Quite a full day yesterday. Father and I took the bus into Sefton Middle to met the welder. At first he and Father seemed to be getting on well together, but then Father said something about me being Silberay. It was horrible. The welder, Toby, went pale and stepped back from me shouting to Father to get me away, as if I was poisonous. It really hurt, but I knew I had to leave for Father to have any chance of changing his mind.

I wandered into the centre of town trying to listen with my heart. Then I found a little corner out of the way where I could sing. It was hard to enter, I felt a bit vulnerable in the street and, if I’m honest with myself, I think Toby’s fear of me still hurt and that got in the way.

Lifting the song was hard too. There was no joy in the music that I joined and it was almost more than I could manage to modulate the drab tones.

Maybe I managed to offer a little light in the end, but I did not stay very long before heading back towards Toby’s workshop. I had not reached the lane where I needed to turn when I met Father and Toby coming towards me. Father must have done a lot of very persuasive talking. Although Toby still seemed to be afraid of me he had agreed to come back with us to the Harbour so that I could take him around and explain things.

In the end I think it was meeting Mother that really persuaded him to trust me enough to allow me to guide him onto Day Bringer with Mother and Father and take him for a little jaunt around the Harbour. It was so good to be at the tiller again even for such a short time.

After that it was obvious that Toby felt a lot more comfortable. He went along to the dry dock to look at Sunrise quite confidently and promised to come back on Monday with his tools and the plate that is needed for her hull.

I offered to make a time to take him and his family out onto the water road and he said he would like that. I wonder if his wife will agree.