JACOB’S ROOM
while two or three gulls gracefully skirted the incoming
waves, and settled near their boots.
The large red faces lying on the bandanna handkerchiefs
stared up at Jacob. Jacob stared down at them. Holding
his bucket very carefully, Jacob then jumped deliberately
and trotted away very nonchalantly at first, but faster and
faster as the waves came creaming up to him and he had to
swetve to avoid them, and the gulls rose in front of him and
floated out and settled again a little farther on. A large
black woman was sitting on the sand. He ran towards her.
“Nanny! Nanny!” he cried, sobbing the words out on
the crest of each gasping breath.
The waves came round her. She was a rock. She was
covered with the seaweed which pops when it is pressed.
He was lost.
Thete he stood. His face composed itself. He was about
to roar when, lying among the black sticks and straw under
the cliff, he saw a whole skull—perhaps a cow’s skull, a skull,
perhaps, with the teeth in it. Sobbing, but absent-mindedly,
he ran farther and farther away until he held the skull in
his arms.
“There he is |” cried Mrs. Flanders, coming round the
rock and covering the whole space of the beach in a few
seconds. What has he got hold of ? Put it down, Jacob |
Drop it this moment! Something horrid, I know. Why
didn’t you stay with us? Naughty little boy! Now put it
down. Now come along both of you,” and she swept round,
holding Archer by one hand and fumbling for Jacob’s atm
with the other. But he ducked down and picked up the
sheep’s jaw, which was loose.
Swinging her bag, clutching her parasol, holding Archer’s
hand, and telling the story of the gunpowder explosion in
which poor Mr. Curnow had lost his eye, Mrs. Flanders
hurried up the steep lane, aware all the time in the depths
of her mind of some buried discomf~=*.

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