“Then he goes below to fix his head up--the side of his head was laid clean open, with the blood runnin’ scuppers full from him. “‘Och,’ says he, ‘but ’tis a great pickle--salt water,’ and he takes an old cotton shirt and tears it up and wraps it ’round his head, and goes on deck again.” “And after that he kept her comin’ just the same, Tommie?” “Just the same. All night long he kept her comin’, and payin’ attention to nobody. In the early mornin’, I mind we passed Josh Bradley in the _Tubal Cain_, him bangin’ along with a busted fores’l, remindin’ us of a gull with a broken wing. We passed a whole fleet of old plugs anchored off Highland Light, ripped by ’em roarin’, and they lookin’ over the rails at the Skipper, his head all wrapped up. Imagine her, Peter, with her four lowers and gaff topsail, and the wind makin’ if anything. And then what should happen but he made out the _Nannie O_ ahead. ‘’Tis Tommie Ohlsen,’ he says, ‘under four lowers. We’ll chase him.’ But Tommie must’ve seen us, for soon we saw his tops’l break out. Then we sent up the stays’l, and then Tommie sent up his. Then we came swingin’ round the Cape--and I’d like to had a photograph of her then--with the Skipper standin’ between house and rail to wind’ard, squeezin’ the salt water out of his beard, and Jerry below singin’: ‘What’s that a-drivin’ in from sea, Like a ghost from out the dawn? And who but Tom O’Donnell And his flying _Colleen Bawn_.’ “‘’Tis fine and gay they’re feelin’,’ says the Skipper, ‘with their singin’, thinkin’ they’ll soon be home. In a minute, now, there’ll be something to sing about. Look at what’s coming,’ and she gets it fair and full. And it was too much for the gang. He floats them all out below. From fore and aft they comes runnin’ up on deck. ‘For God’s sake, Skipper, what is it?’ says they. ‘Don’t worry,’ says the Skipper, ‘’tis only a little squall, and the _Nannie O_ ahead.’ ‘But what’re we goin’ to do, Skipper? We can’t stay below.’ ‘Oh, climb on the weather-rail,’ says the Skipper, ‘and if she goes over, ’tis only a mile to shore.’ And then the face of little Jimmie! ‘My God, my God--my poor, poor wife!’ he says. ‘Whisht, lad, whisht,’ says the Skipper, patting his head, ‘’tis to your wife we’re takin’ you,’ and he keeps on chasin’ the _Nannie O_ across the bay.” “And then?” “And then? Why, he kept her goin’ across the bay. Half-way home, there was a big white steam yacht layin’ to both anchors. She was big enough to tow the _Colleen_ ten knots an hour. [Illustration: What’s that a-drivin’ in from sea, like a ghost from out the dawn?] ‘You’d think it was banshees we was, the way they look out from between the lace curtains,’ says the Skipper, and we rips by her stern like the express train goin’ by West Gloucester station.