"STEVIE”

A Story by Barbara Stephens

The lure of the waterfront at night! The lone gull calls to the dark soa, with the foamed waves scurling on. By the rotting piers and the tall dank sheds I loitered, smelling the salt spray and the aorid kelp on the sand. The fog was coming in, with the sounds of oars on the waters. Was it a rowboat noming up the breakwater? could hardly see. A ory pierced the darkness.

"Land ho! Avast ye swabs bilge-pumps!"

trim the sailo, and man the

The boat merged into view, bucking the white surf like a stallion. A thin lithe figure in jeans and a sailor cap jumped onto the sand, and pulled the boat to shore.

"Come on Mary, me mate

Jump lively!

"Oh, a sailor's life is a jolly life, "The sea, the sea's me real wife; "A sailor-lad's be strong and brave

"At home with ev'ry buokin' wave--

She started a jaunty little horn-pipe dance, which stopped the moment she spotted me on the pier.

"Hello", she cried, "I'm Stevie."

I walked over to her boat. She couldn't have been over ten. "Isn't it late for a little girl to be out?" I asked.

"I'm not a little girl! I'm a sailor like Daddy – an' I'm strong that's why they call me Stevie!"

"Her real name's Stephenie," shouted the other girl in the boat.

"I'm not Stephenie don't call me that.

I'm Steve! Steve!"

A woman now appeared on the pier, calling the girl's name.