
"Come, Adam," he said, soberly."Remember, it's my last clambake for four years."
"Don't say it, Tom!" cried Cecily sharply. "I'll help you with your wood."
So there was a procession of us going to the woodpile and back, and the sticks were laid in order, three layers, on the stones; then another layer of great stones, each stone as big as a football, on the top of the wood. Then I came with a can of kerosene, and sprinkled the wood liberally. Eve had some matches, and she held one out to Ogilvie.
"Light up, Ogilvie," said Tom. "It's your honor."
And Ogilvie lighted the pile, and Tom made some feeble joke about a funeral pyre, and Cecily almost wept; and the fire blazed up fiercely, andwe all drew back. It was hot enough without the fire, and would have been almost unbearable but for the southwest breeze which had started up, and which was sweeping gently, over my bluff. And we watched the fire, as anyone will watch any fire—there is fascination in it—but they began to drift away—to get off their rubber boots and to prepare themselves. No doubt they would have fasted if there had been time. And at last there were left only Old Goodwin and Tom and Ogilvie and I. Eve had gone into the house to fetch the things, and Cecily and Elizabeth with her.
When the fire had burned long and the stones were hot, we raked the ashes off; and shook down upon the stones fresh seaweed from the pile,and on the seaweed laid the clams. Then more seaweed; and the other things, in layers, orderly, with the clean, salt-smelling weed between; then the loose stones, hot stone footballs, and over all we piled the weed and made a dome that smoked and steamed and filled the air with incense. And the others, having rested from their labors, leaning on their forks or sitting on the ground, went their several ways; for they would garb themselves.
Eve did not place her guests. She considered, a pretty thoughtfulness in her eyes and about her mouth, and cast her place-cards in a little heap on the table, saying that they might place themselves; for she did not know what was going on, and feared to make a bad matter worse.
They did place themselves, after much hesitation and drifting about. Elizabeth sat next to me. She seemed to think me a kind of refuge. And Ogilvie sat at Eve's right,—she saw to that,—and Olivia next because she could not help it, and then Bobby. Where the rest sat did not matter. And Old Goodwin and Tom and I took our forks and opened the smoking dome, and set upon the table chicken and fish and lobsters and brown bread, and great pans of clams steaming in their gaping shells. Then all would have set themselves to the business of eating; but I had my instructions. I took an old dust-encrusted bottle from Eve's place, and opened it, and went about and poured into the glasses luminous golden stuff from that old bottle.Then Eve rose, and proposed Ogilvie's health. And we all drank it, but Ogilvie flushed and did not know what to do.
"Oh," he said to Eve, "I never had that done to me before."
And we all laughed, and fell to eating. We opened the clams with our fingers, and took the clam by the head, and gave him a swirl in the saucer of melted butter, and threw our heads back, and took his body into our mouths, and bit him off and cast the head aside, and took the next one. All there had had much experience in the process, and the clams that had seemed enough for a regiment were soon eaten, and there was a prodigious pile of shells under the table so that one could not move his feet without rattling. And thelobsters were gone, and the chickens, and most of the fish, and much of the brown bread. And first one sat back with a sigh, and smiled, and then another; and at last all were sitting, smiling at nothing and doing nothing else—all but Bobby and Olivia. Bobby, it is true, had a smile graven upon his face, but it was a smile of the face and not of the heart; and Olivia seemed out of sorts and did not take the trouble to smile at all. And the bake was but an empty wreck. Then Eve rose quietly, and they all got themselves slowly upon their feet, and began to drift about the bluff.
My place is not very big, only the clipped lawn in front of the house, and about an acre on the south side ending in the bluff, and a couple ofacres to the north, where lies my garden and the rest a hayfield. I should have ploughed up that hayfield and put it into potatoes if I could have found anybody to do the ploughing. But it is just as well as a hayfield. Everybody has been planting potatoes this year. I almost expect to see the gutters sprouting potatoes as I ride along with Old Goodwin in his car. Potatoes will be cheap next winter. And if I had ploughed up that field it would have been even less inviting for our guests to wander over.
Not that any of them showed any disposition to wander over it. The older ones seemed well content to settle down again under my pine, Bobby was mooning alone at the edge of the bluff, Elizabeth was standingtalking with Jimmy Wales, and Jack Ogilvie was trying to persuade Olivia to walk to a little clump of trees. I had seen Eve showing him the clump of trees earlier in the day. At last they did walk off toward the trees, Olivia obviously discontented and watching Bobby out of the corner of her eye.
I drifted toward Eve, and she drifted toward me, and we came together, which might be reprehensible but was not strange. We generally do come together. She was clad all in light, filmy white, with two red roses at her bosom, and her hair a glory. And her eyes—there are no other such eyes as hers.
"Eve," I whispered, "do you want to be disgraced? How can you expect anything else when you dress asyou did for that other clambake that I remember, and your eyes smiling, and that light upon your hair?"
It was more than her eyes that smiled as she looked at me.
"Yes," she whispered in return. "I want to be. Shan't I show you our clump of trees?" She laughed as she finished.
I hesitated. "But Ogilvie—and Olivia."
"Stupid!" she said. "I did not show him every nook. Come!"
So we wandered about, but we brought up at a secluded nook in our clump, and Eve held up her face to mine. But when I had done it she put her finger on my lips and listened.
"Sh!" she breathed. And I sh-sh-ed, and heard Ogilvie's voice, but I could not distinguish any words.Then came Olivia's voice, shrill and petulant.
"They are not having a good time," Eve whispered.
"He is," I answered; for Ogilvie laughed. It was a merry laugh.
"We don't want to snoop, Adam," said Eve. "Let's—"
"Shall we join the others?" Ogilvie asked, still laughing.
"Youmay if you like," said Olivia in a voice filled with discontent.
"And leave you here?"
"And leave me here. I'll take care of myself."
"Very well. Good-bye, Olivia. I may not see you again."
"Not see me again? You mean to-day?" Was she regretting?
"I mean for a great many days. Perhaps never."
"Are you going away?"
"I can't tell you. I go where I am sent. Good-bye."
There was a silence. Then, as we stole out, the sound of a single sob. Then sounds of anger. As we emerged from one side Olivia emerged from the other. She made straight for Bobby, where he yet stood on the edge of the bluff, looking silently over the water.
A maid came running out of the house, and went to Jimmy Wales, and called him to the telephone. In two minutes he came hurrying out again.
"Bobby!" he called. "Jack! Come along. It's a hurry call for the Nantucket lightship. We'll go with you, Jack. Just as you are."
He whispered to me as he passed. "Submarines reported off the Nantucket lightship," he said. "All theavailable destroyers and chasers ordered there."
Elizabeth was standing near, and she heard. Jack and Bobby and Jimmy started on a run.
"Good-bye, Jack," Elizabeth called in a clear voice.
He turned and waved.
"Good-bye, Bobby," she called again, but her voice was not so loud.
He turned. "Good-bye," he said. It was like casting at her head a chunk of ice. Ice would not be the most disagreeable thing on that day, but one would prefer it in some other way than thrown at his head. Elizabeth seemed to think so, for she shrugged her shoulders almost imperceptibly, and I saw tears in her eyes as she turned away.
Captain Fergus hurried after theothers, and our other guests melted away. I found myself standing at the edge of the bluff, just where Bobby had been standing, and I gazed out over the waters of the bay—as if I could see the Nantucket lightship! Ogilvie's boat shot out at full speed, and I watched her until she was a gray speck vanishing into the grayness. Gazing out and seeing nothing, and thinking of submarines! It was absurd. They are not, and yet they haunt me. And I looked down at the little strip of marsh at the foot of my bluff, its waving greens turned to orange under the afternoon sun. A blackbird was flying over those green stems waving in the water. The tide was full, and the Great Painter spread his colors on the little waves. It breathed peace, and here was Ithinking of submarines. I cannot get rid of them. What if one of these reports turn out to be true? Why, anything might be happening out by the lightship.
And I saw the red shoulders of the blackbird as he flew. He lighted on a reed stem, which swayed down nearly to the surface of the water; and so swaying up and down, he sent out his clear whistle again and again. He is not troubled by the thought of submarines. His heart is not in turmoil over them.
Over my hayfield, that morning toward the last of June, a pleasant breeze was blowing, and from the southwest, as is the habit of breezes hereabout. A man clad in white flannels, and wandering slowly about, would have found that hayfield cool enough and pleasant, I have no doubt. I found it pleasant, but not cool, for I was mowing. For weeks I sought some one—any one—who would cut my grass, and cut it in June, for I have a prejudice in favor of June for cutting hay. In the last week of June the grass is in full flower—tiny blossoms of a pale violet color—and the stems are swollen with the juices, and rich and tender. I, in myignorance, believe that it makes more succulent hay than if cut in July, when the stalks have begun to dry up and become thin and wiry. Besides, if it is cut in June it is out of the way, and I can use my hayfield for a ball-field if I am so minded.
I am no mower, and I have not known what a scythe should be. I was dimly aware that my old scythe was not everything that could be desired, for I remember that when I took it to be ground the man applied it lightly to his stone, then harder, then cursed and bore on with all his might, and cursed again and sweated for half an hour, and charged me ten cents, holding the scythe out to me as if he never wanted to see it again. He observed that it was the hardest scythe he ever see; and I smiled andthanked him, and thought no more of the matter, and walked off with my scythe. And I struggled with that scythe for ten years, never being able to keep it sharp, and spending much more time with the whetstone than I did in mowing, but I did but little mowing, only trimming around here and there. I nevergotthe scythe sharp. I know that now, but I did not know it then, attributing the fault to my own lack of skill.
I got a new scythe the other day, being unwilling to whet through two acres. I can get it as sharp as a razor in half a dozen strokes of the stone. When I tried it the other afternoon, just before dinner, I found myself laughing, and I should have gone at the hayfield then if Eve had not stopped me. Now I go about withmy scythe in my hand, and hunt for clumps of grass tall enough to cut, for the hayfield is shorn close and tolerably smooth, and the grass lies in the sun and gives off all manner of sweet odors.
The mowing of that hayfield with that new scythe was simply a joy—a delight. I swung to and fro with the rhythmic motion of rowing—mowing is not unlike rowing, and one swings about thirty or more to the minute—with my eyes on the ground, and I listened to the sounds: a soft ripping with a little metallictingas the scythe advanced, and a gentleswishas it swung back again. Yes, mowing is a delight—with a good scythe; but it is a hot sort of amusement. If I could regulate matters mowing time should fall inNovember. All mowing should be done by hand, and mowing should be compulsory for all able-bodied men. They would be the better for it.
I stood for a few minutes, leaning on my scythe and letting the breeze blow through me and gazing down the bay. Then I went at my mowing again and the scythe sang a new song. It wassub—marine; sub—marine, over and over. And I kept at my mowing mechanically while I thought my thoughts. There had been no reports of submarines since the day of Eve's party, and nothing further said of the report of that day. Even Bobby would say no more than that they did not find any; and when I would have rallied him, remarking that I feared he had not baited his traps properly, he glowered at me,which hurt my feelings. It was not like Bobby to glower. But Bobby seemed tormented by that restlessness which seizes on men in a certain case. I did not laugh at him, for I feared lest he take it but ill, but I did counsel him to take to clamming; at which he gave me a smile that would have brought tears to Eve's eyes. He has not yet found that fount of eternal youth, and whether he will find it or not no one can guess. I hope he will, and that joy and peace will be in his abiding place forever. And the one who should show him the fount is not far to seek, as he well knows; but, as I think, and Eve too, he is stubborn and cherishes some fancied grievance, hugging it to his heart. The poor fool!
Then I stopped mowing, andstraightened my back, and rested. And, on a sudden, that talking machine of my neighbor began pouring forth a strident voice, and I looked and there was the little Sands girl watching me over the wall. She no longer throws things. But I was not giving an exhibition of mowing, and I nodded to her, and went back to my garden. Melons are a lottery; but I looked at my peas—my second look that morning—to make sure that they will be ready for the Fourth, and I took a turn about the garden. And all the while I listened, much against my will, to that strident voice. And when it had finished that particular humorous selection, I fled, my scythe on my arm, for fear that I should have some sort of secret liking for the next selection; and I came tomy pine, and I sat me down on the seat, and again my gaze ran across the waters of the harbor, well ruffled by the breeze and dancing in the sun, to the shore opposite; and down that curving line of shore to the lighthouse on its rock; and over the blue-gray water beyond, that was lightly veiled in haze, to the islands floating high. And on the water between the lighthouse and the islands I saw the Arcadia. She was coming fast, with all her light canvas set, a thing of beauty. It would be a fast submarine I thought, that could damage her—in any sort of breeze. Then I thought idly of Captain Fergus, and of Elizabeth and Olivia, and Bobby and Ogilvie, and of Eve and Pukkie. That is the goal—Eve and Pukkie and Tidda—little Eve.
Elizabeth has been our guest for the past two weeks when she has not been on the Arcadia. She puzzles me yet. What is she doing here so long—a poor girl, seeming to be loafing out the summer? She should be conducting her classes in swimming. It is likely enough that the same question has been a puzzle to Bobby; but he takes it harder than I. I am content to let the question go unanswered and have her stay with us. She is a good comrade, and a comfort to Eve, and she is fond of Tidda, and Pukkie is her willing slave. For Pukkie is at home again.
He came on the twelfth. I remember that we had had a hard rain for two days before, and that all the ploughed land was no better than a bog, and all the fields were coveredwith water under their cover of grass, so that the water was running out through the crevices of the stone walls, through each crevice a rivulet. But not my field, and my garden was no bog. And I waited, sitting just where I was at that moment and gazing idly at the same things that were there before my eyes. I could not work in peace, nor sit in peace for many minutes at a time, but I spent the morning going like a shuttle from garden to pine and wandering the shore, then back again.
Eve had gone with Old Goodwin in his fastest car to bring him back—"him" being Pukkie, my son. But as the time approached for his arrival I sat upon the bench and simulated peace and content, and gave no outward sign of other; but every musclewas tense, and every nerve on edge; I listened so hard that it hurt, and I wished devoutly that Old Goodwin's car was not so perfect and so silent, and I resolutely kept my gaze fixed upon the distant hills, and did not see them.
At last I heard the latch of the gate click faintly, as though somebody had tried to lift it without noise, and I heard an excited chuckle, instantly subdued. And I turned quickly, forgetting that I had resolved not to turn, and there was Pukkie running toward me. And I whipped up and ran, and I sank upon one knee and held my arms wide. And Pukkie ran into them at full speed, almost knocking me over, and he threw his arms around my neck, and he hugged me. He hugged me so tight that I wasnearly strangled; but not quite—not so nearly but that I could hug him close and whisper in his ear.
"Oh, Pukkie!" I whispered. "My dear little son! My well beloved!"
For answer he but hugged me the harder, and gave an excited little laugh that was near to tears. That was enough for me. Indeed, I was not so far from tears. I looked up at Eve, who had followed close, and tears stood in her eyes, but she was smiling. Oh, such a smile! A smile that belongs to wives and mothers—of a certain kind. And, seeing her, I gave thanks. But that is nothing new that I give thanks for that, for I have done the same many times a day for many years.
Then Old Goodwin came up behind Eve.
"If you and Pukkie can spare the time," he said to me, "I should be glad to have you ride home with me—you and Eve. I have something to show you."
Pukkie went somewhat eagerly, and Eve and I, having devoted ourselves to following our son about, went after, not so eagerly. And Old Goodwin took us down to his boathouse, which is at the head of his stone pier and gives upon his artificial harbor, and out of the car and into the boathouse.
"Grandfather," said Pukkie, trying in vain to keep all signs of excitement out of his voice, "is it my dory that we're going to see? Is it?"
Old Goodwin smiled to himself. "Well, no, Pukkie. It isn't yourdory. I didn't manage that. But it's something of that nature."
"Oh," said Pukkie in low tones of disappointment, "I didn't know but—" Old Goodwin had opened the door at the other side. "Oh! What's that?"
Made fast to the stage there lay a perfect little sloop about twenty feet long which seemed to be an exact reproduction in miniature of a large boat. Every sail was there which the large boats carried, every rope and block and stay, although they had drawn the line at a separate topmast. I realized at a glance that there were too many ropes and blocks and stays for her size. It would take more of a crew to handle her easily than she could carry.
But Pukkie realized nothing of thekind. He ran toward her, and stood beside her, touching with a fearful hand her smooth deck, and the pretty blocks and cleats of shining brass, and smiling.
There was even a gangway ladder, and her gunwale not much more than a foot above the water.
Pukkie turned his shining face to me.
"Oh, daddy," he cried, "look at her dear little jibs. Aren't they cunning?"
They were cunning and tiny.
Old Goodwin, simple-hearted gentleman that he was, was as pleased as Pukkie. He seemed delighted.
"There are other sails," he said, smiling and eager. "In the sail locker you will find a gafftopsail and a jibtopsail and a flying jib.We couldn't very well manage any more," he added to me.
"They are quite enough," I returned, "for her size—and for her crew to manage."
"She is rather deep for her length," Old Goodwin went on. "A boy can stand straight in her cabin, and a man very nearly. Go aboard, Puk, and see. Go down into the cabin."
So Pukkie, excited and solemn, went aboard, stepping carefully, and opened the cabin doors, and disappeared. We followed him on deck and looked down. There was a little table in the middle which would fold up out of the way, and there were two small transoms with little netted hammocks for the sleeper's clothes, like a sleeping-car. And there was a silver pitcher for ice water, and racksfor glasses and dishes, and shelves with brass rails around them, and lockers tucked away in every corner, and a door at the forward end which should have led to the galley. Old Goodwin saw my look of incredulity, and he smiled.
"There is a galley," he said, "although a very small one. But I think a boy could manage it. About the size of a cupboard." Old Goodwin pushed the slide farther back. "We had to put this slide on her," he said apologetically, "or there couldn't have been a cabin of any use to anybody. I was sorry."
I was not sorry. It would help to keep the seas off. But Pukkie took one last look around, drew one long, quivering breath, and came up.
"Oh, see!" he cried.
I turned and looked where he was pointing. There was the little wheel, which we had seen before; and there too was a tiny binnacle with its compass, cunningly contrived to take no room, set just forward of the wheel.
"Do you like it, Pukkie?" Old Goodwin asked somewhat wistfully. "Do you think that you'll like her as well as you would have liked a dory?"
"Like her!" cried Pukkie. "Like her! Oh, grandfather!"
And he leaped at his grandfather, and seized him about the neck, and hid his face; and Old Goodwin patted Pukkie's shoulder, somewhat awkwardly, and smiled at Eve and me. I wonder what is the market value of the time that Old Goodwin wastes upon his grandson.
Then Pukkie would go sailing atonce. It did not matter that it was time for luncheon, although my clock that I carry beneath my belt told me that it was. He was not hungry. It did not occur to him to wonder about me, or he would have offered to get me a luncheon in his galley. So we set forth to sail the raging main; a little sail of half an hour, with Eve and Old Goodwin to see us off.
So we set all the little sails, but we did not get out from the sail locker that gafftopsail and the jibtopsail and that wonderful flying jib. The wind was moderately strong. And we glided out from Old Goodwin's harbor with me at the wheel, and Pukkie sitting beside me with shining face. The little boat was handy, and she went about her business with no fuss, and the water began to hisspast under her rail. And I sat the straighter. Truly, what is luncheon?
We passed some fishermen going out—the same way that we were going, and we passed them as if they were at anchor; and they gazed in amazement and I saw them pointing. I headed for a lighter that I saw dimly through the light haze—she was anchored by a wreck, as I chanced to know—and I gave up the wheel to Pukkie.
He had never steered with a wheel, but I undertook to teach him—although the art of steering, whether with a wheel or with a tiller, cannot be taught. One learns to steer by feeling. And Pukkie was alert and anxious to learn. I told him to keep the boat headed for the lighter, at which he looked at me in surprise,and suggested that it might be too far to get back in half an hour. It was; but I did not tell him so.
Thereafter, for some time, the boat cut some astonishing capers, which must have set those fishermen to wondering. We passed the fish traps, with men in rowboats busy with taking in the catch; and we passed innumerable terns, or, rather, they passed us, and they were fishing and sending forth their harsh metallic cry; and we saw a pair of fishhawks, and they too were fishing. All fishing. Truly, the business of the waters is catching fish. And Pukkie was getting the hang of the wheel and steering a straighter course, so that he could give some attention to other matters.
There were rocks which looked like monsters just risen from thedeep, and with the water washing over their backs.
"They look like submarines," said Pukkie. "Don't they, daddy?"
I explained to him the appearance of the back of a modern submarine; but the rocks did remind me of submarines. Everything reminds me of submarines. And we saw, afar off upon the water, a small gray speck. And the speck grew until it became a motor-boat, painted a dark gray. Why they paint them a gray that is almost black is a mystery. There is no concealment in it. This motor-boat was small, and was heading right for us, it seemed.
"Is that a chaser, daddy?" Pukkie seems to have the jargon pat. Probably he learned it at school. "It isn't very fast, is it? It couldn'tcatch a submarine, could it? It wouldn't be any use to chase with that." His words held a depth of scorn. Always submarines. I cannot get away from them. "Why don't you go out and chase them, daddy? I should think you would like to. I would."
I am thankful that he cannot. I gave him some answer that seemed to satisfy him.
"That chaser is trying to meet us," he resumed. "Whichever way I go, she goes too."
It did look so; but it was a small boat and slow. I thought that we could beat her likely enough, if it came to a chase, but Pukkie would not have it so. He wanted to meet her, and asked me to steer.
We met in a few minutes, and thepleasant-faced ensign hailed me and asked if I had a license or a permit or something. I knew nothing of any permit, and I told him so, and he said that they were required, and we had to turn about and sail back again. It was just as well, for we were like to be over our half-hour; and we got in well ahead of the motor-boat.
Since that day I have been out with Pukkie every afternoon, for he must be taught to sail if he has a boat. He is well used to going with me in my dory and he swims passing well for a boy of ten. He will be eleven in October. And Elizabeth has taken him in hand. She sails nearly as well as she swims, and she sails with him nearly every morning; and sometimes Eve and she go with us in theafternoon. I feared a little at first to take so many, for I thought it might swamp the boat; but the boat will carry all she will hold.
I had got to this point in my meditations, and I was well rested, and I was somewhat cooler than I was; and my scythe rested against the bench beside me, and I gazed down the bay at the Arcadia, and I wondered idly about Captain Fergus. If Elizabeth was a mystery, he was no less. He did not seem the sort of man to be sailing idly about in a beautiful, fast yacht when everybody else was busy in looking for something to fight; everybody but Old Goodwin and me, and Old Goodwin is nearly seventy. Fergus is a fighter if ever I saw one, the very kind of man that would stick out his jaw and damn the torpedoes.
Since Tom Ellis is gone, I have no moral support against my conscience—if it is my conscience that makes me vaguely uncomfortable—except the knowledge of Eve's pacifist attitude. I try not to say anything that would give her concern, but it is hard sometimes. It gets harder as time goes on. Gardening is well enough, but I hate to be left alone and gardening. Gardening seems but a poor occupation for a man when other matters are afoot, although it is better, perhaps, than acting as chauffeur for a lot of naval officers. But Tom seems to like it well enough, and says that he has put himself entirely in their hands, and does whatever he is called upon to do, without a thought for the morrow, which is, no doubt, the proper attitude. Cecilylikes it too, and spends most of her time in Newport, going to and fro in Old Goodwin's car. I went over with them one day, and the first thing my eyes alighted upon was the Arcadia just come to anchor, and Captain Fergus landing at the War College. Perhaps his conscience was too much for him. Fergus is a year or two older than I am, and—confound it!—there is some fight left in me yet. If there were only something more than phantoms to fight! And this frantic search for what is not!
I heard the sound of a screen door slamming, and looked around the tree-trunk, and saw Pukkie running over the grass toward me; and behind him there came, at a somewhat more sedate pace, Eve and Elizabeth.
"Daddy," Pukkie called as soonas he saw me, "don't you want to go swimming? We're going. Tidda's at grandmother's."
Being indulged, of course, with unlimited cookies and raisins and anything else she took a fancy to. Grandmothers have a talent for indulging, and Tidda has a genius for accepting indulgences.
"I do, Pukkie. That is exactly what I want. I have been mowing. Is your mother going swimming? You going in, Eve?"
"Yes, she's going." And Eve smiled and nodded.
So I put my scythe in the shed, and we went down the steep path, and along the shore where the water lapped high; and past my clam beds to the bathhouse near the stone pier. The bathhouse is Old Goodwin's, asany might guess, and the little beach is Old Goodwin's, and the float-stage a little way out, with its springboard. It is good bathing at that little beach only when high water covers the sand. Beyond the sand are great pebbles covered with rockweed and barnacles.
Eve came out hesitating, her eyes smiling and tender as she looked at me; but a dark green cap covered her glorious hair except some wisps which ever bother her with their straggling, and the sun shone upon the wandering locks and framed her head in fine spun copper.
"Don't you think, Adam," she asked timidly, "we might go in here? It is a good tide—and I'm afraid I can't manage the float."
Eve does not swim very well,although confidence is all she lacks to make her a passable swimmer. And I was quite willing, but Elizabeth would not hear of it, promising that she would look out for Eve; and she had us all in the boat and rowing out before we could make our objections heard.
And no sooner were we well clear of the beach, than Elizabeth dived, and when she came up again,—it was some distance that she was under water—she called to Pukkie. And Pukkie, with supreme confidence in Elizabeth, stood up on the seat and dived over the side, and swam beside her.
Eve seemed to have more confidence in Elizabeth than she had in me, which is not strange, for I have observed that, in matters of skill or knowledge or judgment, a womanwill trust the veriest stranger before her husband, although in this matter of skill and knowledge Elizabeth was well past me.
So Eve trusted herself utterly to Elizabeth, and she made some progress in her swimming. And we all floundered about there in the cool, clean water until Elizabeth said that Eve was cold, and then we all drew ourselves, dripping, on to the float, and there, but a little way off, was the Arcadia anchored, and her sails nearly furled.
As I gazed at her I thought I saw something queer about her topmast stays—a little thing. It looked almost like aerials for wireless. I asked Elizabeth about it.
She was looking at it too, almost with satisfaction.
"Yes," she said, "I see. It does look as if it might be."
Why should she know? And then the tender put off with Captain Fergus and Bobby and made for the landing, going rather close to us huddled on the float. They hailed us, Bobby very solemnly, but they did not stop.
There was a light of mischief in Eve's eyes.
"I'm going to have Bobby to dinner to-night," she whispered.
"If he'll come," I said in her ear.
"Oh, he'll come."
And he did.
Eve and I were standing alone together and silent and hand in hand upon the edge of my bluff, watching while the Great Painter spread his colors as he was wont to do. The still waters were covered with all mannerof reds and purples. The grasses of the little marsh below us waved gently above the shining mud, and now and then there broke a wave that ran in among the grass stems in ripples of color, and left the wet mud glistening in a coat of shimmering green, and set the grass waving anew.
As we stood there looking down, Bobby came silently and stood beside us, and breathed a long sigh, and gazed for a long time. Then he looked at Eve and smiled.
"Lovely," he said, "and peaceful. For the matter of that, it would be hard to find a more peaceful-looking place than the lightship—in good weather."
"Then, Bobby," I said, "I take it that not many periscopes have fallen to your bow and spear."
He shook his head. "I'm disgusted. I'm beginning to think that the Germans have no submarines, and that all these tales are fables. Your traps, Adam, are no good. I'd just like to get a chance to go across to the North Sea or Ireland or the Channel. I'll tell you in strict confidence—we have been warned not to talk about these things—a mine sweeper went to Boston a few days ago, on the way over. Nobody knows when she will leave Boston. I was greatly tempted to try for a place on her. But I'll get there yet."
"No doubt there would be occupation for idle hands over there. But what has become of Ogilvie? We have not seen him since the clambake."
"He's busy. He's going over—to go on a chaser. Lucky chap! He had his orders that very morning. Waiting for the chaser. But I'd be tried for high treason if you were to tell anybody—even Miss Radnor, for instance."
I had turned about, and there was Elizabeth. She must have heard it all, for she turned pale, and the light in her eyes went out suddenly, leaving them cold as stones. It was a pity.
She came forward slowly. "Why are you afraid of me, Mr. Leverett?"
"Afraid of you?" asked Bobby in surprise. "I am not. Why should I be?" It was a challenge. "We have been warned to be cautious."
"It was not I who was incautious," said Elizabeth.
Bobby smiled, and his smile was not pleasant to see, but he spoke in a faultless manner.
"You are never incautious," he said. "Trust you for that."
Then Pukkie came running, with Tidda after him, and they pitched upon Bobby and created a diversion, which we welcomed.
Our dinner was not a success, as may well be imagined. Elizabeth was cold and silent, which was not like her. We had come to know Elizabeth pretty well, and we liked her; and we knew Bobby very well, and we liked him. And it is unpleasant and awkward when people whom you like and who like each other—I knew it well enough—speak together little and look upon one another with hostility which is but illconcealed. And, dinner over, we withdrew to our candles, but Elizabeth went up with Tidda, and Pukkie followed her. Bobby laughed mirthlessly at that, and muttered something. It sounded to me like "latest victim."
We had a pleasant but short evening with Bobby, and he left early, making an excuse of duty. As we turned away we encountered Elizabeth, who murmured that she had just got the children to sleep, and said that she was going out for a few minutes.
"I was glad to hear that news of Jack," she said. "To say truth, I have known it for a long time. Jack told me." Truly, she was not incautious. "It will settle the yeogirl. That was a joke, he wrote me. But,whether it was or not, it will settle her."
"And Olivia?" I asked.
"Olivia is settled already. She has gone home."
Indeed, a conscience is a most distressing comrade. And, albeit a conscience is not for a fisherman,—he cannot afford it,—a clammer may be pricked and stabbed and plagued by that he would willingly get rid of. For I suppose it was my conscience that impelled me to buy—in secret, for I would not have Eve know of it lest it give her anxiety—a little card with two revolving discs and pictures of a signalman in every position that is possible to a signalman.
By diligent use of that card and much practice in the proper manner of waving my arms I hoped to make myself duly proficient in the art ofsignalling by the wigwag method.
I found the card at a nautical instrument store in the city on the day after our dinner; and as I looked at it somewhat doubtfully, the clerk pulled out a little book that gave the matter more at length. I bought them both, and I have been practising the motions for a week in secret. And that has its difficulties too, that I do it in secret, for if I practised in the house it was not secret, nor was it secret in my garden or in the hayfield or on my bluff. At last I hit upon that little clump of trees. No one could see me there.
To-day being the Fourth of July, I thought it fit that I practise more diligently than usual. So, having gathered my first peas, a generous mess of them, I repaired to the clumpof trees; and having propped the book upon a branch and hung the card upon a twig, I began. But no sooner had I got to work at it than somebody came running out of the house, softly calling, "Adam! Adam!" It was the voice of Eve, and she was waving a paper, for I could hear it rustling. And I swept the book off its branch and the card from its twig, tearing the card in my haste, and I stepped from my hiding-place on to the bluff, so that I should seem to be but gazing out over the water, as is my wont.
I was just putting the book and the card in my pocket when Eve came upon me, but she was so intent that she did not notice. The paper that she had is published in the nearest city, and it is a good paper, abetter paper than any published in Boston. It suits me even better than the London "Times," to which I subscribe, for although the "Times" has the war news in greater detail than we have it, it is usually three weeks old; and news which one has read three weeks before is old enough to have been forgotten.
She held the paper up before my eyes.
"See, Adam," she said. "Here is good news for the Fourth. Our transports have beaten the submarines, great flocks of them, and have sunk some of them, and they have arrived safely, every ship and every man."
I smiled at her enthusiasm. "That should be good news. To be sure, the submarines that were sunk carried their crews down with them to bedrowned like rats in a trap, and we used to think that Germans were pretty good—"
"Good!" she cried. "When they have committed so many murders on the sea!"
"Well, these Germans will commit no more murders. Let me see your paper."
There it was in great staring lines of type before my eyes. I had but just digested the headlines, and was preparing to read the solid columns when Eve snatched it away.
"I can't wait for you to read it all. I want to show it to father."
There was probably nothing there that Old Goodwin did not know already. He has a way of knowing things; but I said nothing of it. I smiled again at Eve, and let her go.
"Adam," she said anxiously, turning back, "youwouldn't commit murders on the sea, would you?Youcouldn't persuade yourself that it was right?"
"Well," I answered gravely, "I have none in contemplation, but I have not given the matter much consideration. If I were sailing the high seas, and were to meet—also sailing the raging main—Sands and his talking machine, I might—"
Eve laughed. "Yes, you might." And she came back and kissed me. "You're no sort of a murderer."
"You don't know, Eve," I protested, "what sort of a murderer I might be. I would not boast, and I speak in all modesty, but I try to do as well as I can whatever I set my hand to. I venture to saythat I should do my murdering thoroughly."
She laughed again, merrily, and again she kissed me.
"The murdering that you will do will not amount to that." And she snapped her fingers. "Jack Ogilvie is like to do more of it,—if you call that murder." She sighed and turned away. "Now I will go."
And she was gone down the steep path and along the shore, stopping now and then to wave at me. It hurt me somewhat not to go with her, but I must be at my signalling.
So, as soon as Eve was out of sight in the greenery, I began again, standing on the bluff where I was, an imprudent thing to do. I laid my book and my card upon the ground, and began to wave my arms gently,stooping now and then to the book to be sure that I had it right, and saying the names of the letters to myself as I waved. For each letter has a name in the signal book. And as I waved, I thought upon Eve's sigh that she had sighed as she turned away, and it seemed almost as if she were sorry that I was not as Ogilvie; but that could not be that she would have me go, for had she not said other? And, without knowing what I was doing, I proclaimed it to the world. "Eve would have me murder," was the sentence I was signalling. "Eve would have me murder on the sea even as Ogilvie." I was even shouting the names of the letters by this. And I looked and there was a big gray motor-boat just without the harbor, and Ogilvie himself standingup on her deck and watching me—and wondering, I had no doubt.
The motor-boat came on swiftly, and Ogilvie watched me as if he thought I had gone daft, while I, out of bravado I fear, signalled again that message about Eve, no better than a lie. And directly opposite my bluff the motor-boat came to a stop, and Ogilvie began to wave his arms, so that any that saw might well think there were two madmen in the harbor. And to my delight, I could read it, and read it easily. It was a brief message, it is true. "What!" said Ogilvie with his waving arms. "Repeat."
I did not repeat, but I sent him another message. "Come up here and I will explain. I am practising. Give me some more."
So he gave me more, and I could read it, although his messages were not simple. It filled my soul with an unreasonable joy, as a boy's when he finds that he has mastered at school some task which he thought that he had not. And we waved our arms at each other, two gone clean crazy, for a long time, and Ogilvie smiled more and more, until at last he laughed.
"Well done," he signalled. "I will be there in half an hour."
And the motor-boat started again, and I turned, smiling, well pleased with myself, and there sat Eve on the bench under the pine, and she was laughing.
"Adam," she said, "come here and sit beside me, and explain. Oh, bring your book." For in my awkwardness I was leaving it there onthe grass. "I saw it. I have been watching you."
And I turned meekly as that same boy at school caught in some mischief, and I went and sat beside her, but I did not explain.
"Where is Elizabeth?" I asked.
"Elizabeth," she said, "has gone sailing with Pukkie. You might have known it. Now, what were you doing, and why were you doing it?"
I have found the truth to serve me best, and I would not tell Eve other than the truth in any littlest thing. So I told her all, and showed her the matter all set forth in the book. And she was interested and pleased, and would learn wigwagging herself.
"You must teach me, Adam," she said, "and we will do it together."
And that pleased me mightily,that we do it together. And she clasped my arm in both her hands, and bent forward and looked up into my face. And in her eyes as she looked was even greater tenderness than was wont to be, and that was a marvel; and there was a great joy too.
"Tell me, Adam," she said softly. "Why did you do it? What set you at it?"
"The nature that God gave me," I said, "or conscience, which is the same thing. I do not know. It—it is hard, Eve, to be forty-three when one would be twenty-three—for a reason. As for the signalling," I added, "that is nothing much, save that we be learning it together."
"I know," she said. "A symptom."
I did not know what she meant, whether my conscience or thesignalling. But still she was looking up at me with joy in her eyes, and happiness; and she gave a little soft cry and a little happy laugh, and she squeezed my arm between her hands.
"Oh, Adam, Adam!" she cried low. "I love you—you don't know how much. And I don't wish thatIwas twenty-three. Do you know why?"
I could not guess.
"At twenty-three I was not married," said Eve. "I did not even know you."
What I did then any may guess. No doubt it was imprudent too. And we were once more sitting decorous, and about Eve's lips and in her eyes was that smile of joy and happiness.
"You will see, Adam," she said. "It will all come right."
"What will come right?" asked a voice. "Is anything wrong?"
And we turned, and there was Jack Ogilvie.
"I do not know what Eve meant," I answered him, "unless she referred to my signalling. No doubt that is wrong enough."