CHAPTER FOUR 



THE CONCRETE DECK 



OUT of the sea as a tuber might have been pulled from the earth, 

 the bag heaved, black. Solid channels of w^ater dripped aw^ay from 

 it over the deck as though they w^ere glistening with the w^hiteness 

 of roots. Strands of seaweedy life trickled betw^een the meshes 

 and a rope dangled in complicated fashion from the cod-end knot 

 that had kept the net closed from the sea. Finch advanced into the 

 pound to meet them, and catching the free end of this rope, began 

 to tug. It gave, remarkably easily for such a massive tangle of tv^^ine. 

 The net reeled open and the released fish tumbled, thudded, w^rig- 

 gled and flapped dow^n the front of his oilskin onto the deck. He 

 then retied the cod-end and, since there had been no rents in the 

 net, they shot the traw^l again. 



The w^arps once more held tight in the block, the Caroon rolling 

 ponderously, leisurely, the net again greedy at the sea-bottom, 

 the w^hole crew^ w^as called forward to have a look at the catch. 

 'It'd be a starvation diet for all of us if we were earning our living 

 at this rate,' mumbled the Goldfish; and Finch seemed to agree. 

 They both knew that they were not even trying for a big bag, that 

 they were using an antiquated gear over a used-up ground, that 

 the seasons were against them, that they could not sell what they 

 caught, that the Caroon was only a training ship and therefore not 

 allowed to go into competition with the commercial vessels, that 

 they had come out only to show their pupils the simplest elements 

 of trawling and a variety of the commonest fish species : they knew 

 that a large haul would merely have embarrassed them and that 



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