I.

"No," says he.

A little after dark I was lying on a coil of ropes, napping it. The boys
were having the Bay of Biscay quite lively, and I waked up on the jump
in the choruses. Kent came up while they were telling

"How she lay
On that day
In the _Bay_ of BISCAY O!"

He was not singing. He sat down beside me, and first I thought I
wouldn't trouble myself about him, and then I thought I would.

So I opens one eye at him encouraging. He crawls up a little closer to
me. It was rather dark where we sat, with a great greenish shadow
dropping from the mainsail. The wind was up a little, and the light at
helm looked flickery and red.

"Jake," says he all at once, "where's your mother?"

"In--heaven!" says I, all taken aback; and if ever I came nigh what you
might call a little disrespect to your mother, it was on that occasion,
from being taken so aback.

"Oh!" said he. "Got any women-folks to home that miss you?" asks he, by
and by.

Said I, "Shouldn't wonder."

After that he sits still a little with his elbows on his knees; then he
speers at me sidewise awhile; then said he, "I s'pose _I_'ve got a
mother to home. I ran away from her."

This, mind you, is the first time he has ever spoke about his folks
since he came aboard.

"She was asleep down in the south chamber," says he. "I got out the
window. There was one white shirt she'd made for meetin' and such. I've
never worn it out here. I hadn't the heart. It has a collar and some
cuffs, you know. She had a headache making of it. She's been follering
me round all day, a sewing on that shirt. When I come in she would look
up bright-like and smiling. Father's dead. There ain't anybody but me.
All day long she's been follering of me round."

So then he gets up, and joins the lads, and tries to sing a little; but
he comes back very still and sits down. We could see the flickery light
upon the boys' faces, and on the rigging, and on the cap'n, who was
damning the bo'sen a little aft.

"Jake," says he, quite low, "look here. I've been thinking. Do you
reckon there's a chap here--just one, perhaps--who's said his prayers
since he came aboard?"

"_No!_" said I, quite short: for I'd have bet my head on it.

I can remember, as if it was this morning, just how the question
sounded, and the answer. I can't seem to put it into words how it came
all over me. The wind was turning brisk, and we'd just eased her with a
few reefs; Bob Smart, out furling the