Benjamin occasionally stole afternoons in Rye--if he was discovered there would be furious scenes with Reuben, but he had learned cunning, and also, being of a sporting nature, was willing to take risks. Some friends of his were building a ship down at the Camber. Week by week he watched her grow, watched the good timber fill in her ribs, watched her decks spread themselves, watched her masts rise, and at last smelt the good smell of her tarring. She was a three-masted schooner, and her first voyage was to be to the Canaries. Her builders drank many a toast with Backfield's truant son, who gladly risked his father's blows to be with them in their work and hearty boozing. He forgot the farmyard smells he hated in the shipyard smells he loved, and his slavery in oaths and rum--with buckets of tar and coils of rope, and rousing chanties and stories of strange ships. Next spring the news came to Odiam that Benjamin had run away to sea. § 9. It was Rose who had to tell Reuben. Benjamin had given no one the faintest hint of his plans; indeed for the last two or three weeks his behaviour had been unusually good. Then one morning, when Reuben was at Robertsbridge market, he disappeared--Handshut could not find him to take his place in the lambing shed. Rose was angry, for she had wanted young Handshut to hang some curtains for her--one cause of disagreement between her and Reuben was her habit of coaxing the farm-hands to do odd jobs about the house. That same evening, before her husband was back, a letter came for Rose. It was from Benjamin at Rye, announcing that he was sailing that night in the _Rother Lady_ for Las Palmas. He was sick of the farm, and could not stand it any longer. Would Rose tell his father? Rose was not sorry to see the last of Benjamin, whom she had always despised as a coarse lumpkinish youth, whose clothes smelt strongly either of pitch or manure. But she dreaded breaking the news to Reuben. She disliked her husband's rages, and now she would have to let one loose. Then suddenly she thought of something, and a little smile dimpled the corners of her mouth. Reuben came in tired after a day's prodding and bargaining in Robertsbridge market-place. Rose, like a wise woman, gave him his supper, and then, still wise, came and sat on his knee. "Ben ..." "Well, liddle Rose." "I've some bad news for you." "Wot?" "Jemmy's gone for a sailor." He suddenly thrust her from him, and the lines which had begun to soften on his face as he held her, reappeared in their old harshness and weariness. "Gone!" "Yes. I had a letter from him this evening. He couldn't stand Odiam any longer, so he ran away. He's sailed for a place called Palma."