PETER GOLDTHWAITE'S TREASURE
"And so, Peter, you won't even consider of the business?" saidMr. John Brown, buttoning his surtout over the snug rotundity ofhis person, and drawing on his gloves. "You positively refuse tolet me have this crazy old house, and the land under andadjoining, at the price named?"
"Neither at that, nor treble the sum," responded the gaunt,grizzled, and threadbare Peter Goldthwaite. "The fact is, Mr.Brown, you must find another site for your brick block, and becontent to leave my estate with the present owner. Next summer, Iintend to put a splendid new mansion over the cellar of the oldhouse."
"Pho, Peter!" cried Mr. Brown, as he opened the kitchen door;"content yourself with building castles in the air, wherehouse-lots are cheaper than on earth, to say nothing of the costof bricks and mortar. Such foundations are solid enough for youredifices, while this underneath us is just the thing for mine;and so we may both be suited. What say you again?"
"Precisely what I said before, Mr. Brown," answered PeterGoldthwaite. "And as for castles in the air, mine may not be asmagnificent as that sort of architecture, but perhaps assubstantial, Mr. Brown, as the very respectable brick block withdry goods stores, tailors' shops, and banking rooms on the lowerfloor, and lawyers' offices in the second story, which you are soanxious to substitute."
"And the cost, Peter, eh?" said Mr. Brown, as he withdrew, insomething of a pet. "That, I suppose, will be provided for,off-hand, by drawing a check on Bubble Bank!"
John Brown and Peter Goldthwaite had been jointly known to thecommercial world between twenty and thirty years before, underthe firm of Goldthwaite & Brown; which co-partnership, however,was speedily dissolved by the natural incongruity of itsconstituent parts. Since that event, John Brown, with exactly thequalities of a thousand other John Browns, and by just suchplodding methods as they used, had prospered wonderfully, andbecome one of the wealthiest John Browns on earth. PeterGoldthwaite, on the contrary, after innumerable schemes, whichought to have collected all the coin and paper currency of thecountry into his coffers, was as needy a gentleman as ever wore apatch upon his elbow. The contrast between him and his formerpartner may be briefly marked; for Brown never reckoned uponluck, yet always had it; while Peter made luck the main conditionof his projects, and always missed it. While the means held out,his speculations had been magnificent, but were chiefly confined,of late years, to such small business as adventures in thelottery. Once he had gone on a gold-gathering expeditionsomewhere to the South, and ingeniously contrived to empty hispockets more thoroughly than ever; while others, doubtless, werefilling theirs with native bullion by the handful. More recentlyhe had expended a legacy of a thousand or two of dollars inpurchasing Mexican scrip, and thereby became the proprietor of aprovince; which, however, so far as Peter could find out, wassituated where he might have had an empire for the samemoney,--in the clouds. From a search after this valuable realestate Peter returned so gaunt and threadbare that, on reachingNew England, the scarecrows in the cornfields beckoned to him, ashe passed by. "They did but flutter in the wind," quoth PeterGoldthwaite. No, Peter, they beckoned, for the scarecrows knewtheir brother!
At the period of our story his whole visible income would nothave paid the tax of the old mansion in which we find him. It wasone of those rusty, moss-grown, many-peaked wooden houses, whichare scattered about the streets of our elder towns, with abeetle-browed second story projecting over the foundation, as ifit frowned at the novelty around it. This old paternal edifice,needy as he was, and though, being centrally situated on theprincipal street of the town, it would have brought him ahandsome sum, the sagacious Peter had his own reasons for neverparting with, either by auction or private sale. There seemed,indeed, to be a fatality that connected him with his birthplace;for, often as he had stood on the verge of ruin, and standingthere even now, he had not yet taken the step beyond it whichwould have compelled him to surrender the house to his creditors.So here he dwelt with bad luck till good should come.
Here then in his kitchen, the only room where a spark of firetook off the chill of a November evening, poor Peter Goldthwaitehad just been visited by his rich old partner. At the close oftheir interview, Peter, with rather a mortified look, glanceddownwards at his dress, parts of which appeared as ancient as thedays of Goldthwaite & Brown. His upper garment was a mixedsurtout, wofully faded, and patched with newer stuff on eachelbow; beneath this he wore a threadbare black coat, some of thesilk buttons of which had been replaced with others of adifferent pattern; and lastly, though he lacked not a pair ofgray pantaloons, they were very shabby ones, and had beenpartially turned brown by the frequent toasting of Peter's shinsbefore a scanty fire. Peter's person was in keeping with hisgoodly apparel. Gray-headed, hollow-eyed, pale-cheeked, andlean-bodied, he was the perfect picture of a man who had fed onwindy schemes and empty hopes, till he could neither live on suchunwholesome trash, nor stomach more substantial food. But,withal, this Peter Goldthwaite, crack-brained simpleton as,perhaps, he was, might have cut a very brilliant figure in theworld, had he employed his imagination in the airy business ofpoetry, instead of making it a demon of mischief in mercantilepursuits. After all, he was no bad fellow, but as harmless as achild, and as honest and honorable, and as much of the gentlemanwhich nature meant him for, as an irregular life and depressedcircumstances will permit any man to be.
As Peter stood on the uneven bricks of his hearth, looking roundat the disconsolate old kitchen, his eyes began to kindle withthe illumination of an enthusiasm that never long deserted him.He raised his hand, clinched it, and smote it energeticallyagainst the smoky panel over the fireplace.
"The time is come!" said he. "With such a treasure at command, itwere folly to be a poor man any longer. To-morrow morning I willbegin with the garret, nor desist till I have torn the housedown!"
Deep in the chimney-corner, like a witch in a dark cavern, sat alittle old woman, mending one of the two pairs of stockingswherewith Peter Goldthwaite kept his toes from being frostbitten.As the feet were ragged past all darning, she had cut pieces outof a cast-off flannel petticoat, to make new soles. TabithaPorter was an old maid, upwards of sixty years of age, fifty-fiveof which she had sat in that same chimney-corner, such being thelength of time since Peter's grandfather had taken her from thealmshouse. She had no friend but Peter, nor Peter any friend butTabitha; so long as Peter might have a shelter for his own head,Tabitha would know where to shelter hers; or, being homelesselsewhere, she would take her master by the hand and bring him toher native home, the almshouse. Should it ever be necessary, sheloved him well enough to feed him with her last morsel, andclothe him with her under petticoat. But Tabitha was a queer oldwoman, and, though never infected with Peter's flightiness, hadbecome so accustomed to his freaks and follies that she viewedthem all as matters of course. Hearing him threaten to tear thehouse down, she looked quietly up from her work.
"Best leave the kitchen till the last, Mr. Peter," said she.
"The sooner we have it all down the better," said PeterGoldthwaite. "I am tired to death of living in this cold, dark,windy, smoky, creaking, groaning, dismal old house. I shall feellike a younger man when we get into my splendid brick mansion,as, please Heaven, we shall by this time next autumn. You shallhave a room on the sunny side, old Tabby, finished and furnishedas best may suit your own notions."
"I should like it pretty much such a room as this kitchen,"answered Tabitha. "It will never be like home to me till thechimney-corner gets as black with smoke as this; and that won'tbe these hundred years. How much do you mean to lay out on thehouse, Mr. Peter?"
"What is that to the purpose?" exclaimed Peter, loftily. "Did notmy great-granduncle, Peter Goldthwaite, who died seventy yearsago, and whose namesake I am, leave treasure enough to buildtwenty such?"
"I can't say but he did, Mr. Peter," said Tabitha, threading herneedle.
Tabitha well understood that Peter had reference to an immensehoard of the precious metals, which was said to exist somewherein the cellar or walls,
or under the floors, or in some concealedcloset, or other out-of-the-way nook of the house. This wealth,according to tradition, had been accumulated by a former PeterGoldthwaite, whose character seems to have borne a remarkablesimilitude to that of the Peter of our story. Like him he was awild projector, seeking to heap up gold by the bushel and thecartload, instead of scraping it together, coin by coin. LikePeter the second, too, his projects had almost invariably failed,and, but for the magnificent success of the final one, would haveleft him with hardly a coat and pair of breeches to his gaunt andgrizzled person. Reports were various as to the nature of hisfortunate speculation: one intimating that the ancient Peter hadmade the gold by alchemy; another, that he had conjured it out ofpeople's pockets by the black art; and a third, still moreunaccountable, that the devil had given him free access to theold provincial treasury. It was affirmed, however, that somesecret impediment had debarred him from the enjoyment of hisriches, and that he had a motive for concealing them from hisheir, or at any rate had died without disclosing the place ofdeposit. The present Peter's father had faith enough in the storyto cause the cellar to be dug over. Peter himself chose toconsider the legend as an indisputable truth, and, amid his manytroubles, had this one consolation that, should all otherresources fail, he might build up his fortunes by tearing hishouse down. Yet, unless he felt a lurking distrust of the goldentale, it is difficult to account for his permitting the paternalroof to stand so long, since he had never yet seen the momentwhen his predecessor's treasure would not have found plenty ofroom in his own strong box. But now was the crisis. Should hedelay the search a little longer, the house would pass from thelineal heir, and with it the vast heap of gold, to remain in itsburial-place, till the ruin of the aged walls should discover itto strangers of a future generation.
"Yes!" cried Peter Goldthwaite, again, "to-morrow I will setabout it."
The deeper he looked at the matter the more certain of successgrew Peter. His spirits were naturally so elastic that even now,in the blasted autumn of his age, he could often compete with thespring-time gayety of other people. Enlivened by his brighteningprospects, he began to caper about the kitchen like a hobgoblin,with the queerest antics of his lean limbs, and gesticulations ofhis starved features. Nay, in the exuberance of his feelings, heseized both of Tabitha's hands, and danced the old lady acrossthe floor, till the oddity of her rheumatic motions set him intoa roar of laughter, which was echoed back from the rooms andchambers, as if Peter Goldthwaite were laughing in every one.Finally he bounded upward almost out of sight, into the smokethat clouded the roof of the kitchen, and, alighting safely onthe floor again, endeavored to resume his customary gravity.
"To-morrow, at sunrise," he repeated, taking his lamp to retireto bed, "I'll see whether this treasure be hid in the wall of thegarret."
"And as we're out of wood, Mr. Peter," said Tabitha, puffing andpanting with her late gymnastics, "as fast as you tear the housedown, I'll make a fire with the pieces."
Gorgeous that night were the dreams of Peter Goldthwaite! At onetime he was turning a ponderous key in an iron door not unlikethe door of a sepulchre, but which, being opened, disclosed avault heaped up with gold coin, as plentifully as golden corn ina granary. There were chased goblets, also, and tureens, salvers,dinner dishes, and dish covers of gold, or silver gilt, besideschains and other jewels, incalculably rich, though tarnished withthe damps of the vault; for, of all the wealth that wasirrevocably lost to the man, whether buried in the earth orsunken in the sea, Peter Goldthwaite had found it in this onetreasure-place. Anon, he had returned to the old house as poor asever, and was received at the door by the gaunt and grizzledfigure of a man whom he might have mistaken for himself, onlythat his garments were of a much elder fashion. But the house,without losing its former aspect, had been changed into a palaceof the precious metals. The floors, walls, and ceiling were ofburnished silver; the doors, the window frames, the cornices, thebalustrades and the steps of the staircase, of pure gold; andsilver, with gold bottoms, were the chairs, and gold, standing onsilver legs, the high chests of drawers, and silver thebedsteads, with blankets of woven gold, and sheets of silvertissue. The house had evidently been transmuted by a singletouch; for it retained all the marks that Peter remembered, butin gold or silver instead of wood; and the initials of his name,which, when a boy, he had cut in the wooden door-post, remainedas deep in the pillar of gold. A happy man would have been PeterGoldthwaite except for a certain ocular deception, which,whenever he glanced backwards, caused the house to darken fromits glittering magnificence into the sordid gloom of yesterday.
Up, betimes, rose Peter, seized an axe, hammer, and saw, which hehad placed by his bedside, and hied him to the garret. It was butscantily lighted up, as yet, by the frosty fragments of asunbeam, which began to glimmer through the almost opaquebull's-eyes of the window. A moralizer might find abundant themesfor his speculative and impracticable wisdom in a garret. Thereis the limbo of departed fashions, aged trifles. Of a day, andwhatever was valuable only to one generation of men, and whichpassed to the garret when that generation passed to the grave,not for safe keeping, but to be out of the way. Peter saw pilesof yellow and musty account-books, in parchment covers, whereincreditors, long dead and buried, had written the names of deadand buried debtors in ink now so faded that their moss-growntombstones were more legible. He found old moth-eaten garmentsall in rags and tatters, or Peter would have put them on. Herewas a naked and rusty sword, not a sword of service, but agentleman's small French rapier, which had never left itsscabbard till it lost it. Here were canes of twenty differentsorts, but no gold-headed ones, and shoe-buckles of variouspattern and material, but not silver nor set with preciousstones. Here was a large box full of shoes, with high heels andpeaked toes. Here, on a shelf, were a multitude of phials,half-filled with old apothecaries' stuff, which, when the otherhalf had done its business on Peter's ancestors, had been broughthither from the death chamber. Here--not to give a longerinventory of articles that will never be put up at auction--wasthe fragment of a full-length looking-glass, which, by the dustand dimness of its surface, made the picture of these old thingslook older than the reality. When Peter not knowing that therewas a mirror there, caught the faint traces of his own figure, hepartly imagined that the former Peter Goldthwaite had come back,either to assist or impede his search for the hidden wealth. Andat that moment a strange notion glimmered through his brain thathe was the identical Peter who had concealed the gold, and oughtto know whereabout it lay. This, however, he had unaccountablyforgotten.
"Well, Mr. Peter!" cried Tabitha, on the garret stairs. "Have youtorn the house down enough to heat the teakettle?"
"Not yet, old Tabby," answered Peter; "but that's soon done--asyou shall see."
With the word in his mouth, he uplifted the axe, and laid abouthim so vigorously that the dust flew, the boards crashed, and, ina twinkling, the old woman had an apron full of broken rubbish.
"We shall get our winter's wood cheap," quoth Tabitha.
The good work being thus commenced, Peter beat down all beforehim, smiting and hewing at the joists and timbers, unclinchingspike-nails, ripping and tearing away boards, with a tremendousracket, from morning till night. He took care, however, to leavethe outside shell of the house untouched, so that the neighborsmight not suspect what was going on.
Never, in any of his vagaries, though each had made him happywhile it lasted, had Peter been happier than now. Perhaps, afterall, there was something in Peter Goldthwaite's turn of mind,which brought him an inward recompense for all the external evilthat it caused. If he were poor, ill-clad, even hungry, andexposed, as it were, to be utterly annihilated by a precipice ofimpending ruin, yet only his body remained in these miserablecircumstances, while his aspiring soul enjoyed the sunshine of abright futurity. It was his nature to be always young, and thetendency of his mode of life to keep him so. Gray hairs werenothing, no, nor wrinkles, nor infirmity; he might look old,indeed, and be somewhat disagreeably connected with a gaunt oldfigure
, much the worse for wear; but the true, the essentialPeter was a young man of high hopes, just entering on the world.At the kindling of each new fire, his burnt-out youth rose afreshfrom the old embers and ashes. It rose exulting now. Having livedthus long--not too long, but just to the right age--a susceptiblebachelor, with warm and tender dreams, he resolved, so soon asthe hidden gold should flash to light, to go a-wooing, and winthe love of the fairest maid in town. What heart could resisthim? Happy Peter Goldthwaite!
Every evening--as Peter had long absented himself from his formerlounging-places, at insurance offices, news-rooms, andbookstores, and as the honor of his company was seldom requestedin private circles--he and Tabitha used to sit down sociably bythe kitchen hearth. This was always heaped plentifully with therubbish of his day's labor. As the foundation of the fire, therewould be a goodly-sized backlog of red oak, which, after beingsheltered from rain or damp above a century, still hissed withthe heat, and distilled streams of water from each end, as if thetree had been cut down within a week or two. Next these werelarge sticks, sound, black, and heavy, which had lost theprinciple of decay, and were indestructible except by fire,wherein they glowed like red-hot bars of iron. On this solidbasis, Tabitha would rear a lighter structure, composed of thesplinters of door panels, ornamented mouldings, and such quickcombustibles, which caught like straw, and threw a brilliantblaze high up the spacious flue, making its sooty sides visiblealmost to the chimney-top. Meantime, the gleam of the old kitchenwould be chased out of the cobwebbed corners and away from thedusky cross-beams overhead, and driven nobody could tell whither,while Peter smiled like a gladsome man, and Tabitha seemed apicture of comfortable age. All this, of course, was but anemblem of the bright fortune which the destruction of the housewould shed upon its occupants.
While the dry pine was flaming and crackling, like an irregulardischarge of fairy musketry, Peter sat looking and listening, ina pleasant state of excitement. But, when the brief blaze anduproar were succeeded by the dark-red glow, the substantial heat,and the deep singing sound, which were to last throughout theevening, his humor became talkative. One night, the hundredthtime, he teased Tabitha to tell him something new about hisgreat-granduncle.
"You have been sitting in that chimney-corner fifty-five years,old Tabby, and must have heard many a tradition about him," saidPeter. "Did not you tell me that, when you first came to thehouse, there was an old woman sitting where you sit now, who hadbeen housekeeper to the famous Peter Goldthwaite?"
"So there was, Mr. Peter," answered Tabitha, "and she was nearabout a hundred years old. She used to say that she and old PeterGoldthwaite had often spent a sociable evening by the kitchenfire--pretty much as you and I are doing now, Mr. Peter."
"The old fellow must have resembled me in more points than one,"said Peter, complacently, "or he never would have grown so rich.But, methinks, he might have invested the money better than hedid--no interest!--nothing but good security!--and the house tobe torn down to come at it! What made him hide it so snug,Tabby?"
"Because he could not spend it," said Tabitha; "for as often ashe went to unlock the chest, the Old Scratch came behind andcaught his arm. The money, they say, was paid Peter out of hispurse; and he wanted Peter to give him a deed of this house andland, which Peter swore he would not do."
"Just as I swore to John Brown, my old partner," remarked Peter."But this is all nonsense, Tabby! I don't believe the story."
"Well, it may not be just the truth," said Tabitha; "for somefolks say that Peter did make over the house to the Old Scratch,and that's the reason it has always been so unlucky to them thatlived in it. And as soon as Peter had given him the deed, thechest flew open, and Peter caught up a handful of the gold. But,lo and behold!--there was nothing in his fist but a parcel of oldrags."
"Hold your tongue, you silly old Tabby!" cried Peter in greatwrath. "They were as good golden guineas as ever bore theeffigies of the king of England. It seems as if I could recollectthe whole circumstance, and how I, or old Peter, or whoever itwas, thrust in my hand, or his hand, and drew it out all of ablaze with gold. Old rags, indeed!"
But it was not an old woman's legend that would discourage PeterGoldthwaite. All night long he slept among pleasant dreams, andawoke at daylight with a joyous throb of the heart, which few arefortunate enough to feel beyond their boyhood. Day after day helabored hard without wasting a moment, except at meal times, whenTabitha summoned him to the pork and cabbage, or such othersustenance as she had picked up, or Providence had sent them.Being a truly pious man, Peter never failed to ask a blessing; ifthe food were none of the best, then so much the more earnestly,as it was more needed;--nor to return thanks, if the dinner hadbeen scanty, yet for the good appetite, which was better than asick stomach at a feast. Then did he hurry back to his toil, and,in a moment, was lost to sight in a cloud of dust from the oldwalls, though sufficiently perceptible to the ear by the clatterwhich he raised in the midst of it. How enviable is theconsciousness of being usefully employed! Nothing troubled Peter;or nothing but those phantoms of the mind which seem like vaguerecollections, yet have also the aspect of presentiments. Heoften paused, with his axe uplifted in the air, and said tohimself,--"Peter Goldthwaite, did you never strike this blowbefore?" or, "Peter, what need of tearing the whole house down?Think a little while, and you will remember where the gold ishidden." Days and weeks passed on, however, without anyremarkable discovery. Sometimes, indeed, a lean, gray rat peepedforth at the lean, gray man, wondering what devil had got intothe old house, which had always been so peaceable till now. And,occasionally, Peter sympathized with the sorrows of a femalemouse, who had brought five or six pretty, little, soft anddelicate young ones into the world just in time to see themcrushed by its ruin. But, as yet, no treasure!
By this time, Peter, being as determined as Fate and as diligentas Time, had made an end with the uppermost regions, and got downto the second story, where he was busy in one of the frontchambers. It had formerly been the state bed-chamber, and washonored by tradition as the sleeping apartment of GovernorDudley, and many other eminent guests. The furniture was gone.There were remnants of faded and tattered paper-hangings, butlarger spaces of bare wall ornamented with charcoal sketches,chiefly of people's heads in profile. These being specimens ofPeter's youthful genius, it went more to his heart to obliteratethem than if they had been pictures on a church wall by MichaelAngelo. One sketch, however, and that the best one, affected himdifferently. It represented a ragged man, partly supportinghimself on a spade, and bending his lean body over a hole in theearth, with one hand extended to grasp something that he hadfound. But close behind him, with a fiendish laugh on hisfeatures, appeared a figure with horns, a tufted tail, and acloven hoof.
"Avaunt, Satan!" cried Peter. "The man shall have his gold!"
Uplifting his axe, he hit the horned gentleman such a blow on thehead as not only demolished him, but the treasure-seeker also,and caused the whole scene to vanish like magic. Moreover, hisaxe broke quite through the plaster and laths, and discovered acavity.
"Mercy on us, Mr. Peter, are you quarrelling with the OldScratch?" said Tabitha, who was seeking some fuel to put underthe pot.
Without answering the old woman, Peter broke down a further spaceof the wall, and laid open a small closet or cupboard, on oneside of the fireplace, about breast high from the ground. Itcontained nothing but a brass lamp, covered with verdigris, and adusty piece of parchment. While Peter inspected the latter,Tabitha seized the lamp, and began to rub it with her apron.
"There is no use in rubbing it, Tabitha," said Peter. "It is notAladdin's lamp, though I take it to be a token of as much luck.Look here Tabby!"
Tabitha took the parchment and held it close to her nose, whichwas saddled with a pair of iron-bound spectacles. But no soonerhad she began to puzzle over it than she burst into a chucklinglaugh, holding both her hands against her sides.
"You can't make a fool of the old woman!" cried she. "This isyour own handwriting, Mr. Peter! the same as in the let
ter yousent me from Mexico."
"There is certainly a considerable resemblance," said Peter,again examining the parchment. "But you know yourself, Tabby,that this closet must have been plastered up before you came tothe house, or I came into the world. No, this is old PeterGoldthwaite's writing; these columns of pounds, shillings, andpence are his figures, denoting the amount of the treasure; andthis at the bottom is, doubtless, a reference to the place ofconcealment. But the ink has either faded or peeled off, so thatit is absolutely illegible. What a pity!"
"Well, this lamp is as good as new. That's some comfort," saidTabitha.
"A lamp!" thought Peter. "That indicates light on my researches."
For the present, Peter felt more inclined to ponder on thisdiscovery than to resume his labors. After Tabitha had gone downstairs, he stood poring over the parchment, at one of the frontwindows, which was so obscured with dust that the sun couldbarely throw an uncertain shadow of the casement across thefloor. Peter forced it open, and looked out upon the great streetof the town, while the sun looked in at his old house. The air,though mild, and even warm, thrilled Peter as with a dash ofwater.
It was the first day of the January thaw. The snow lay deep uponthe house-tops, but was rapidly dissolving into millions ofwater-drops, which sparkled downwards through the sunshine, withthe noise of a summer shower beneath the eaves. Along the street,the trodden snow was as hard and solid as a pavement of whitemarble, and had not yet grown moist in the spring-liketemperature. But when Peter thrust forth his head, he saw thatthe inhabitants, if not the town, were already thawed out by thiswarm day, after two or three weeks of winter weather. Itgladdened him--a gladness with a sigh breathing through it--tosee the stream of ladies, gliding along the slippery sidewalks,with their red cheeks set off by quilted hoods, boas, and sablecapes, like roses amidst a new kind of foliage. The sleigh-bellsjingled to and fro continually: sometimes announcing the arrivalof a sleigh from Vermont, laden with the frozen bodies ofporkers, or sheep, and perhaps a deer or two; sometimes of aregular market-man, with chickens, geese, and turkeys, comprisingthe whole colony of a barn yard; and sometimes of a farmer andhis dame, who had come to town partly for the ride, partly to goa-shopping, and partly for the sale of some eggs and butter. Thiscouple rode in an old-fashioned square sleigh, which had servedthem twenty winters, and stood twenty summers in the sun besidetheir door. Now, a gentleman and lady skimmed the snow in anelegant car, shaped somewhat like a cockle-shell. Now, astage-sleigh, with its cloth curtains thrust aside to admit thesun, dashed rapidly down the street, whirling in and out amongthe vehicles that obstructed its passage. Now came, round acorner, the similitude of Noah's ark on runners, being an immenseopen sleigh with seats for fifty people, and drawn by a dozenhorses. This spacious receptacle was populous with merry maidsand merry bachelors, merry girls and boys, and merry old folks,all alive with fun, and grinning to the full width of theirmouths. They kept up a buzz of babbling voices and low laughter,and sometimes burst into a deep, joyous shout, which thespectators answered with three cheers, while a gang of roguishboys let drive their snowballs right among the pleasure party.The sleigh passed on, and, when concealed by a bend of thestreet, was still audible by a distant cry of merriment.
Never had Peter beheld a livelier scene than was constituted byall these accessories: the bright sun, the flashing water-drops,the gleaming snow, the cheerful multitude, the variety of rapidvehicles, and the jingle jangle of merry bells which made theheart dance to their music. Nothing dismal was to be seen, exceptthat peaked piece of antiquity, Peter Goldthwaite's house, whichmight well look sad externally, since such a terrible consumptionwas preying on its insides. And Peter's gaunt figure, halfvisible in the projecting second story, was worthy of his house.
"Peter! How goes it, friend Peter?" cried a voice across thestreet, as Peter was drawing in his head. "Look out here, Peter!"
Peter looked, and saw his old partner, Mr. John Brown, on theopposite sidewalk, portly and comfortable, with his furred cloakthrown open, disclosing a handsome surtout beneath. His voice haddirected the attention of the whole town to Peter Goldthwaite'swindow, and to the dusty scarecrow which appeared at it.
"I say, Peter," cried Mr. Brown again, "what the devil are youabout there, that I hear such a racket whenever I pass by? Youare repairing the old house, I suppose,--making a new one of it,eh?"
"Too late for that, I am afraid, Mr. Brown," replied Peter. "If Imake it new, it will be new inside and out, from the cellarupwards."
"Had not you better let me take the job?" said Mr. Brown,significantly.
"Not yet!" answered Peter, hastily shutting the window; for, eversince he had been in search of the treasure, he hated to havepeople stare at him.
As he drew back, ashamed of his outward poverty, yet proud of thesecret wealth within his grasp, a haughty smile shone out onPeter's visage, with precisely the effect of the dim sunbeams inthe squalid chamber. He endeavored to assume such a mien as hisancestor had probably worn, when he gloried in the building of astrong house for a home to many generations of his posterity. Butthe chamber was very dark to his snow-dazzled eyes, and verydismal too, in contrast with the living scene that he had justlooked upon. His brief glimpse into the street had given him aforcible impression of the manner in which the world kept itselfcheerful and prosperous, by social pleasures and an intercourseof business, while he, in seclusion, was pursuing an object thatmight possibly be a phantasm, by a method which most people wouldcall madness. It is one great advantage of a gregarious mode oflife that each person rectifies his mind by other minds, andsquares his conduct to that of his neighbors, so as seldom to belost in eccentricity. Peter Goldthwaite had exposed himself tothis influence by merely looking out of the window. For a while,he doubted whether there were any hidden chest of gold, and, inthat case, whether he was so exceedingly wise to tear the housedown, only to be convinced of its non-existence.
But this was momentary. Peter, the Destroyer, resumed the taskwhich fate had assigned him, nor faltered again till it wasaccomplished. In the course of his search, he met with manythings that are usually found in the ruins of an old house, andalso with some that are not. What seemed most to the purpose wasa rusty key, which had been thrust into a chink of the wall, witha wooden label appended to the handle, bearing the initials, P.G. Another singular discovery was that of a bottle of wine,walled up in an old oven. A tradition ran in the family, thatPeter's grandfather, a jovial officer in the old French War, hadset aside many dozens of the precious liquor for the benefit oftopers then unborn. Peter needed no cordial to sustain his hopes,and therefore kept the wine to gladden his success. Manyhalfpence did he pick up, that had been lost through the cracksof the floor, and some few Spanish coins, and the half of abroken sixpence, which had doubtless been a love token. There waslikewise a silver coronation medal of George the Third. But oldPeter Goldthwaite's strong box fled from one dark corner toanother, or otherwise eluded the second Peter's clutches, till,should he seek much farther, he must burrow into the earth.
We will not follow him in his triumphant progress, step by step.Suffice it that Peter worked like a steam-engine, and finished,in that one winter, the job which all the former inhabitants ofthe house, with time and the elements to aid them, had only halfdone in a century. Except the kitchen, every room and chamber wasnow gutted. The house was nothing but a shell,--the apparition ofa house,--as unreal as the painted edifices of a theatre. It waslike the perfect rind of a great cheese, in which a mouse haddwelt and nibbled till it was a cheese no more. And Peter was themouse.
What Peter had torn down, Tabitha had burned up; for she wiselyconsidered that, without a house, they should need no wood towarm it; and therefore economy was nonsense. Thus the whole housemight be said to have dissolved in smoke, and flown up among theclouds, through the great black flue of the kitchen chimney. Itwas an admirable parallel to the feat of the man who jumped downhis own throat.
On the night between the last day of winter and the first ofspring, every
chink and cranny had been ransacked, except withinthe precincts of the kitchen. This fated evening was an ugly one.A snow-storm had set in some hours before, and was still drivenand tossed about the atmosphere by a real hurricane, which foughtagainst the house as if the prince of the air, in person, wereputting the final stroke to Peter's labors. The framework beingso much weakened, and the inward props removed, it would havebeen no marvel if, in some stronger wrestle of the blast, therotten walls of the edifice, and all the peaked roofs, had comecrushing down upon the owner's head. He, however, was careless ofthe peril, but as wild and restless as the night itself, or asthe flame that quivered up the chimney at each roar of thetempestuous wind.
"The wine, Tabitha!" he cried. "My grandfather's rich old wine!We will drink it now!"
Tabitha arose from her smoke-blackened bench in thechimney-corner, and placed the bottle before Peter, close besidethe old brass lamp, which had likewise been the prize of hisresearches. Peter held it before his eyes, and, looking throughthe liquid medium, beheld the kitchen illuminated with a goldenglory, which also enveloped Tabitha and gilded her silver hair,and converted her mean garments into robes of queenly splendor.It reminded him of his golden dream.
"Mr. Peter," remarked Tabitha, "must the wine be drunk before themoney is found?"
"The money IS found!" exclaimed Peter, with a sort of fierceness."The chest is within my reach. I will not sleep, till I haveturned this key in the rusty lock. But, first of all, let usdrink!"
There being no corkscrew in the house, he smote the neck of thebottle with old Peter Goldthwaite's rusty key, and decapitatedthe sealed cork at a single blow. He then filled two little chinateacups, which Tabitha had brought from the cupboard. So clearand brilliant was this aged wine that it shone within the cups,and rendered the sprig of scarlet flowers, at the bottom of each,more distinctly visible than when there had been no wine there.Its rich and delicate perfume wasted itself round the kitchen.
"Drink, Tabitha!" cried Peter. "Blessings on the honest oldfellow who set aside this good liquor for you and me! And here'sto Peter Goldthwaite's memory!"
"And good cause have we to remember him," quoth Tabitha, as shedrank.
How many years, and through what changes of fortune and variouscalamity, had that bottle hoarded up its effervescent joy, to bequaffed at last by two such boon companions! A portion of thehappiness of the former age had been kept for them, and was nowset free, in a crowd of rejoicing visions, to sport amid thestorm and desolation of the present time. Until they havefinished the bottle, we must turn our eyes elsewhere.
It so chanced that, on this stormy night, Mr. John Brown foundhimself ill at ease in his wire-cushioned arm-chair, by theglowing grate of anthracite which heated his handsome parlor. Hewas naturally a good sort of a man, and kind and pitiful wheneverthe misfortunes of others happened to reach his heart through thepadded vest of his own prosperity. This evening he had thoughtmuch about his old partner, Peter Goldthwaite, his strangevagaries, and continual ill luck, the poverty of his dwelling, atMr. Brown's last visit, and Peter's crazed and haggard aspectwhen he had talked with him at the window.
"Poor fellow!" thought Mr. John Brown. "Poor, crackbrained PeterGoldthwaite! For old acquaintance' sake, I ought to have takencare that he was comfortable this rough winter."
These feelings grew so powerful that, in spite of the inclementweather, he resolved to visit Peter Goldthwaite immediately. Thestrength of the impulse was really singular. Every shriek of theblast seemed a summons, or would have seemed so, had Mr. Brownbeen accustomed to hear the echoes of his own fancy in the wind.Much amazed at such active benevolence, he huddled himself in hiscloak, muffled his throat and ears in comforters andhandkerchiefs, and, thus fortified, bade defiance to the tempest.But the powers of the air had rather the best of the battle. Mr.Brown was just weathering the corner, by Peter Goldthwaite'shouse, when the hurricane caught him off his feet, tossed himface downward into a snow bank, and proceeded to bury hisprotuberant part beneath fresh drifts. There seemed little hopeof his reappearance earlier than the next thaw. At the samemoment his hat was snatched away, and whirled aloft into some fardistant region, whence no tidings have as yet returned.
Nevertheless Mr. Brown contrived to burrow a passage through thesnow-drift, and, with his bare head bent against the storm,floundered onward to Peter's door. There was such a creaking andgroaning and rattling, and such an ominous shaking throughout thecrazy edifice, that the loudest rap would have been inaudible tothose within. He therefore entered, without ceremony, and gropedhis way to the kitchen.
His intrusion, even there, was unnoticed. Peter and Tabitha stoodwith their backs to the door, stooping over a large chest, which,apparently, they had just dragged from a cavity, or concealedcloset, on the left side of the chimney. By the lamp in the oldwoman's hand, Mr. Brown saw that the chest was barred and clampedwith iron, strengthened with iron plates and studded with ironnails, so as to be a fit receptacle in which the wealth of onecentury might be hoarded up for the wants of another. PeterGoldthwaite was inserting a key into the lock.
"O Tabitha!" cried he, with tremulous rapture, "how shall Iendure the effulgence? The gold!--the bright, bright gold!Methinks I can remember my last glance at it, just as theiron-plated lid fell down. And ever since, being seventy years,it has been blazing in secret, and gathering its splendor againstthis glorious moment! It will flash upon us like the noondaysun!"
"Then shade your eyes, Mr. Peter!" said Tabitha, with somewhatless patience than usual. "But, for mercy's sake, do turn thekey!"
And, with a strong effort of both hands, Peter did force therusty key through the intricacies of the rusty lock. Mr. Brown,in the mean time, had drawn near, and thrust his eager visagebetween those of the other two, at the instant that Peter threwup the lid. No sudden blaze illuminated the kitchen.
"What's here?" exclaimed Tabitha, adjusting her spectacles, andholding the lamp over the open chest. "Old Peter Goldthwaite'shoard of old rags."
"Pretty much so, Tabby," said Mr. Brown, lifting a handful of thetreasure.
Oh, what a ghost of dead and buried wealth had Peter Goldthwaiteraised, to scare himself out of his scanty wits withal! Here wasthe semblance of an incalculable sum, enough to purchase thewhole town, and build every street anew, but which, vast as itwas, no sane man would have given a solid sixpence for. Whatthen, in sober earnest, were the delusive treasures of the chest?Why, here were old provincial bills of credit, and treasurynotes, and bills of land, banks, and all other bubbles of thesort, from the first issue, above a century and a half ago, downnearly to the Revolution. Bills of a thousand pounds wereintermixed with parchment pennies, and worth no more than they.
"And this, then, is old Peter Goldthwaite's treasure!" said JohnBrown. "Your namesake, Peter, was something like yourself; and,when the provincial currency had depreciated fifty orseventy-five per cent., he bought it up in expectation of a rise.I have heard my grandfather say that old Peter gave his father amortgage of this very house and land, to raise cash for his sillyproject. But the currency kept sinking, till nobody would take itas a gift; and there was old Peter Goldthwaite, like Peter thesecond, with thousands in his strong box and hardly a coat to hisback. He went mad upon the strength of it. But, never mind,Peter! It is just the sort of capital for building castles in theair."
"The house will be down about our ears!" cried Tabitha, as thewind shook it with increasing violence.
"Let it fall!" said Peter, folding his arms, as he seated himselfupon the chest.
"No, no, my old friend Peter," said John Brown. "I have houseroom for you and Tabby, and a safe vault for the chest oftreasure. To-morrow we will try to come to an agreement about thesale of this old house. Real estate is well up, and I couldafford you a pretty handsome price."
"And I," observed Peter Goldthwaite, with reviving spirits, "havea plan for laying out the cash to great advantage."
"Why, as to that," muttered John Brown to himself, "we must applyto the next court for a guardian to t
ake care of the solid cash;and if Peter insists upon speculating, he may do it, to hisheart's content, with old PETER GOLDTHWAITE'S TREASURE."
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