Page:Silver Shoal Light.djvu/201

 wind and waves grew all the more fearsome by coming out of the darkness. The keeper's man was away, spending Christmas ashore with his old mother, so that the keeper was single-handed. He went up to light his lamp, and in the lantern he felt the tower tremble and the iron stairs shudder under him.

"Before the keeper's son went to bed, he hung his stocking at the chimney-place," (Jim looked up at the mantel shelf, and so did Garth) "and there it was, blowing to and fro in the gusts that came whirling down the chimney and scattering the embers. He worried a great deal about the good Saint Nick's being able to get to the Light in such very bad weather; but his mother assured him that Santa Claus was quite used to the Arctic regions—storms, too, no doubt—and that, as he didn't have to come in a boat, it really made no difference. So the keeper's son went to sleep, much relieved.

"Close on to midnight the keeper, who was on watch, made out two misty lights reeling through the darkness. They were the lights of a schooner. The master of the vessel told the keeper, later on, what happened aboard his ship, and I'll tell it to you. They saw the Light, it seems, and they likewise heard the breakers, but