Prologue
Imagine a painting, oiled with pastels, painted to curves and slips and dips of the brushed. Dabbed with splotches of white foam purifying the spatter off beach and rock. And above it, the Dynnarch Monarch, a bread and butter of the small town. The integration of the building and the walls of the harbor slipstreamed into the ocean. At long last, our artist entered the veil, and set his paintbrush down, passing back into the door of reality. The bar inside was but a canvas to him, and the people, just paint.
He sat down and began to see onward in the corner, an elderly man singing a shanty. A shanty of a story, of a hero, and the town on a night like tonight.
SAILOR
A merrier place you may believe
Was Mousehole on Tom Bawcock's Eve.
To be there then who wouldn't who wouldn't wish
To sup on seven sorts of fish.
A musician joined the group and plucked his fiddle from the case, sawing along the string and chiming in with a melody.
SAILORS
When murgy broth had cleared the path
Comed lances for a fry
And then us had a bit o' scad
And starry gazey pie.
The music stopped as the sailors danced to the tune, their massive boots booming against the floor. The ladies joined in and countered with their lighter shoes rapping across the floor. The men retaliated, their fiddler returning to the fray.
SAILORS
Next comed fair maids
Brave thrusty jades
As made our oozles dry
And ling and hake
Enough to make
A running shark to sigh
All jumped into the song, and the leader of this chant was an elderly man with a long white beard. He could have been mistaken for Father Christmas if not for his blue attire. He wasn't as adept at dancing, but he led them in song, and soon swung into a bar stool and swerved to face them with a drink in hand.
SAILORS
As each we'd clunk
As health were drunk
In bumpers brimming high
And when up came
Tom Bawcock's name
We praised him to the sky!
The music died down slowly and everyone turned to the old man, repeating the last verse.
OLD MAN
And when up came...
Tom Bawcock's name…
We praised him to the sky.
Everyone went silent to overhear the yearly tale from the Old Man, and his memory of the life of the sailor that saved them from certain death. Our artist joined them in the background to listen and hear the story of a hero unlike any other.