Chapter 4 No.4

Ole Jarge put down the baler and wiped the perspiration from his forehead. A few fish scales transferred themselves from the back of his oakum-coloured hand to his venerable brow.

"'Tain't no use," he murmured. "'Er's nigh twenty year' ole-come nex' month. Tar ain't no use neither. 'Tis new strakes 'ers wantin'." He thumbed the seams of the old boat that lay on the shingle, with the outgoing tide still lapping round her stern. "An' new strakes do cost tarrible lot." He sat puffing his clay pipe, and transferred his gaze from the bottom of the boat to the whitewashed cottages huddled under the lee of the cliffs. A tall figure was moving about the nets that festooned the low wall in front of the cottages.

Ole Jarge removed his pipe from his mouth, substituted two fingers of his right hand, and gave a long, shrill whistle. It was a disconcerting performance. For one thing, you associated the trick with irrepressible boyhood, and, for another, the old man squinted slightly as he did it. As a matter of fact, he had learned it on the Dogger Bank fifty years before; fog-bound in a dory, it was a useful accomplishment.

Young Jarge straightened up, raised one hand in acknowledgment of the summons, and came crunching slowly across the shingle towards the boat. Ole Jarge sat smoking in philosophical silence till his son was beside him. Then he removed his pipe and spat over the listed gunwale.

"'Er's daid," he observed laconically.

Young Jarge bent stiffly and tapped the seams, inside and out, much as a veterinary surgeon runs his hand over a horse's legs.

"Ya-a-is," he confirmed, and sat down on the stem of the old boat. "'Er's very nigh's ole 's what us be," he added, after a pause, and began shredding some tobacco into the palm of his hand.

Ole Jarge nodded. Then he lifted his head quickly. "'Er's bound to last 'nother year." For the first time there was concern in his voice. Adversity does not grip the mind of the Cornish fisherfolk suddenly. It filters slowly through the chinks of the armour God has given them. Cornish men (and surely Cornish maids) were kind to the survivors of the wrecked Armada. It may be that they, in their turn, bequeathed a strain of Southern fatalism to many of their benefactors.

"'Er's bound to," repeated Ole Jarge. He got ponderously out of the boat and removed a tattered sou'wester to scratch his head with his thumbnail-another trick that had survived the adventurous days of the Dogger Bank.

The unfamiliar note of anxiety in his father's voice stirred Young Jarge. He rose to his feet with perplexity in his dark eyes, mechanically pulling up the bleached leather thigh-boots he wore afloat and ashore, "rainy-come-fine."

Inspiration had come, as it does to men of the West once the need is realised to the full.

"Du 'ee mind that there li'l' ole copper boiler-what come out o' granfer's house when 'er blawed down-back tu '98?" asked Young Jarge slowly.

Ole Jarge nodded.

"S'pose us was to hammer 'n out flat like an' nail un down to bottom, 'long wi' oakum an' drop o' white lead-what du 'ee say?"

Ole Jarge silently measured the area of the sprunk strakes with the stumpy thumb and little finger of an outstretched hand. Then he puckered his forehead and stared out to sea, apparently making mental calculations connected with the "li'l' ole copper boiler."

"Ya-a-ais." He replaced the piece of perished tarpaulin that had once been a sou'-wester on his head, and set off slowly across the shingle towards the village. Young Jarge followed, staring at his boots as he walked.

"Us 'll hammer 'n out after tea," said Ole Jarge over his shoulder.

His great, great, very great grandfather would have said "Ma?ana!"

* * * * *

The setting sun had tipped the dancing wavelets with fire and was glowing red in each pool left by the receding tide when Ole Jarge emerged from his cottage door. In one hand he carried a hammer, and in the other a tin of white lead. Young Jarge joined him with a small, square copper boiler in his arms.

"Where'll us put un tu, feyther?"

Ole Jarge set off across the beach in the direction of the boat. "Bring un along!" he commanded in a manner dimly suggestive of a lord high executioner.

Young Jarge followed, and dumped his burden down alongside the boat.

"Now!" said Ole Jarge grimly. He spat on his hands and prepared to enjoy himself. Bang! bang! bang-a-bang! bang! went the hammer. Young Jarge sat down on the gunwale of the boat and contemplated his parent's exertions.

"It du put Oi in mind of a drum," he said appreciatively.