Evening Republican, Volume 15, Number 92, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 April 1911 — When the Light Shown [ARTICLE]

When the Light Shown

By LAWRENCE ALFRED CLAY

(Cawrmht, «sn, hr limoUuS Literary Prow.)

The fishing schooner Laura B. had coate Into port with her catch, and she had hardly been made fast to the wharf before the cottages a mile away were talking in whispers about an incident that had happened while she was still far at sea. The feeling of loyalty among the men that face the tempests and hardships of the Ashing grounds Is very strong. They have their differences and quarrels while at sea, but all Is forgiven when land Is sighted again. No landsman knows that all was not harmony. A fisherman will forgive a taunt, a curse, a blow —more than that — bat there is one thing he cannot forgive, and that is cowardice in the face of danger. No schooner captain asks a man if he is brave, when selecting a crew. The inference is that every man who wodld go down to the tempest-tossed sea is ready to imperil his life at demand and think Utile of it Cowardice can be overlooked in a landsman, but not in a fisherman. The landsman cowardice may have no results. That of a fisherman may make a dosed widows and three-score orphans. The Laura B. came home in a fierce gale and a terrible sea. The fishermen do not select their own weather. While taking his trick at the wheel young George Shaw looked behind him and saw a mountainous wave racing down on the vessel. That sight has frightened many a helmsman. .There is peril, but the howling gale and ravening sea magnifies it ten times over. The man had seen the same thing often enough and held fast,\but this time he flinched. Fishermen do not want explanations the eye cannot see. With a . shout of terror Shaw l4ft the wheel. In sixty seconds the schooner would have been a wreck had not the mate been at hand to jump to the abandoned wheel and hold on for the life of all,' even when the waters closed over his head and his sou'wester floated away amid the foam. It was touch and go, but the staunch craft won the fight. Was there a storm of curses for Shaw? Not a curse. Reproofs from captain and shipmates? Not a word. Did the man seek to explain what he realized would be looked upon as m cowardly act? He did not utter a syllable. He knew that any word he could utter would be thrown away. He had been marked down for a coward. That settled It In ten minutes he felt an outlaw. His shipmates spoke to him, but there was a drawing away. They did not look into his face when they spoke. Among themselves they said they would keep the secret and —was It the gulls that carried it from house to house when port was reached? High up on the hill was the cottage of the Widow Larkins. Her husband and his schooner had been lost In just such a gale when homecoming, perhaps from some act of cowardice. Jennie Larkins, her handsome daughter, ' oould row or sail a boat and as a fisherman's daughter she had a contempt for a man who flinched when gale and sea demanded wrecks and lives. It was known that George Shaw was her accepted lover. Would she excuse and forgive, asked those who whispered. Would the lover call at the house and explain? No! She didn’t look for him, and had he come 6he would have been greatly surprised. He didn't think of calling. On landing he took the trolley car for his home, six miles away. The incident was related to his permits in a plain, straight way. They had the sympathy of the bond, but they shock their heads and sighed. 1 A month passed, and then there came the great gale that will be remembered by children when they have grown to be men and women. It came out of the east like howling fiends. It uprooted great trees and unroofed buildings. It caught up great patches of foam from the raging sea and carried them inland for a mile. Oh. the greed of that gale! Thirty-five schooners and their crews were a part of the sacrifice. After the gale had raged for fortyeight hours and was still howling. George Shaw went down to the port. Almost the first thing he heard was that one of the lightkeepers on Tompkins Point was in the town, unable to return, and that the other was ill and telephoning for help. The mas was known to Shaw, and over the line of wire which might be broken any minute a voice in the lighthouse aaM to the men safe on land: 'tSoorge, I may have been poisoned by the canned tomatoes. I’m in ter rfble pain and have a raging fever. I don’t believe I shall live two hours longer. Get help to me!” Shaw went down to the shore among the fishermen. t>Bly * dory can land there, and whit dory ever built can face that seal There’s a hundred or us would go ts there was any chance." Shaw walked back to the telephone an<L said to the man in the lighthoijf# * “Jim, I’m going to make s try for it. There’s one chance in a thousand and I’m going to take It." gale and sea. Only-only, George. I

there’ll be no light tonight, and God help the vessels driving in!” “But I tell you I’m going to try it. and 11l have medicines for ypn If I can get there. Brace up and try to weather it out” Back to the shore and among the crew of the Laura B. Some of the nodded In a distant way, but none had a word. “I’m going to try it in a dory—will you go along?" asked the man under the ban. “No! No! No! Why, man, you are stark crazy! That sea and this wind would beat the biggest man-of-war in the navy!” , To the mate whose quick action had saved the schooner Shaw said: ”1 flinched at sea when that big wave came roaring down astern. Are these waves larger?” “By a third, man!” “But I’m going to try them, and in a dory at that Will you go along and pull an oar?” ' T *1 will not!” Shaw went to the doctor and the drug store for a remedy for the man at the lighthouse, and then to the telephone to say: “Jim, old man. I’m coming!" "You’ll never make it! I’m growing worse all the time, and the light —the light tonight! It won’t — won’t— ’’ And then the line went dead, and it seemed as if there was a note of satisfaction In the gale. When the crowd on the shore saw a dory made ready and understood that Shaw was to venture where no other man dared to, a great shout of protest went up, and men laid detaining hands on him. “I left the wheel of the Laura 8.. you know!” he said In taunting voice. “I want company on this trip. Who will go?” “I will!” answered a voice after a moment’s silence. Jennie Larkins came pushing her way through the press. Then men swore and shouted and women wept and exclaimed. The girl walked straight up to Shaw and laid a hand on his arm and said: “If we can’t make It we’ll go down together!” The November afternoon was waning. In an hour the great lantern must be lit or there would be wrecks oh the shore. Twice —thrice the dory was beaten back. Then she got away to be lost almost at once in the driving spray. When a sea lifted her up she seemed to be forty feet in the air. It was of no use to go to the telephone for news. The crowds must wait They waited with the dusk coming ou—with the gale tearing away at roofs and trees —with the crews of ships at sea daring and praying, and men and women stood elbow to elbow and did not speak. Thus it was until the lamps began to shine in the cottages on the hillsides, and then a mighty shout went up. The lantern in the tower of' the lighthouse was shining over twenty miles of troubled sea. The landing had been made —a man’s life had been saved, and the man who had once lost his nerve had redeemed himself in the eyes of all men. and of the girl who was to be his bride.