Aunt Jane's Nieces at Millville
Nora came to live with
her again, bringing her child, and the two women were company for one
another while their husbands were at sea.
"In course of time my mother had two children, a girl and a boy, and
because the Hucks boy was considerably older than they, he took care of
them, to a great extent, and the three youngsters were always together.
Their favorite playground was on the beach, at the foot of the bluff,
and before young Tom was ten years old he could swim like a duck, and
manage a boat remarkably well. The Wegg children, having something of
their mother's timid nature, perhaps, were not so adventurous, but they
seldom hesitated to go wherever Tom led them.
"One day, while my mother was slightly ill and Nora was attending to
her, Tom disobeyed the commands that had been given him, and took his
younger companions out on the ocean for a ride in his boat. No one knows
how far they went, or exactly what happened to them; but a sudden squall
sprang up, and the children being missed, my mother insisted, ill as she
was, in running down to the shore to search for her darlings. Braving
the wind and drenched by rain, the two mothers stood side by side,
peering into the gloom, while brave men dared the waves to search for
the missing ones. The body of the girl was first washed ashore, and my
mother rocked the lifeless form in her arms until her dead son was laid
beside her. Then young Tom's body was recovered, and the horror
was complete.
"When my father arrived, three days later, he not only found himself
bereaved of the two children he had loved so tenderly, but his young
wife was raving with brain fever, and likely to follow her babies to the
grave. During that terrible time, Nora, who could not forget that it was
her own adventurous son who had led all three children to their death,
went suddenly blind--from grief, the doctors said.
"My father pulled his wife back to life by dint of careful nursing; but
whenever she looked at the sea she would scream with horror; so it
became necessary to take her where the cruel sound of the breakers could
never reach her ears.
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There was once a king who was very powerful. He had great influence over the wild beasts and animals. Now the tortoise was looked upon as the wisest of all beasts and men. This king had a son named Ekpenyon, to whom he gave fifty young girls as wives, but the prince did not like any of them. The king was very angry at this, and made a law that if any man had a daughter who was finer than the prince's wives, and who found favour in his son's eyes, the girl herself and her father and mother should be killed.
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