Read The Brides of Rollrock Island for Free Online Page B

you have the time.”
    When Gower had gone out the door and Missus Fisher to the back room, old Fisher shafted me a look and said in a low voice, “I know nothing, girl, about any of that, nothing.”
    I did not believe him; nobody so old could know
nothing
. I waited in case he should say more, but he ignored me, and then I must stand aside to let Missus Fisher through with the rattling cupand saucer. There was an amount of fussing to do, to set the tea where the old man wanted it, and warn him of its hotness, and be told not to think him a fool, and during this I lost heart, and eased myself away along the rows of sacks and barrels.
    Bustling back to her counter, “Girl!” called Missus Fisher. “Here.”
    She unlocked the money drawer and took out a coin; it shone silver. “He says you’re to have a shilling.”
    “A shilling?” I was so astonished that I all but forgot what a shilling was. The word’s sounds flew out of my mouth; the thing shone in the air. I felt a crashing shame. How would I hide the coin from Billy and my sisters, from Mam and Dad? And now Missus Fisher knew too. She might not know why her great-grandfather-in-law was being so generous, but she would know that he did not give shillings out to every child who came by. I had marked myself; she knew there was something odd about me—and how many other people would she tell?
    I shook my head.
    “He’s quite insistent, my darling,” she said unfriendlily. “Come, take it.” She shook it. She neither smiled nor frowned, but her eyes worked on me. If I refused or ran away, she would think me even more peculiar. “It won’t bite you. There.” And the thing, all cold except where Missus Fisher’s fingers had held it so long, was in my hand. “Now run along and put it somewhere safe.”
    Slowly, numbly, I walked up the town through the fine gray rain. What had I done, what had I brought on myself? Back home, I slid the shilling into the toe of one of the Cordlin socks; it was as if I had stolen it, the uncomfortable feelings that clustered aroundit. I was confused by its very shillingness; farthings and ha’pennies were all I had ever bargained with. Such a quantity of sweets was available to me now, I could hardly do the sums of it, and when I attempted them, I knew that I could never hide so much, or eat it all myself. And if I shared, everyone would ask me how I came by such a feast, and hear about Mister Fisher’s favor, and wonder aloud what kind of nuisance I had been, that he had paid me so handsomely to keep away from him.

    I had not been down to Crescent Corner in a while. After Ambler’s visit and the Cordlin bun and the socks and the shilling, I was too conscious of the town’s eyes on me.
    But I did miss seeing the seals, however embarrassed I had been by their pursuing me into town. Whenever I took off the bands to wash myself, in among the earth’s up-pouring and the sea’s I felt the knowledge that the herd was there, an itch upon my mind; this faded in the autumn as they left on their great migration, but the following spring it returned when they assembled at the Crescent again.
    When the sisters suggested walking down to the seal nursery, I thought I might risk going too. I dawdled along behind them on the field road, careful not to seem too eager. I stood along the cliff top with them, and closed my lips on the suggestion that we go down to see the seal babs closer. Grassy uttered it, though, and down we went.
    At the bottom Ann Jelly and Tatty danced out across therocks. The others stood at the foot of the path, Bee calling out warnings and Grassy and Lorel encouragement—“Go up and touch one! Pick up a bab, and we’ll take it home!”
    I sat where the path ended in a wide step, and watched the silver-blue sweep of the ocean. When all the sisters had their backs to me, I loosened the tied bands on my shoulder, and took a long, deep look at the seals, and let them see me. Up they reared, ready to surge at me. My