Chapter 16
What sort of response was that—if he was a good man? Of course Daddy was a good man. Why was the whale-mother angry if it wasn’t because of something people had done? What did she look like?
No matter how many questions Tom asked, the only answer he got from the big man was that he needed to see for himself.
So Tom gave in. "OK, OK, I’ll go and see her."
When the fireman next to him tried to whistle through his teeth, a tooth fell out of his jaw, bounced over the table and onto the floor.
"That boy’s got courage," another said.
"Stupid," another one added.
"Such a waste of soft boy-flesh," the third said.
The fourth fireman had ducked under the table to look for his tooth.
The big man said, "He will be right, if he’s made of the right stuff."
Whatever that meant. Tom s
