The woman's countenance was all wrinkled with trouble.
"He must be out there, too," she murmured to Louise. "Ain't none o'
these chaps off the _Curlew_ jest right yet--scar't blue, or suthin'.
They don't seem to rightly sense that Cap'n Abe was with 'em all the
time aboard that schooner."
"Poor Cap'n Abe!" groaned Louise again.
"And that old pirate's with him," said Betty. But her tone lacked its
usual venom in speaking of Cap'n Amazon. "Who'd ha' thought it? I
reckoned he was nothing but a bag o' wind, with all his yarns of bloody
murder an' the like. But he is a Silt; no gettin' around that. And
Cap'n Abe allus did say the Silts were proper seamen."
"Poor, poor Cap'n Abe!" sobbed Louise.
"Now, now!" soothed Betty. "Don't take on so, deary. They'll get 'em
both. Never fear."
But the rising gale forbade another launching of the lifeboat for
hours. The night shut down over the wind-ridden sea and shore, and by
the pallid light fitfully playing over the tumbling waters the watchers
along the sands saw the stricken _Curlew_ being slowly wrenched to
pieces by the waves that wolfed about and over her.
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