“‘Twill be the house next,” muttered Oddie. “And then her planks will come wide apart--and then----” He rolled it between his teeth. “Well, then we’ll all go together. But”--he locked his jaws again--“drive her you must, Patsie Oddie,” and bang, bang, smash, bang, and smash again he held her to it. And in the morning she came clear; still an awful sea on and wind to tear the heart out of the ocean itself, but clear water--beautiful, clear water. By the morning light he saw what he could not see in the dark night, that her port anchor was gone from her bow--scraped off against the bottom--and that her decks were covered with the sand off the bottom also; but she herself--his darling _Delia_--was all right. There was nothing gone that could not be replaced--maybe a bit loose in the seams, but, Lord, Gloucester was full of good calkers--and now they had the beautiful clear water. God be praised! And, after all, if never a woman in all the world smiled on him again, ’twas worth while saving men’s lives. Oddie drew the slide back from the cabin companion-way. “Set the watch,” he called, and the first on watch, Martin Carr, came up and took the wheel from him. “Gloucester,” said Oddie--“you know the course, Martin. And be easy on her. ’Tisn’t in nature for a vessel not to loosen a bit after last night, but there’ll be nothing the pumps won’t clear. I know that by the heave of her under me. She’s all right, Martin--a great vessel. We owe our lives to her ableness this night, but pump her out,” and went below to draw off his boots. His legs were so swollen that he had to split the leather from knee to heel to get them off, and when he turned them upside down sand ran out of the legs of them. “A wild night,” he said, and looked curiously at the sand--a wild night it was--“and I’m tired. Since leavin’ Gloucester I’ve not seen my bunk. Call me in two hours,” and turned in on the floor and fell instantly asleep. After a storm it should be good to see the fine green water rippling again under the sun, but to Patsie Oddie it brought no sense of joy. He only glowered and glowered as down the coast he sailed the _Delia_. Even the sight of Cape Sable, which generally brings a smile to the faces of fishermen homeward bound, had no effect on him. He drove her on, and even seemed to welcome the cold nor’-wester that met him when he straightened out for what in a fair wind, and his vessel tight, would have been one long last riotous leg.