Three arrow designs with script quotes

The arrows are the thing I keep looking at. Mr Abernethy, the second mate, has a sheaf of old flash he brought from a Liverpool parlour years ago, and he lets the boys pick from it when the weather is too foul for the deck. Every one of them has a line of script beside it. Keep aiming. Aim in life. I thought them soppy at first, but Owen says a man on a long run needs something to hold on to that isn't a rope, and the drawings are so neat, the fletching all diamonds and little crosses like a lace collar, that you forget they are only words.

I chose the one that says follow your arrow, wherever it points. I told Abernethy it was a daft choice for a boy who has never once in his life known where he was going. He laughed so hard he had to sit down on the hatch. Then he went below and came back with the needle himself.

I will show you when I am home, if the sea lets me. Tell Mam I am eating properly and that I have not gone soft in the head, only a little bit tattooed.