“The lad, the lad! Do I care for the lad?”
“No, God forgive ye!” my uncle cried, “not you that ought.”
“That ought, you fool?”
“Ay; that ought.”
The man laughed.
“I’ll not have ye laugh,” said my uncle, “at Dannie. Ye’ve tried my patience enough with scorn o’ that child.” He tapped the table imperatively, continuing with rising anger, and scowled in a way I had learned to take warning from. “No more o’ that!” says he. “Ye’ve no call t’ laugh at the lad.”
The laughter ceased—failed ridiculously. It proved my uncle’s mastery of the situation. The man might bluster, but was in a moment reduced.
“Top,” said the stranger, leaning forward a little, “I have asked you a simple question: Will you or won’t you?”
“I will not!”
In exasperation the man struck my uncle on the cheek.
“I’ll not hurt ye for that!” said my uncle, gently. “I’ll not hurt ye, man, for that!”
He was struck again. “There will come an extremity,” the stranger calmly added, “when I shall find it expedient to have you assassinated.”
“I’ll not hurt ye for the threat,” said my uncle. “But man,” he cried, in savage anger, “an you keeps me from workin’ my will with the lad—”
“The lad, the lad!”
“An you keeps me from workin’ my will with that good lad—”
“I say to you frankly: Damn the lad!”
My uncle struck the stranger. “Ye’ll mend your manners!” cried he. “Ye’ve forgot your obligations, but ye’ll mend your manners!”
I marvelled that these men should strike each other with impunity. The like was never known before. That each should patiently bear the insult of the other! I could not make it out. ’Twas strange beyond experience. A blow—and the other cheek turned! Well enough for Christians—but my vicious uncle and this evil stranger! That night, while I watched and listened unperceived from the hall, I could not understand; but now I know that a fellowship of wickedness was signified.
“I’ll not hurt you, Top,” the stranger mocked, “for the blow.”
My uncle laughed.
“Are you laughing, Top?” the stranger sneered. “You are, aren’t you? Well,” says he, “who laughs last laughs best. And I tell you, Top, though you may seem to have the best laugh now, I’ll have the last. And you won’t like it, Top—you won’t be happy when you hear me.”
My uncle laughed again. I wish he had not laughed—not in that unkind way.
“Anyhow,” said the stranger, “take that with my compliments!”
’Twas a brutal blow with the closed fist. I cried out. My uncle, with the sting and humiliation of the thing to forbear, was deaf to the cry; but the gray little man from St. John’s, who knew well enough he would have no buffet in return, turned, startled, and saw me. My uncle’s glance instantly followed; whereupon a singular thing happened. The old man—I recall the horror with which he discovered me—swept the lamp from the table with a swing of his hand. It hurtled like a star, crashed against the wall, fell shattered and extinguished. We were in darkness—and in silence. For a long interval no word was spoken; the gale was free to noise itself upon our ears—the patter of rain, the howl of the wind, the fretful breaking; of the sea.
“Dannie, lad,” says my uncle, at last, “is that you?”
“Ay, sir.”
“Then,” says he, tenderly, “I ’low you’d best be t’ bed. I’m feared you’ll be cotchin’ cold, there in the draught, in your night-gown. Ye’re so wonderful quick, lad, t’ cotch cold.”
“I’ve come, sir,” says I, “t’ your aid.”
The stranger tittered.
“T’ your aid, sir!” I shouted, defiantly.
“I’m not needin’ ye, Dannie. Ye’re best in bed. ’Tis so wonderful late. I ’low ye’ll be havin’ the croup again, lad, an you don’t watch out. An’ ye mustn’t have the croup; ye really mustn’t! Remember the last time, Dannie, an’ beware. Ah, now! Ye’ll never have the croup an ye can help it. Think,” he pleaded, “o’ the hot-water cloths, an’ the fear ye put me to. An’ Dannie,” he added, accusingly, “ye know the ipecac is all runned out!”
“I’ll stand by, sir,” says I.
“’Tis kind o’ you!” my uncle exclaimed, with infinite graciousness and affection. “’Tis wonderful kind! An’ I’m glad ye’re kind t’ me now—with my ol’ shipmate here. But you isn’t needed, lad; so do you go t’ bed like the good b’y that you is. Go t’ bed, Dannie, God bless ye!—go t’ bed, an’ go t’ sleep.”
“Ay,” I complained; “but I’m not wantin’ t’ leave ye with this man.”
“True, an’ I’m proud of it,” says he; “but I’ve no means o’ curin’ the croup. An’ Dannie,” says he, “I’m more feared o’ the croup than o’ the devil. Do you go t’ bed.”
“I’ll go,” I answered, “an you wills it.”
’Twas very dark in the dining-room; there was no sight of the geometrical gentlemen on that geometrically tempestuous sea to stay a lad in his defiance.
“Good lad!” said my uncle. “God bless ye!”
On the landing above I encountered my tutor, half-dressed, a candle in hand. ’Twas a queer figure he cut, thinks I—an odd, inconsequent figure in a mysterious broil of the men of our kind. What was this cockney—this wretched alien—when the passions of our coast were stirring? He would be better in bed. An eye he had—age-wise ways and a glance to overawe my youth—but what was he, after all, in such a case as this? I was his master, however unlearned I might be; his elder and master, to be sure, in a broil of our folk. Though to this day I respect the man for his manifold virtues, forgetting in magnanimity his failings, I cannot forgive his appearance on that night: the candle, the touselled hair, the disarray, the lean legs of him! “What’s all this?” he demanded. “I can’t sleep. What’s all this about? Is it a burglar?”
It made me impatient—and no wonder!
“What’s this, you know?” he repeated. “Eh? What’s all this row?”
“Do you go t’ bed!” I commanded, with a stamp, quite out of temper. “Ye’re but a child! Ye’ve no hand in this!”
He was dutiful.…
* * * *
By-and-by my uncle came to my room. He would not enter, but stood at the door, in much embarrassment, all the while looking at the flame of his candle. “Dannie, lad,” he inquired, at last, “is you comfortable?”
“Ay, sir,” says I.
“An’ happy?”
“Ay, sir.”
“An’ is you content,” says he, “all alone with ol’ Nick Top at Twist Tickle?”
I was content.
“You isn’t upsot, is you, by the capers o’ my ol’ shipmate?”
I answered as he wished. “No, sir,” said I.
“Oh no,” says he; “no need o’ bein’ upsot by that ol’ bully. He’ve wonderful queer ways, I’ll not deny, but ye’re not in the way o’ knowin’, Dannie, that he’ve not a good heart. I ’low ye’ll maybe take to un, lad—when you comes t’ know un better. I hopes ye will. I hopes ye’ll find it easy t’ deal with un. They’s no need now o’ bein’ upsot; oh my, no! But, Dannie, an I was you,” says he, a bit hopelessly, “times bein’ what they is, an’ life uncertain—an I was you, lad—afore I went t’ sleep I—I—I ’low I’d overhaul that there twenty-third psa’m!”
He went away then.…
XII
NEED O’ HASTE
When I awoke ’twas to a gray morning. The wind had fallen to half a gale for stout craft—continuing in the east, the rain gone out of it. Fog had come upon the islands at dawn; ’twas now everywhere settled thick—the hills lost to sight, the harbor water black and illimitable, the world all soggy and muffled. There was a great noise of breakers upon the seaward rocks. A high sea running without (they said); but yet my uncle had manned a trap-skiff at dawn (said they) to put a stranger across to Topmast Point. A
gentleman ’twas (said they)—a gray little man with a red mole at the tip of his nose, who had lain the night patiently enough at Skipper Eli Flack’s, but must be off at break o’ day, come what might, to board the outside boat for St. John’s at Topmast Harbor. He had gone in high good-humor; crackin’ off along o’ Skipper Nick (said Eli) like he’d knowed un all his life. An’ Nick? why, ecod! Nick was crackin’ off, too. Never knowed such crackin’ off atween strangers. You could hear the crew laughin’ clear t’ the narrows. ’Twould be a lovely cruise! Rough passage, t’ be sure; but Nick could take a skiff through that! An’ Nick would drive her, ecod! You’d see ol’ Nick wing it back through the narrows afore the night was down if the wind held easterly. He’d be the b’y t’ put she to it!
I scanned the sky and sea.
“Ay,” quoth Eli, of the gale; “she haven’t spit out all she’ve got. She quit in a temper, at dawn,” says he, “an’ she’ll be back afore night t’ ease her mind.”
’Twas a dismal prospect for my uncle.
“But ’twould be a clever gale at flirtin’,” Eli added, for my comfort, “that could delude an’ overcome ol’ Nick!”
My tutor would go walking upon the roads and heads of our harbor (said he) to learn of this new world into which he had come in the dark. ’Twas gray and windy and dripping on the hills; but I led him (though his flimsy protection against the weather liked me not) over the Whisper Cove road to the cliffs of Tom Tulk’s Head, diligently exercising, as we went, for my profit and his befitting entertainment, all the Chesterfieldian phrases ’twas in me to recall. ’Twas easy to perceive his delight in this manner of speech: ’twas a thing so manifest, indeed, such was the exuberance of his laughter and so often did he clap me on the back, that I was fairly abashed by the triumph, and could not for the life of me continue, but must descend, for lack of spirit, to the common tongue of our folk, which did him well enough, after all, it seemed. It pleased him mightily to be set on the crest and brink of that great cliff, high in the mist, the gray wind blowing by, the black sea careering from an ambush of fog to break in wrathful assault upon the grim rocks below. ’Twas amazing: the slender figure drawn in glee to breast the gale, the long arms opened to the wind, the rapt, dark face, the flashing eyes, the deep, eager breaths like sighs of rapture. A rhapsody: the rush and growl and frown of the world (said he)—the sombre colors, the veil of mist, the everlasting hills, rising in serenity above the turmoil and evanescent rage. To this I listened in wonder. I had not for myself discovered these beauties; but thereafter, because of this teaching, I kept watch.
Came, then, out of the mist, Judith, upon accustomed business. “Dannie, lad,” she asked me, not shy of the stranger, because of woful anxiety, “you’ve not seed my mother hereabouts, is you?”
I grieved that I had not.
“She’ve been gone,” said Judith, with a helpless glance, sweeping the sombre, veiled hills, “since afore dawn. I waked at dawn, Dannie, an’ she were gone from the bed—an’ I isn’t been able t’ find she, somehow. She’ve wandered off—she’ve wandered off again—in her way.”
I would help, said I.
“You’re kind, Dannie,” said she. “Ay, God’s sake, lad! You’re wondrous kind—t’ me.”
My tutor tipped the sad little face, as though by right and propriety admitted long ago, and for a moment looked unabashed into Judith’s eyes—an engaging glance, it seemed, for Judith was left unresisting and untroubled by it. They were eyes, now, speaking anxious fear and weariness and motherly concern, the brows drawn, the tragic little shadows, lying below, very wide and blue.
“You are a pretty child,” said my tutor, presently; “you have very beautiful eyes, have you not? But you knew it long ago, of course,” he added, smiling in a way most captivating, “didn’t you?”
“No, sir.”
I remember the day—the mist and wind and clamoring sea and solemn hills, the dour, ill-tempered world wherein we were, our days as grass (saith the psalmist). Ay, an’ ’tis so. I remember the day: the wet moss underfoot; the cold wind, blowing as it listed; the petulant sea, wreaking an ancient enmity, old and to continue beyond our span of feeling; the great hills of Twin Islands hid in mist, but yet watching us; the clammy fog embracing us, three young, unknowing souls. I shall not forget—cannot forget—the moment of that first meeting of the maid Judith with John Cather. ’Twas a sombre day, as he had said—ay, a troubled sea, a gray, cold, sodden earth!
“And has nobody told you that you were pretty?” my tutor ran on, in pleasant banter.
She would not answer; but shyly, in sweet self-consciousness, looked down.
“No?” he insisted.
She was too shy of him to say.
“Not even one?” he persisted, tipping up the blushing little face. “Not even one?”
I thought it very bold.
“Come, now,” says he. “There is a boy. You are so very pretty, you know. You are so very, very pretty. There must be a boy—a sweetheart. Surely there is at least one lad of taste at Twist Tickle. There is a sweetheart; there must be a sweetheart. I spell it with a D!” cries he, triumphantly, detecting the horrified glance that passed between Judy and me. And he clapped me on the back, and stroked Judith’s tawny hair, his hand bold, winning; and he laughed most heartily. “His name,” says he, “is Daniel!”
“Yes, sir,” said Judith, quite frankly.
My tutor laughed again; and I was glad that he did—in that kind way. I was glad—’twas a flush of warm feeling—that my tutor and Judith were at once upon terms of understanding. I was glad that Judith smiled, glad that she looked again, with favor, in interested speculation, into the dark eyes which smiled back at her again. I would have them friends—’twas according to my plan.…
* * * *
At mid-day the wrath of the sea began to fail. The racing lop, the eager, fuming crests—a black-and-white confusion beneath the quiet, gray fog—subsided into reasonableness. ’Twas wild enough, wind and sea, beyond the tickle rocks; but still ’twas fishing weather and water for the courageous.
The fool of Twist Tickle came to our gate. “Mother always ’lowed,” says he, “that when a man could he ought t’; an’ mother knowed.”
“You’re never bound out, Moses!”
“Well,” he drawled, “mother always ’lowed that when a man could pick up a scattered fish an’ wouldn’t, he were a mean sort o’ coward.”
“An’ you’ll be takin’ me?”
“I was ’lowin’,” he answered, “that us might get out an’ back an us tried.”
’Twas a brave prospect. Beyond the tickle in a gale o wind! ’Twas irresistible—to be accomplished with the fool of Twist Tickle and his clever punt. I left the pottering Cather to put ship-shape his cabin (as he now called it) for himself—a rainy-day occupation for aliens. In high delight I put out with Moses Shoos to the Off-and-On grounds. Man’s work, this! ’Twas hard sailing for a hook-and-line punt—the reel and rush and splash of it—but an employment the most engaging. ’Twas worse fishing in the toss and smother of the grounds; but ’twas a thrilling reward when the catch came flopping overside—the spoil of a doughty foray. We fished a clean half-quintal; then, late in the day, a rising wind caught us napping in Hell Alley. It came on to blow from the east with fury. There was no beating up to the tickle in the teeth of it; ’twas a task beyond the little punt, drive her to it as we would. When dusk came—dusk fast turning the fog black—the fool turned tail and wisely ran for Whisper Cove. ’Twas dark when we moored the punt to the stage-head: a black night come again, blowing wildly with rain—great gusts of wind threshing the trees above, screaming from cliff to cliff. There were lights at Judith’s: ’twas straightway in our minds to ask a cup of tea in her kitchen; but when we came near the door ’twas to the discovery of company moving in and out.
There were women in the kitchen.
“’Tis Judith’s mother, Dannie,” Aunt Esther All whispered. “’Tis on’y she. ’Tis on’y Elizabeth.”
>
We had found her on the hills that morning.
“She’ve come t’ die all of a suddent. ’Tis another of her spells. Oh, Lord! She’ve come t’ die.”
There was no solemnity in this outer room.
“She’ve woful need o’ salvation,” Aunt Esther pattered. “She’s doomed, lad, an she doesn’t repent. Parson Stump ought t’ be fetched t’ work on she.”
There was grief—somewhere there was grief. I heard a sob; it came from a child’s breast. And there followed, then, some strange, rambling words of comfort in Elizabeth’s voice—a plea, it was, to never mind. Again a sob—Judith’s grief.
“’Tis Judith,” Aunt Esther sighed. “She’ve gone an’ give way.”
The child’s heart would break!
“Mother always ’lowed, Dannie,” Moses whispered, “that they ought t’ be a parson handy—when It come.”
’Twas beyond the power of the fool to manage: who was now a fool, indeed—white and shivering in this Presence. I would fetch the parson, said I—and moved right willingly and in haste upon the errand. Aunt Esther followed me beyond the threshold. She caught my arm with such a grasp that I was brought up in surprise. We stood in the wind and rain. The light from the kitchen fell through the doorway into the black night. Aunt Esther’s lean, brown face, as the lamp betrayed, was working with eager and shameless curiosity. They had wondered, these women of Whisper Cove, overlong and without patience, to know what they wished to know but could not discover. “She’ve been wantin’ Skipper Nicholas,” says she. “She’ve been callin’ for Skipper Nicholas. She’ve been singin’ out, Dannie, like a wretch in tarture. Tell un t’ come. She’ve been wantin’ un sore. She’ve a thing on her mind. Tell un not t’ fail. ’Tis something she’ve t’ tell un. ‘I wants Skipper Nicholas!’ says she. ‘Fetch Nicholas! I wants a word with he afore I die.’ Hist!” Aunt Esther added, as though imparting some delight, “I ’low ’tis the secret.”
The Sea-Story Megapack: 30 Classic Nautical Works Page 93
