Summary: The Mysteries Of Harris Burdick
Captain Tory
“He swung his lantern three times and slowly the schooner appeared.”—The Mysteries of Harris Burdick
The tendrils of the mist were being gently caressed by the rays of light, ridding the sea of its obscurity. The schooner was in sight. It didn’t, however, have masts. No, this was a schooner that had already lost its wings.
He swung the lantern once more. . . .
It swayed to the left. . . .
In his eyes, it sailed with the grace of rotting driftwood, with red paint prickling and peeling like a sunburn. That’s what too much light can do to people, he thought. It burns them out.
He was saying this while holding the lantern right by his face.
The lantern swung to the right. . . .
But things were slightly different in the child’s
eyes; everything had a degree of perpetual splendour in the gentle luminescence of the beckoning lights around him. He followed the path of this schooner—one he thought was wafting into a land of transcendent wonders and beauty with attributes that are without example in the habitable globe. The lantern swayed above him as his heart followed its rhythm. Inspirited by its glow, his daydreams of what lay in undiscovered solitudes of eternal light became more fervent and vivid. The child was always looking at something beyond him, and without the legs to carry him there, the schooner was his only hope.
The iron grip around the child’s arm tightened. It was a metal clutch of superiority that watery daydreams could not erode.
The lantern flickered three times.
Its fuel was running low; it was ephemeral, it was weak. But still, it glowed—thump, thump, thump—like a heartbeat.
And perhaps to the child, the way the sun settled into the unknown horizon, the way the city backdrop was characterized by dotted windows of light, the way the lantern was swung, the schooner did have masts. And they were pulsating and reverberating and expanding all by the simple wave of light.
The lantern swung to the left. . . .
But to the man who held the lamp a foot away from his face, it was not the gentle warmth of light he felt. It was the harsh burn of coming too close to the lantern that burned and smouldered as it pleased. In the end, it only consumed him. To the man who held the lantern a foot away from his face, that boat was a moth being irrationally drawn to a light that will bring none but harm.
They called the ship Captain Tory.
They were men who remained faithful and hopeful to some distant entity beyond their reach. Cutting through still air, encountering nothing by the occasional sign of life, flying blindly into the abyss, blindly believing therein lies the answer to their fantasies.
One pair of eyes rimmed with age and experience, another pair of eyes edged with ambition.
But soon, the lantern stopped swinging.
“He swung his lantern three times and slowly the schooner appeared.”—The Mysteries of Harris Burdick
The tendrils of the mist were being gently caressed by the rays of light, ridding the sea of its obscurity. The schooner was in sight. It didn’t, however, have masts. No, this was a schooner that had already lost its wings.
He swung the lantern once more. . . .
It swayed to the left. . . .
In his eyes, it sailed with the grace of rotting driftwood, with red paint prickling and peeling like a sunburn. That’s what too much light can do to people, he thought. It burns them out.
He was saying this while holding the lantern right by his face.
The lantern swung to the right. . . .
But things were slightly different in the child’s
eyes; everything had a degree of perpetual splendour in the gentle luminescence of the beckoning lights around him. He followed the path of this schooner—one he thought was wafting into a land of transcendent wonders and beauty with attributes that are without example in the habitable globe. The lantern swayed above him as his heart followed its rhythm. Inspirited by its glow, his daydreams of what lay in undiscovered solitudes of eternal light became more fervent and vivid. The child was always looking at something beyond him, and without the legs to carry him there, the schooner was his only hope.
The iron grip around the child’s arm tightened. It was a metal clutch of superiority that watery daydreams could not erode.
The lantern flickered three times.
Its fuel was running low; it was ephemeral, it was weak. But still, it glowed—thump, thump, thump—like a heartbeat.
And perhaps to the child, the way the sun settled into the unknown horizon, the way the city backdrop was characterized by dotted windows of light, the way the lantern was swung, the schooner did have masts. And they were pulsating and reverberating and expanding all by the simple wave of light.
The lantern swung to the left. . . .
But to the man who held the lamp a foot away from his face, it was not the gentle warmth of light he felt. It was the harsh burn of coming too close to the lantern that burned and smouldered as it pleased. In the end, it only consumed him. To the man who held the lantern a foot away from his face, that boat was a moth being irrationally drawn to a light that will bring none but harm.
They called the ship Captain Tory.
They were men who remained faithful and hopeful to some distant entity beyond their reach. Cutting through still air, encountering nothing by the occasional sign of life, flying blindly into the abyss, blindly believing therein lies the answer to their fantasies.
One pair of eyes rimmed with age and experience, another pair of eyes edged with ambition.
But soon, the lantern stopped swinging.