Grenfell: Knight-Errant of the North

Excerpt

A BOY AND THE SEA

"I wonder if Jim is ever going to get back! My, isn't it an awful storm!"

Wilfred Grenfell, then a small boy, stood at the window of his home in Cheshire, England, looking out across the sea-wall at the raging, seething waters of the Irish Sea.

The wind howled and the snowflakes beat against the window-panes as if they were tiny birds that wanted to get in.

"Mother," he pleaded, "can I put on my sweater and my rubber boots and go down on the beach and see if I can find Jim?"

"Yes," said his mother. "But wrap yourself up warmly, and don't stay long—and don't take any risks, will you, dear?"

Almost before the words were out of her mouth, Wilf was down the stairs and out in the roadway, where fishermen watched their little boats as they tossed at anchor riding out the storm.

Wilf stepped up to a big, grizzled mariner he knew, whom every one called Andy.

"Andy, have you seen Jim?"

"Jim who?"

"Jim Anderson."

"Was he the chap that went out in the Daisy Bell about four hours ago?"

"Yes," said Wilf, trying to control himself, "and he wanted me to go with him, but——"

His words were cut short by a great wave that hurled itself against the wall. The spray leapt high over the stones and drenched Andy and the boy.

"It's lucky ye didn't go, boy," said Andy, solemnly. "We're watchin' for the boat now. My brother was on her, and two cousins o' my wife. She was a little craft, and a leaky one. We were goin' to patch her up an' make her fit. But we waited too long. An' now——" He drew his rough sleeve across his eyes.

The wind howled round their ears and the hail was smiting and stinging as though the storm had a devilish mind to drive them away.

"Why don't you go out in a boat and get them?" pleaded Wilf.

Andy shook his head. "It ain't that we're afraid," he said. "But there ain't a boat we have here that could ride those waves. The coast-guard tried—and now look!" He pointed to a heap of broken, white-painted timbers lying in the roadway, half-hidden from them by the whooping blizzard that threw its dizzying veils of snow before their eyes.

"That's the coast-guard's boat!" exclaimed Andy. "The sea picked her up, she did, and threw her right over the sea-wall as if she was an egg, an' mashed her flat. That shows how much of a chance there'd be for us to get through an' get back, supposin' we could find 'em. No, boy, we've got to wait."

"Look!" cried the lad, excitedly. "Please look, Andy. What's that bobbing up and down in the surf?"

The fisherman put to his eyes his worn and rusted spy-glass.

Then he gritted his teeth and bit his lip. "You stay up here on the road, boy. I got to climb down there and make sure."

Wilf stood at the sea-wall. He was barely tall enough to look over it.

He watched Andy clamber painfully down over the great rocks piled high against the outer face of the wall.

Every now and then a big wave would rise up, a green monster of hissing foam and fury, and throw itself on him like a wild animal trying to scare him back.

But men of that breed are not afraid....