Part 19

"What are the signs of fish?" asked the Doctor.

"Fine!" said Skipper Tom. "The signs be wonderful fine."

"I hope you'll have a big year."

"There's a promise of un," Skipper Tom grinned happily. "The trap's sure to do fine for us."

But nobody knows from one day to another what will happen on The Labrador.

According to habit Skipper Tom was up bright and early on Sunday morning and went for a look at the trap. When presently he returned to join Doctor Grenfell at breakfast he was plainly worried.

"There's a berg driftin' down on the trap. We'll have to take her in," he announced.

"But 'tis Sunday," exclaimed his wife. "You'll never be workin' on Sunday."

"Aye, 'tis Sunday and 'tis against my principles to fish on the Sabbath day. I never did before, but 'tis to save our cod trap now. The lads and I'll not fish. We'll just haul the trap."

"The Lard'll forgive that, whatever," agreed his wife.

Skipper Tom went out when he had eaten, but it was not long until he returned.

"I'm not goin' to haul the trap today," he said quietly and decisively. "There are those in this harbor," he added, turning to Doctor Grenfell, "who would say, if I hauled that trap, that 'twould be no worse for them to fish on Sunday than for me to haul my trap. Then they'd go fishin' Sundays the same as other days, and none of un would keep Sunday any more as a day of rest, as the Lard intends us to keep un, and has told us in His own words we must keep un. I'll not haul the trap this day, though 'tis sore hard to lose un."

For a principle, and because he was well aware of his influence upon the folk of the settlement, Skipper Tom had made his decision to sacrifice his cod trap and the earnings of his lifetime. His conscience told him it would be wrong to do a thing that might lead others to do wrong. When our conscience tells us it is wrong to do a thing, it is wrong for us to do it. Conscience is the voice of God. If we disobey our conscience God will soon cease to speak to us through it. That is the way every criminal in the world began his downward career. He disobeyed his conscience, and continued to disobey it until he no longer heard it.

Skipper Tom never disobeyed his conscience. Now the temptation was strong. His whole life's savings were threatened to be swept away. There was still time to save the trap.

But Skipper Tom was strong. He turned his back upon the cod trap and the iceberg and temptation, and as he and Doctor Grenfell climbed the hill to the chapel he greeted his neighbors calmly and cheerily.

Every eye in Red Bay was on Skipper Tom that day. Every person knew of the cod trap and its danger, and all that it meant to Skipper Tom, and the temptation Skipper Tom was facing; but from all outward appearance he had dismissed the cod trap and the iceberg from his mind.

When dusk fell that night the iceberg was almost upon the cod trap.

FOOTNOTES:

Pronounced kentel in Labrador; 112 pounds.

XIV

THE SAVING OF RED BAY

At an early hour on Sunday evening Skipper Tom went to his bed as usual, and it is quite probable that within a period of ten minutes after his head rested upon his pillow he was sleeping peacefully. There was nothing else to do. He had no doubt that his cod trap was lying under the iceberg a hopeless wreck.

Well, what of it? In any case he had acted as his conscience had him act. He knew that there were those who would say that his conscience was over-sensitive. Perhaps it was, but it was his conscience, not theirs. He was class leader in the chapel. He never forgot that. And he was the leading citizen of the settlement. At whatever cost, he must needs prove a good example to his neighbors in his deeds. Worry would not help the case in the least. Too much of it would incapacitate him. He had lived forty-four years without a cod trap, and he had not starved, and he could finish his days without one.

"The Lard'll take care of us," Skipper Tom often said when they were in a tight pinch, but he always added, "if we does our best to make the best of things and look after ourselves and the things the Lard gives us to do with. He calls on us to do that."

Though Skipper Tom could scarce see how his trap might have escaped destruction he had no intention of resting upon that supposition and perhaps he still entertained a lingering hope that it had escaped. There is no doubt he prayed for its preservation, and he had strong faith in prayer. At any rate, at half past eleven o'clock that night he was up and dressed, and routed his two sons out of their beds. At the stroke of midnight, waiting a tick longer perhaps, to be quite sure that Sunday had gone and Monday morning had arrived, he and his sons pushed out in their big boat.

Skipper Tom would not be doing his best if he did not make certain of what had actually happened to the cod trap. Every one in Red Bay said it had been destroyed, and no doubt of that. But no one knew for a certainty, and there might have been an intervention of Divine Providence.

"The Lard helped us to get that trap," said Skipper Tom, "and 'tis hard to believe he'll take un away from us so soon, for I tried not to be vain about un, only just a bit proud of un and glad I has un. If He's took un from me I'll know 'twere to try my faith, and I'll never complain."

Down they rowed toward the iceberg, whose polished surface gleamed white in the starlight.