at the place as people look at a stranger with whom they know they are going to have a lot to do.
SHOTLEY PIER
Slowly the Goblin crept by the first of the piers.
“Only just enough wind,” said Jim. “Can’t take off sail till the last minute. Keep her going just as she is, close past the far pier. Bring her into the wind when I shout. I’m going forrard to get the anchor ready.”
“Can I come too, to see how you do it?” said John.
“Come on.”
Susan, Titty and Roger were alone in the cockpit. Susan was steering just as well as she knew how.
“They’ll want those headsail sheets cast off at the last minute,” she said, not taking her eyes off the pier ahead. “You take one, Titty, and Roger the other, and be ready when he shouts.”
Up on the foredeck Jim was stocking the big anchor, and ranging a lot of chain on deck, while John sat on the cabin roof watching everything he did.
Jim was lowering the anchor over the bows. “You have to be careful the stock doesn’t catch on the bobstay,” he said, and John took a good grip of the forestay and looked over Jim’s shoulder and saw how the anchor hung free at the Goblin’s forefoot, all ready to let go.
“Now for the staysail,” said Jim.
From the cockpit the others watched, Susan doing her best not to think of anything but her steering. The staysail came rattling down. John was bundling it out of the way, while Skipper Jim was standing up judging the distance they had gone beyond the pier.
“Straight into the wind,” he called. “Cast off the jib sheet.”
“That’s yours,” said Titty, and Roger cast it off. The jib was rolling up on itself. The boom swung slowly over the cockpit. Jim was stooping again. There was a sudden rattle and roar as the chain ran out, and the anchor went down.
“We’ve arrived,” said Titty.
“Susan’s still steering,” said Roger.
Susan with a sigh of relief let go of the tiller.
“Who’s for the shore?” called Jim Brading from the foredeck.
CHAPTER V
SLEEPING AFLOAT
“WHO’S for the shore?”
“I am,” shouted Roger.
“Let’s all go,” said Titty.
But Susan looked through the cabin to the clock that was fixed on a bulkhead under the barometer.
“Hadn’t they better have supper first?” she said. “It’s after their time and Mother’s sure to ask.”
“Right, Mister Mate,” said Jim. “If supper won’t take too long to make, John and I’ll be getting the sail stowed and the lamps filled. What are you going to give us?”
“There are all those sausage rolls,” said Susan.
“What about hotting up tomato soup?” said Jim. “You’ll find a row of tins in the starboard cupboard.
“Good,” said Roger.
“I’ll do the lamps right away,” said Jim. “I’ve got to fill the cooking stove and it’ll last for a couple of days. Let me just get the mainsail down.”
The big red sail came down and the boom was lowered into its crutches. The sail was loosely stowed and tied. “No need to put the cover on,” said Jim. “We’ll be hoisting it again in the morning.” Then from somewhere under one of the cockpit seats Jim pulled out a paraffin can and poured a lot of oil into the reservoir of the cooking stove. Susan lit the burners and put a kettle on one to boil up some water for tea, and sitting on the companion-steps with a long spoon kept the tomato soup stirring slowly round a saucepan on the other. Meanwhile, Jim filled the cabin lamp and the riding light. He shook the big oilcan.
“Enough to fill the riding light again tomorrow,” he said.
“What about the red and green ones?” said Roger, who had been looking at them, roped in their places in the fo’c’sle. “Didn’t you say they’d burnt out?”
“We shan’t need them,” said Jim. “It isn’t as if we were going to sea. We shan’t be sailing at night.”
Though it was quite light outside, it seemed already dark in the cabin. Jim lit the cabin lamp and a mellow light shone on the faces of his crew. Supper was over. Everybody had thought well of the tomato soup and agreed with Roger that nobody who had not tried would believe how much nicer sausage rolls tasted in a ship’s cabin than when eaten anywhere else. Susan had washed up, passing the wet things to be dried by Titty and Roger.
“Lucky they’re Woolworth’s unbreakables,” Jim had laughed as one of the gay red plates had slipped out of Roger’s fingers, bounced on the floor and rolled away to hide itself somewhere under the engine. He had gone down on hands and knees to look for it with a big electric torch. “What a torch!” Roger had said, and then as Jim scrambled to his feet again with the torch and the plate, he had exclaimed at the red light coming through the plate. “Good as a port light,” Jim had said, and had held the plate in front of the torch and lit up everybody’s face in turn with a warm red glow. “Grand torch,” he said, flashing it on and off. “It makes as good a stern-light as anybody could want. I had to show it to a steamer two or three times the night before last.”
“Do tell us about it.”
“About what?”
“The voyage from Dover,” said John.
“Nothing much to tell,” said Jim, putting the plate away, dropping the last of the spoons into the spoon-box and showing Susan just where it had to go in the cupboard so that it shouldn’t rattle. Earnestly watched by all of them, he filled and lit his pipe.
“Tell it, anyway,” said Roger.
“You were all alone,” said Titty.
“I know old Goblin pretty well,” said Jim. “Nothing in being alone, except that I couldn’t get any sleep. It wouldn’t have been so bad if I hadn’t had to hang about so long outside.
“Outside what?”
“The shoals,” said Jim. “There was a bit of fog and I didn’t want to come nosing in all blind. I don’t like shoals when I can’t see the buoys. Look here, you’d better have a squint at the chart. Heave up, John. You’re sitting on them.”
John got up, and Jim Brading rolled up the end of the mattress on the port bunk and pulled
