Erema; Or, My Father's Sin
Page 5
CHAPTER V
UNCLE SAM
The influence of the place in which I lived began to grow on me. Thewarmth of the climate and the clouds of soft and fertile dust werebroken by the refreshing rush of water and the clear soft green ofleaves. We had fruit trees of almost every kind, from the peach to theamber cherry, and countless oaks by the side of the river--not large,but most fantastic. Here I used to sit and wonder, in a foolish,childish way, whether on earth there was any other child so strangelyplaced as I was. Of course there were thousands far worse off, moredesolate and destitute, but was there any more thickly wrapped inmystery and loneliness?
A wanderer as I had been for years, together with my father, change ofplace had not supplied the knowledge which flows from lapse of time.Faith, and warmth, and trust in others had not been dashed out of me byany rude blows of the world, as happens with unlucky childrenhuddled together in large cities. My father had never allowed me muchacquaintance with other children; for six years he had left me with acommunity of lay sisters, in a little town of Languedoc, where I was theonly pupil, and where I was to remain as I was born, a simple heretic.Those sisters were very good to me, and taught me as much as I couldtake of secular accomplishment. And it was a bitter day for me when Ileft them for America.
For during those six years I had seen my father at long intervals, andhad almost forgotten the earlier days when I was always with him. I usedto be the one little comfort of his perpetual wanderings, when I was acareless child, and said things to amuse him. Not that he ever playedwith me any more than he played with any thing; but I was the last ofhis seven children, and he liked to watch me grow. I never knew it,I never guessed it, until he gave his life for mine; but, poor littlecommon thing as I was, I became his only tie to earth. Even to me hewas never loving, in the way some fathers are. He never called me by petnames, nor dandled me on his knee, nor kissed me, nor stroked down myhair and smiled. Such things I never expected of him, and thereforenever missed them; I did not even know that happy children always havethem.
But one thing I knew, which is not always known to happier children:I had the pleasure of knowing my own name. My name was an Englishone--Castlewood--and by birth I was an English girl, though of EnglandI knew nothing, and at one time spoke and thought most easily in French.But my longing had always been for England, and for the sound of Englishvoices and the quietude of English ways. In the chatter and heat anddrought of South France some faint remembrance of a greener, cooler,and more silent country seemed to touch me now and then. But where inEngland I had lived, or when I had left that country, or whether I hadrelations there, and why I was doomed to be a foreign girl--all thesequestions were but as curling wisps of cloud on memory's sky.
Of such things (much as I longed to know a good deal more about them) Inever had dared to ask my father; nor even could I, in a roundabout way,such as clever children have, get second-hand information. In thefirst place, I was not a clever child; for the next point, I never hadunderhand skill; and finally, there was no one near me who knew anything about me. Like all other girls--and perhaps the very same tendencyis to be found in boys--I had strong though hazy ideas of caste. Thenoble sense of equality, fraternity, and so on, seems to come later inlife than childhood, which is an age of ambition. I did not know who inthe world I was, but felt quite sure of being somebody.
One day, when the great tree had been sawn into lengths, and with theaid of many teams brought home, and the pits and the hoisting tacklewere being prepared and strengthened to deal with it, Mr. Gundry, beingfull of the subject, declared that he would have his dinner in the millyard. He was anxious to watch, without loss of time, the settlement ofsome heavy timbers newly sunk in the river's bed, to defend the outworksof the mill. Having his good leave to bring him his pipe, I found himsitting upon a bench with a level fixed before him, and his emptyplate and cup laid by, among a great litter of tools and things. He waslooking along the level with one eye shut, and the other most sternlyintent; but when I came near he rose and raised his broad pith hat, andmade me think that I was not interrupting him.
"Here is your pipe, Uncle Sam," I said; for, in spite of all his formalways, I would not be afraid of him. I had known him now quite longenough to be sure he was good and kind. And I knew that the world aroundthese parts was divided into two hemispheres, the better half beingof those who loved, and the baser half made of those who hated, SawyerSampson Gundry.
"What a queer world it is!" said Mr. Gundry, accepting his pipe toconsider that point. "Who ever would have dreamed, fifty years agone,that your father's daughter would ever have come with a pipe to lightfor my father's son?"
"Uncle Sam," I replied, as he slowly began to make those puffs whichseem to be of the highest essence of pleasure, and wisps of bluesmoke flitted through his white eyebrows and among the snowy curls ofhair--"dear Uncle Sam, I am sure that it would be an honor to a princessto light a pipe for a man like you."
"Miss Rema, I should rather you would talk no nonsense," he answered,very shortly, and he set his eye along his level, as if I had offendedhim. Not knowing how to assert myself and declare that I had spoken myhonest thoughts, I merely sat down on the bench and waited for him tospeak again to me. But he made believe to be very busy, and scarcely toknow that I was there. I had a great mind to cry, but resolved not to doit.
"Why, how is this? What's the matter?" he exclaimed at last, when I hadbeen watching the water so long that I sighed to know where it was goingto. "Why, missy, you look as if you had never a friend in all the wideworld left."
"Then I must look very ungrateful," I said; "for at any rate I have one,and a good one."
"And don't you know of any one but me, my dear?"
"You and Suan Isco and Firm--those are all I have any knowledge of."
"'Tis a plenty--to my mind, almost too many. My plan is to be a goodfriend to all, but not let too many be friends with me. Rest you quitesatisfied with three, Miss Rema. I have lived a good many years, and Inever had more than three friends worth a puff of my pipe."
"But one's own relations, Uncle Sam--people quite nearly related to us:it is impossible for them to be unkind, you know."
"Do I, my dear? Then I wish that I did. Except one's own father andmother, there is not much to be hoped for out of them. My own brothertook a twist against me because I tried to save him from ruin; and ifany man ever wished me ill, he did. And I think that your father had thesame tale to tell. But there! I know nothing whatever about that."
"Now you do, Mr. Gundry; I am certain that you do, and beg you to tellme, or rather I demand it. I am old enough now, and I am certain my dearfather would have wished me to know every thing. Whatever it was, I amsure that he was right; and until I know that, I shall always be themost miserable of the miserable."
The Sawyer looked at me as if he could not enter into my meaning,and his broad, short nose and quiet eyes were beset with wrinkles ofinquiry. He quite forgot his level and his great post in the river, andtilted back his ancient hat, and let his pipe rest on his big brown arm."Lord bless me!" he said, "what a young gal you are! Or, at least, whata young Miss Rema. What good can you do, miss, by making of a rout? Hereyou be in as quiet a place as you could find, and all of us likesand pities you. Your father was a wise man to settle you here in thisenlightened continent. Let the doggoned old folk t'other side of theworld think out their own flustrations. A female young American you arenow, and a very fine specimen you will grow. 'Tis the finest thing to beon all God's earth."
"No, Mr. Gundry, I am an English girl, and I mean to be an Englishwoman.The Americans may be more kind and generous, and perhaps my fatherthought so, and brought me here for that reason. And I may be glad tocome back to you again when I have done what I am bound to do. Rememberthat I am the last of seven children, and do not even know where therest are buried."
"Now look straight afore you, missy. What do you see yonner?" The Sawyerwas getting a little tired, perhaps, of this long interruption.
"I see eno
rmous logs, and a quantity of saws, and tools I don't evenknow the names of. Also I see a bright, swift river."
"But over here, missy, between them two oaks. What do you please to seethere, Miss Rema?"
"What I see there, of course, is a great saw-mill."
"But it wouldn't have been 'of course,' and it wouldn't have been atall, if I had spent all my days a-dwelling on the injuries of my family.Could I have put that there unekaled sample of water-power and humaningenuity together without laboring hard for whole months of a stretch,except upon the Sabbath, and laying awake night after night, and bendingall my intellect over it? And could I have done that, think you now,if my heart was a-mooning upon family wrongs, and this, that, and theother?"
Here Sampson Gundry turned full upon me, and folded his arms, and spreadhis great chin upon his deer-skin apron, and nodded briskly with hisdeep gray eyes, surveying me in triumph. To his mind, that mill was thewonder of the world, and any argument based upon it, with or withoutcoherence, was, like its circular saws, irresistible. And yet he thoughtthat women can not reason! However, I did not say another word justthen, but gave way to him, as behooved a child. And not only that, but Ialways found him too good to be argued with--too kind, I mean, and largeof heart, and wedded to his own peculiar turns. There was nothing abouthim that one could dislike, or strike fire at, and be captious; and healways proceeded with such pity for those who were opposed to him thatthey always knew they must be wrong, though he was too polite to tellthem so. And he had such a pleasant, paternal way of looking down intoone's little thoughts when he put on his spectacles, that to say anymore was to hazard the risk of ungrateful inexperience.