"The dark sky loomed overhead, waves crashed and spilled into me small little boat. I called her the Minnow, she was so small. But I didn't have any money to buy a bigger one! So it was jus' me and her, out on the sea.
"Rain pelted me, sharp as needles, they were! A huge, booming thunder shook the whole sea, and right ahead of me, a lightnin' bolt shot down into the ocean."
Cindy and her twin sister, Mindy, listened intensly to what their sea-faring grandfather would say next.
He always brought stories with him whenever he came from Scottland to New York. He would always tell his grandaughters of his adventures out on the sea.
"What next, grandfather?" Mindy asked, leaning forward. The twins never tired of their grandfather's stories. It seemed he had a million, and each one completely different.
"Well, that's when I saw the beam of the lighthouse come through the fog, it shone right in my eyes. Happiest moment I had in weeks!
"Quickly, I paddled towards it with the only thing I had; a walrus tusk." Cindy looked at her grandfather suspiciously. "Grandfather, I like your real stories. You couldn't have possibly had a walrus tusk with you!"
"Oh, but I did." Grandfather winked. It was true, he had gone all the way to the Arctic, and with him we brought back a walrus tusk he had found wedged in the icy banks of a large pond.
Cindy gasped. "O-okay, that's amazing! After your story, will you show it to me?" Cindy asked. Mindy had gone to the kitchen to get cookies.
"I'm afraid it's back in me home in Scottland." Grandfather said wearily. Cindy looked at her grandfather, she was concerned about him.
She knew that he was disappointed that he haden't brought his walrus tusk with him, but she sensed something more.
"Grandfather, what's wrong?" she asked. Grandfather looked up at her. "Well, I came here to celebrate my nintieth birthday with you, your sister, and your parents," he scruffed Cindy's redish orange hair until it looked like a bird's nest.
"And, I think I'm just getting too old. I don't think I'll be able to come and visit anymore." Grandfather had more to say, but Cindy's heart was already sinking.
"But grandfather, we could always visit you in Scottland. I've always wanted to go." Grandfather shrugged.
"That may be so," He said. "But, there won't be anymore adventures for me anymore, nor will I be able to fulfill the Seaman's Quest."
YOU ARE READING
The Seaman's Quest
פרוזהThe Seaman's Quest for generations has been to see a mermaid, and to have a witness, or have proof that these creatuers exist. And that, is the Seaman's Quest. Twelve year-old Cindy Bay's grandfather has been a man of the sea for seventy years...
