“I don't wonder he laughed,” observed Wingate, who seemed to enjoy irritating his friend. “You must have been good as a circus.”
“Humph!” grunted the depot master. “If I remember right you said YOU wa'n't any ten-cent side show under similar circumstances, Barzilla. Heave ahead, Bailey!”
Captain Stitt, unruffled, resumed:
“I tell you, I had to take it that evenin',” he said. “All the time I was cookin' and while he was eatin' supper, Billings was rubbin' it into me about my bein' scared. Called me all the saltwater-hero names he could think of—'Hobson' and 'Dewey' and the like of that, usin' em sarcastic, of course. Finally, he said he remembered readin' in school, when he was little, about a girl hero, name of Grace Darlin'. Said he cal'lated, if I didn't mind, he'd call me Grace, 'cause it was heroic and yet kind of fitted in with my partic'lar brand of bravery. I didn't answer much; he had me down, and I knew it. Likewise I judged he was more or less out of his head; no sane man would yell the way he done aboard that automobile.
“Then he commenced to spin yarns about himself and his doin's, and pretty soon it come out that he'd been a cowboy afore young Stumpton give up ranchin' and took to automobilin'. That cleared the sky line some, of course; I'd read consider'ble about cowboys in the ten-cent books my nephew fetched home when he was away to school. I see right off that Billings was the livin' image of Deadwood Dick and Wild Bill and the rest in them books; they yelled and howled and hadn't no regard for life and property any more'n he had. No, sir! He wa'n't no crazier'n they was; it was in the breed, I judged.
“'I sure wish I had you on the ranch, Grace,' says he. 'Why don't you come West some day? That's where a hero like you would show up strong.'
“'Godfrey mighty!' I sings out. 'I wouldn't come nigh such a nest of crazy murderers as that fur no money! I'd sooner ride in that automobile of yours, and St. Peter himself couldn't coax me into THAT again, not if 'twas fur a cruise plumb up the middle of the golden street!'
“I meant it, too, and the next afternoon when it come time to start for home he found out that I meant it. We'd shot a lot of ducks, and Billings was havin' such a good time that I had to coax and tease him as if he was a young one afore he'd think of quittin'. It was quarter of six when he backed the gas cart out of the shed. I was uneasy, 'cause 'twas past low-water time, and there was fog comin' on.
“'Brace up, Dewey!' says he. 'Get in.'
“'No, Mr. Billings,' says I. 'I ain't goin' to get in. You take that craft of yourn home, and I'll sail up alongside in my dory.'
“'In your which?' says he.
“'In my dory,' I says. 'That's her hauled up on the beach abreast the shanty.'
“He looked at the dory and then at me.
“'Go on!' says he. 'You ain't goin' to pack yourself twelve mile on THAT SHINGLE?'
“'Sartin I am! says I. 'I ain't takin' no more chances.'
“Do you know, he actually seemed to think I was crazy then. Seemed to figger that the dory wa'n't big enough; and she's carried five easy afore now. We had an argument that lasted twenty minutes more, and the fog driftin' in nigher all the time. At last he got sick of arguin', ripped out somethin' brisk and personal, and got his tin shop to movin'.
“'You want to cross over to the ocean side,' I called after him. 'The Cut-through's been dredged at the bay end, remember.'
“'Be hanged!' he yells, or more emphatic. And off he whizzed. I see him go, and fetched a long breath. Thanks to a merciful Providence, I'd come so fur without bein' buttered on the undercrust of that automobile or scalped with its crazy shover's bowie knife.
“Ten minutes later I was beatin' out into the bay in my dory. All around was the fog, thin as poorhouse gruel so fur, but thickenin' every minute. I was worried; not for myself, you understand, but for that cowboy shover. I was afraid he wouldn't fetch t'other side of the Cut-through. There wa'n't much wind, and I had to make long tacks. I took the inshore channel, and kept listenin' all the time. And at last, when 'twas pretty dark and I was cal'latin' to be about abreast of the bay end of the Cut-through, I heard from somewheres ashore a dismal honkin' kind of noise, same as a wild goose might make if 'twas chokin' to death and not resigned to the worst.
“'My land!' says I. 'It's happened!' And I come about and headed straight in for the beach. I struck it just alongside the gov'ment shanty. The engineers had knocked off work for the week, waitin' for supplies, but they hadn't took away their dunnage.
“'Hi!' I yells, as I hauled up the dory. 'Hi-i-i! Billings, where be you?'
“The honkin' stopped and back comes the answer; there was joy in it.
“'What? Is that Cap'n Stitt?'
“'Yes,' I sings out. 'Where be you?'
“'I'm stuck out here in the middle of the crick. And there's a flood on. Help me, can't you?'
“Next minute I was aboard the dory, rowin' her against the tide up the channel. Pretty quick I got where I could see him through the fog and dark. The auto was on the flat in the middle of the Cut-through, and the water was hub high already. Billings was standin' up on the for'ard thwart, makin' wet footmarks all over them expensive cushions.
“'Lord,' says he, 'I sure am glad to see you, pard! Can we get to land, do you think?'
“'Land?' says I, makin' the dory fast alongside and hoppin' out into the drink. ''Course we can land! What's the matter with your old derelict? Sprung a leak, has it?'
“He went on to explain that the automobile had broke down when he struck the flat, and he couldn't get no farther. He'd been honkin' and howlin' for ten year at least, so he reckoned.
“'Why in time,' says I, 'didn't you mind me and go up the ocean side? And why in nation didn't you go ashore and—But never mind that now. Let me think. Here! You set where you be.'
“As I shoved off in the dory again he turned loose a distress signal.
“'Where you goin'?' he yells. 'Say, pard, you ain't goin' to leave me here, are you?'
“'I'll be back in a shake,' says I, layin' to my oars. 'Don't holler so! You'll have the life-savers down here, and then the joke'll be on us. Hush, can't you? I'll be right back!'
“I rowed up channel a little ways, and then I sighted the place I was bound for. Them gov'ment folks had another shanty farther up the Cut-through. Moored out in front of it was a couple of big floats, for their stone sloops to tie up to at high water. The floats were made of empty kerosene barrels and planks, and they'd have held up a house easy. I run alongside the fust one, cut the anchor cable with my jackknife, and next minute I was navigatin' that float down channel, steerin' it with my oar and towin' the dory astern.
“'Twas no slouch of a job, pilotin' that big float, but part by steerin' and part by polin' I managed to land her broadside on to the auto. I made her fast with the cable ends and went back after the other float. This one was a bigger job than the fust, but by and by that gas wagon, with planks under her and cable lashin's holdin' her firm, was restin' easy as a settin' hen between them two floats. I unshipped my mast, fetched it aboard the nighest float, and spread the sail over the biggest part of the brasswork and upholstery.
“'There,' says I, 'if it rains durin' the night she'll keep pretty dry. Now I'll take the dory and row back to the shanty after some spare anchors there is there.'
“'But what's it fur, pard?' asks Billings for the nine hundred and ninety-ninth time. 'Why don't we go where it's dry? The flood's risin' all the time.'
“'Let it rise,' I says. 'I cal'late when it gets high enough them floats'll rise with it and lift the automobile up, too. If she's anchored bow and stern she'll hold, unless it comes on to blow a gale, and to-morrow mornin' at low tide maybe you can tinker her up so she'll go.'
“'Go?' says he, like he was astonished. 'Do you mean to say you're reckonin' to save the CAR?'
“'Good land!' I says, starin' at him. 'What else d'you s'pose? Think I'd let seventy-five hundred dollars' wuth of gilt-edged extravagance go to the bottom? What did you cal'late I was tryin' to save—the clam flat? Give me that dory rope; I'm goin' after them anchors. Sufferin' snakes! Where IS the dory? What have you done with it?'
“He'd been holdin' the bight of the dory rodin'. I handed it to him so's he'd have somethin' to take up his mind. And, by time, he'd forgot all about it and let it drop! And the dory had gone adrift and was out of sight.
“'Gosh!' says he, astonished-like. 'Pard, the son of a gun has slipped his halter!'
“I was pretty mad—dories don't grow on every beach plum bush—but there wa'n't nothin' to say that fitted the case, so I didn't try.
“'Humph!' says I. 'Well, I'll have to swim ashore, that's all, and go up to the station inlet after another boat. You stand by the ship. If she gets afloat afore I come back you honk and holler and I'll row after you. I'll fetch the anchors and we'll moor her wherever she happens to be. If she shouldn't float on an even keel, or goes to capsize, you jump overboard and swim ashore. I'll—'
“'Swim?' says he, with a shake in his voice. 'Why, pard, I can't swim!'
“I turned and looked at him. Shover of a two-mile-a-minute gold-plated butcher cart like that, a cowboy murderer that et his friends for breakfast—and couldn't swim! I fetched a kind of combination groan and sigh, turned back the sail, climbed aboard the automobile, and lit up my pipe.
“'What are you settin' there for?' says he. 'What are you goin' to do?'
“'Do?' says I. 'Wait, that's all—wait and smoke. We won't have to wait long.'
“My prophesyin' was good. We didn't have to wait very long. It was pitch dark, foggy as ever, and the tide a-risin' fast. The floats got to be a-wash. I shinned out onto 'em, picked up the oar that had been left there, and took my seat again. Billings climbed in, too, only—and it kind of shows the change sence the previous evenin'—he was in the passenger cockpit astern, and I was for'ard in the pilot house. For a reckless daredevil he was actin' mighty fidgety.
“And at last one of the floats swung off the sand. The automobile tipped scandalous. It looked as if we was goin' on our beam ends. Billings let out an awful yell. Then t'other float bobbed up and the whole shebang, car and all, drifted out and down the channel.
“My lashin's held—I cal'lated they would. Soon's I was sure of that I grabbed up the oar and shoved it over the stern between the floats. I hoped I could round her to after we passed the mouth of the Cut-through, and make port on the inside beach. But not in that tide. Inside of five minutes I see 'twas no use; we was bound across the bay.
“And now commenced a v'yage that beat any ever took sence Noah's time, I cal'late; and even Noah never went to sea in an automobile, though the one animal I had along was as much trouble as his whole menagerie. Billings was howlin' blue murder.
“'Stop that bellerin'!' I ordered. 'Quit it, d'you hear! You'll have the station crew out after us, and they'll guy me till I can't rest. Shut up! If you don't, I'll—I'll swim ashore and leave you.'
“I was takin' big chances, as I look at it now. He might have drawed a bowie knife or a lasso on me; 'cordin' to his yarns he'd butchered folks for a good sight less'n that. But he kept quiet this time, only gurglin' some when the ark tilted. I had time to think of another idee. You remember the dory sail, mast and all, was alongside that cart. I clewed up the canvas well as I could and managed to lash the mast up straight over the auto's bows. Then I shook out the sail.
“'Here!' says I, turnin' to Billings. 'You hang on to that sheet. No, you needn't nuther. Make it fast to that cleat alongside.'
“I couldn't see his face plain, but his voice had a funny tremble to it; reminded me of my own when I climbed out of that very cart after he'd jounced me down to Setuckit the day before.
“'What?' he says. 'Wh-what? What sheet? I don't see any sheet. What do you want me to do?'
“'Tie this line to that cleat. That cleat there! CLEAT, you lubber! CLEAT! That knob! MAKE IT FAST! Oh, my gosh t'mighty! Get out of my way!'
“The critter had tied the sheet to the handle of the door instead of the one I meant, and the pull of the sail hauled the door open and pretty nigh ripped it off the hinges. I had to climb into the cockpit and straighten out the mess. I was losin' my temper; I do hate bunglin' seamanship aboard a craft of mine.
“'But what'll become of us?' begs Billings. 'Will we drown?'
“'What in tunket do we want to drown for? Ain't we got a good sailin' breeze and the whole bay to stay on top of—fifty foot of water and more?'
“'Fifty foot!' he yells. 'Is there fifty foot of water underneath us now? Pard, you don't mean it!'
“'Course I mean it. Good thing, too!'
“'But fifty foot! It's enough to drown in ten times over!'
“'Can't drown but once, can you? And I'd just as soon drown in fifty foot as four—ruther, 'cause 'twouldn't take so long.'
“He didn't answer out loud; but I heard him talkin' to himself pretty constant.
“We was well out in the bay by now, and the seas was a little mite more rugged—nothin' to hurt, you understand, but the floats was all foam, and once in a while we'd ship a little spray. And every time that happened Billings would jump and grab for somethin' solid—sometimes 'twas the upholstery and sometimes 'twas me. He wa'n't on the thwart, but down in a heap on the cockpit floor.
“'Let go of my leg!' I sings out, after we'd hit a high wave and that shover had made a more'n ordinary savage claw at my underpinnin'. 'You make me nervous. Drat this everlastin' fog! somethin'll bump into us if we don't look out. Here, you go for'ard and light them cruisin' lights. They ain't colored 'cordin' to regulations, but they'll have to do. Go for'ard! What you waitin' for?'
“Well, it turned out that he didn't like to leave that cockpit. I was mad.
“'Go for'ard there and light them lights!' I yelled, hangin' to the steerin' oar and keepin' the ark runnin' afore the wind.
“'I won't!' he says, loud and emphatic. 'Think I'm a blame fool? I sure would be a jack rabbit to climb over them seats the way they're buckin' and light them lamps. You're talkin' through your hat!'
“Well, I hadn't no business to do it, but, you see, I was on salt water, and skipper, as you might say, of the junk we was afloat in; and if there's one thing I never would stand it's mutiny. I hauled in the oar, jumped over the cockpit rail, and went for him. He see me comin', stood up, tried to get out of the way, and fell overboard backwards. Part of him lit on one of the floats, but the biggest part trailed in the water between the two. He clawed with his hands, but the planks was slippery, and he slid astern fast. Just as he reached the last plank and slid off and under I jumped after him and got him by the scruff of the neck. I had hold of the lashin' end with one hand, and we tailed out behind the ark, which was sloppin' along, graceful as an elephant on skates.
“I was pretty well beat out when I yanked him into that cockpit again. Neither of us said anything for a spell, breath bein' scurce as di'monds. But when he'd collected some of his, he spoke.
“'Pard,' he says, puffin', 'I'm much obleeged to you. I reckon I sure ain't treated you right. If it hadn't been for you that time I'd—'
“But I was b'ilin' over. I whirled on him like a teetotum.
“'Drat your hide!' I says. 'When you speak to your officer you say sir! And now you go for'ard and light them lights. Don't you answer back! If you do I'll fix you so's you'll never ship aboard another vessel! For'ard there! Lively, you lubber, lively!'
“He went for'ard, takin' consider'ble time and hangin' on for dear life. But somehow or 'nuther he got the lights to goin'; and all the time I hazed him terrible. I was mate on an Australian packet afore I went fishin' to the Banks, and I can haze some. I blackguarded that shover awful.
“'Ripperty-rip your everlastin' blankety-blanked dough head!' I roared at him. 'You ain't wuth the weight to sink you. For'ard there and get that fog horn to goin'! And keep it goin'! Lively, you sculpin! Don't you open your mouth to me!'
“Well, all night we sloshed along, straight acrost the bay. We must have been a curious sight to look at. The floats was awash, so that the automobile looked like she was ridin' the waves all by her lonesome; the lamps was blazin' at either side of the bow; Billings was a-tootin' the rubber fog horn as if he was wound up; and I was standin' on the cushions amidships, keepin' the whole calabash afore the wind.
“We never met another craft the whole night through. Yes, we did meet one. Old Ezra Cahoon, of Harniss, was out in his dory stealin' quahaugs from Seth Andrews's bed over nigh the Wapatomac shore. Ezra stayed long enough to get one good glimpse of us as we bust through the fog; then he cut his rodin' and laid to his oars, bound for home and mother. We could hear him screech for half an hour after he left us.
“Ez told next day that the devil had come ridin' acrost the bay after him in a chariot of fire. Said he could smell the brimstone and hear the trumpet callin' him to judgment. Likewise he hove in a lot of particulars concernin' the personal appearance of the Old Boy himself, who, he said, was standin' up wavin' a red-hot pitchfork. Some folks might have been flattered at bein' took for such a famous character; but I wa'n't; I'm retirin' by nature, and besides, Ez's description wa'n't cal'lated to bust a body's vanity b'iler. I was prouder of the consequences, the same bein' that Ezra signed the Good Templars' pledge that afternoon, and kept it for three whole months, just sixty-nine days longer than any previous attack within the memory of man had lasted.
“And finally, just as mornin' was breakin', the bows of the floats slid easy and slick up on a hard, sandy beach. Then the sun riz and the fog lifted, and there we was within sight of the South Ostable meetin'-house. We'd sailed eighteen miles in that ark and made a better landin' blindfold than we ever could have made on purpose.
“I hauled down the sail, unshipped the mast, and jumped ashore to find a rock big enough to use for a makeshift anchor. It wa'n't more'n three minutes after we fust struck afore my boots hit dry ground, but Billings beat me one hundred and seventy seconds, at that. When I had time to look at that shover man he was a cable's length from high-tide mark, settin' down and grippin' a bunch of beach grass as if he was afeard the sand was goin' to slide from under him; and you never seen a yallerer, more upset critter in your born days.
“Well, I got the ark anchored, after a fashion, and then we walked up to the South Ostable tavern. Peleg Small, who runs the place, he knows me, so he let me have a room and I turned in for a nap. I slept about three hours. When I woke up I started out to hunt the automobile and Billings. Both of 'em looked consider'ble better than they had when I see 'em last. The shover had got a gang of men and they'd got the gas cart ashore, and Billings and a blacksmith was workin' over—or rather under—the clockwork.
“'Hello!' I hails, comin' alongside.
“Billings sticks his head out from under the tinware.
“'Hi, pard!' says he. I noticed he hadn't called me 'Grace' nor 'Dewey' for a long spell. Hi, pard,' he says, gettin' to his feet, 'the old gal ain't hurt a hair. She'll be good as ever in a couple of hours. Then you and me can start for Orham.'
“'In HER?' says I.
“'Sure,' he says.
“'Not by a jugful!' says I, emphatic. 'I'll borrer a boat to get to Orham in, when I'm ready to go. You won't ketch me in that man killer again; and you can call me a coward all you want to!'
“'A coward?' says he. 'You a coward? And—Why, you was in that car all night!'
“'Oh!' I says. 'Last night was diff'rent. The thing was on water then, and when I've got enough water underneath me I know I'm safe.'
“'Safe!' he sings out. 'SAFE! Well, by—gosh! Pard, I hate to say it, but it's the Lord's truth—you had me doin' my “Now I lay me's”!'
“For a minute we looked at each other. Then says I, sort of thinkin' out loud, 'I cal'late,' I says, 'that whether a man's brave or not depends consider'ble on whether he's used to his latitude. It's all accordin'. It lays in the bringin' up, as the duck said when the hen tried to swim.'
“He nodded solemn. 'Pard,' says he, 'I sure reckon you've called the turn. Let's shake hands on it.'
“So we shook; and . . .”
Captain Bailey stopped short and sprang from his chair. “There's my train comin',” he shouted. “Good-by, Sol! So long, Barzilla! Keep away from fortune tellers and pretty servant girls or YOU'LL be gettin' married pretty soon. Good-by.”
He darted out of the waiting room and his companions followed. Mr. Wingate, having a few final calls to make, left the station soon afterwards and did not return until evening. And that evening he heard news which surprised him.
As he and Captain Sol were exchanging a last handshake on the platform, Barzilla said:
“Well, Sol, I've enjoyed loafin' around here and yarnin' with you, same as I always do. I'll be over again in a month or so and we'll have some more.”
The Captain shook his head. “I may not be here then, Barzilla,” he observed.
“May not be here? What do you mean by that?”
“I mean that I don't know exactly where I shall be. I shan't be depot master, anyway.”
“Shan't be depot master? YOU won't? Why, what on airth—”
“I sent in my resignation four days ago. Nobody knows it, except you, not even Issy, but the new depot master for East Harniss will be here to take my place on the mornin' of the twelfth, that's two days off.”
“Why! Why! SOL!”
“Yes. Keep mum about it. I'll—I'll let you know what I decide to do. I ain't settled it myself yet. Good-by, Barzilla.”
The following morning, at nine o'clock, Issy McKay sat upon the heap of rusty chain cable outside the blacksmith's shop at Denboro, reading, as usual, a love story. Issy was taking a “day off.” He had begged permission of Captain Sol Berry, the permission had been granted, and Issy had come over to Denboro, the village eight miles above East Harniss, in his “power dory,” or gasoline boat, the Lady May. The Lady May was a relic of the time before Issy was assistant depot master, when he gained a precarious living by quahauging, separating the reluctant bivalve from its muddy house on the bay bottom with an iron rake, the handle of which was forty feet long. Issy had been seized with a desire to try quahauging once more, hence his holiday. The rake was broken and he had put in at Denboro to have it fixed. While the blacksmith was busy, Issy laboriously spelled out the harrowing chapters of “Vivian, the Shop Girl; or Lord Lyndhurst's Lowly Love.”
A grinning, freckled face peered cautiously around the corner of the blacksmith's front fence. Then an overripe potato whizzed through the air and burst against the shop wall a few inches from the reader's head. Issy jumped.
“You—you everlastin' young ones, you!” he shouted fiercely. “If I git my hands onto you, you'll wish you'd—I see you hidin' behind that fence.”
Two barefooted little figures danced provokingly in the roadway and two shrill voices chanted in derision:
“Is McKay—Is McKay—
Makes the Injuns run away!
“Scalped anybody lately, Issy?”
Alas for the indiscretions of youth! The tale of Issy's early expedition in search of scalps and glory was known from one end of Ostable County to the other. It had made him famous, in a way.
“If I git a-holt of you kids, I'll bet there'll be some scalpin' done,” retorted the persecuted one, rising from the heap of cable.
A second potato burst like a bombshell on the shingles behind him. McKay was a good general, in that he knew when it was wisest to retreat. Shoving the paper novel into his overalls pocket, he entered the shop.
“What's the matter, Is?” inquired the grinning blacksmith. Most people grinned when they spoke to Issy. “Gittin' too hot outside there, was it? Why don't you tomahawk 'em and have 'em for supper?”
“Humph!” grunted the offended quahauger. “Don't git gay now, Jake Larkin. You hurry up with that rake.”
“Oh, all right, Is. Don't sculp ME; I ain't done nothin'. What's the news over to East Harniss?”
“Oh, I don't know. Not much. Sam Bartlett, he started for Boston this mornin'.”
“Who? Sam Bartlett? I want to know! Thought he was down for six weeks. You sure about that, Is?”
“Course I'm sure. I was up to the depot and see him buy his ticket and git on the cars.”
“Did, hey? Humph! So Sam's gone. Gertie Higgins still over to her Aunt Hannah's at Trumet?”
Issy looked at his questioner. “Why, yes,” he said suspiciously. “I s'pose she's there. Fact, I know she is. Pat Starkey's doin' the telegraphin' while she's away. What made you ask that?”
The blacksmith chuckled. “Oh, nothin',” he said. “How's her dad's dyspepsy? Had any more of them sudden attacks of his? I cal'late they'll take the old man off some of these days, won't they? I hear the doctor thinks there's more heart than stomach in them attacks.”
But the skipper of the Lady May was not to be put off thus. “What you drivin' at, Jake?” he demanded. “What's Sam Bartlett's goin' away got to do with Gertie Higgins?”
In his eagerness he stepped to Mr. Larkin's side. The blacksmith caught sight of the novel in his customer's pocket. He snatched it forth.
“What you readin' now, Is?” he demanded. “More blood and brimstone? 'Vivy Ann, the Shop Girl!' Gee! Wow!”
“You gimme that book, Jake Larkin! Gimme it now!”
Fending the frantic quahauger off with one mighty arm, the blacksmith proceeded to read aloud:
“'Darlin',' cried Lord Lyndhurst, strainin' the beautiful and blushin' maid to his manly bosom, 'you are mine at last. Mine! No—' Jerushy! a love story! Why, Issy! I didn't know you was in love. Who's the lucky girl? Send me an invite to your weddin', won't you?”
Issy's face was a fiery red. He tore the precious volume from its desecrator's hand, losing the pictured cover in the struggle.
“You—you pesky fool!” he shouted. “You mind your own business.”
The blacksmith roared in glee. “Oh, ho!” he cried. “Issy's in love and I never guessed it. Aw, say, Is, don't be mean! Who is she? Have you strained her to your manly bosom yit? What's her name?”
“Shut up!” shrieked Issy, and strode out of the shop. His tormentor begged him not to “go off mad,” and shouted sarcastic sympathy after him. But Mr. McKay heeded not. He stalked angrily along the sidewalk. Then espying just ahead of him the boys who had thrown the potatoes, he paused, turned, and walking down the carriageway at the side of the blacksmith's place of business, sat down upon a sawhorse under one of its rear windows. He could, at least, be alone here and think; and he wanted to think.
For Issy—although he didn't look it—was deeply interested in another love story as well as that in his pocket. This one was printed upon his heart's pages, and in it he was the hero, while the heroine—the unsuspecting heroine—was Gertie Higgins, daughter of Beriah Higgins, once a fisherman, now the crotchety and dyspeptic proprietor of the “general store” and postmaster at East Harniss.
This story began when Issy first acquired the Lady May. The Higgins home stood on the slope close to the boat landing, and when Issy came in from quahauging, Gertie was likely to be in the back yard, hanging out the clothes or watering the flower garden. Sometimes she spoke to him of her own accord, concerning the weather or other important topics. Once she even asked him if he were going to the Fourth of July ball at the town-hall. It took him until the next morning—like other warriors, Issy was cursed with shyness—to summon courage enough to ask her to go to the ball with him. Then he found it was too late; she was going with her cousin, Lennie Bloomer. But he felt that she had offered him the opportunity, and was happy and hopeful accordingly.
This, however, was before she went to Boston to study telegraphy. When she returned, with a picture hat and a Boston accent, it was to preside at the telegraph instrument in the little room adjoining the post office at her father's store. When Issy bowed blushingly outside the window of the telegraph room, he received only the airiest of frigid nods. Was there what Lord Lyndhurst would have called “another”? It would seem not. Old Mr. Higgins, her father, encouraged no bows nor attentions from young men, and Gertie herself did not appear to desire them. So Issy gave up his tales of savage butchery for those of love and blisses, adored in silence, and hoped—always hoped.
But why had the blacksmith seemed surprised at the departure of Sam Bartlett, the “dudey” vacationist from the city, whose father had, years ago, been Beriah Higgins's partner in the fish business? And why had he coupled the Bartlett name with that of Gertie, who had been visiting her father's maiden sister at Trumet, the village next below East Harniss, as Denboro is the next above it? Issy's suspicions were aroused, and he wondered.
Suddenly he heard voices in the shop above him. The window was open and he heard them plainly.
“Well! WELL!” It was the blacksmith who uttered the exclamation. “Why, Bartlett, how be you? What you doin' over here? Thought you'd gone back to Boston. I heard you had.”
Slowly, cautiously, the astonished quahauger rose from the sawhorse and peered over the window sill. There were two visitors in the shop. One was Ed Burns, proprietor of the Denboro Hotel and livery stable. The other was Sam Bartlett, the very same who had left East Harniss that morning, bound, ostensibly, for Boston. Issy sank back again and listened.
“Yes, yes!” he heard Sam say impatiently; “I know, but—see here, Jake, where can I hire a horse in this God-forsaken town?”
“Well, well, Sam!” continued Larkin. “I was just figurin' that Beriah had got the best of you after all, and you'd had to give it up for this time. Thinks I, it's too bad! Just because your dad and Beriah Higgins had such a deuce of a row when they bust up in the fish trade, it's a shame that he won't hark to your keepin' comp'ny with Gertie. And you doin' so well; makin' twenty dollars a week up to the city—Ed told me that—and—”
“Yes, yes! But never mind that. Where can I get a horse? I've got to be in Trumet by eight to-night sure.”
“Trumet? Why, that's where Gertie is, ain't it?”
“Look a-here, Jake,” broke in the livery-stable keeper. “I'll tell you how 'tis. Oh, it's all right, Sam! Jake knows the most of it; I told him. He can keep his mouth shut, and he don't like old crank Higgins any better'n you and me do. Jake, Sam here and Gertie had fixed it up to run off and git married to-night. He was to pretend to start for Boston this mornin'. Bought a ticket and all, so's to throw Beriah off the scent. He was to get off the train here at Denboro and I was to let him have a horse 'n' buggy. Then, this afternoon, he was goin' to drive through the wood roads around to Trumet and be at the Baptist Church there at eight to-night sharp. Gertie's Aunt Hannah, she's had her orders, and bein' as big a crank as her brother, she don't let the girl out of her sight. But there's a fair at the church and Auntie's tendin' a table. Gertie, she steps out to the cloak room to git a handkerchief which she's forgot; see? And she hops into Sam's buggy and away they go to the minister's. After they're once hitched Old Dyspepsy can go to pot and see the kittle bile.”
“Bully! By gum, that's fine! Won't Beriah rip some, hey?”
“Yes, but there's the dickens to pay. I've only got two horses in the stable to-day. The rest are let. And the two I've got—one's old Bill, and he couldn't go twenty mile to save his hide. And t'other's the gray mare, and blamed if she didn't git cast last night and use up her off hind leg so's she can't step. And Sam's GOT to have a horse. Where can I git one?”
“Hum! Have you tried Haynes's?”
“Yes, yes! And Lathrop's and Eldredge's. Can't git a team for love nor money.”
“Sho! And he can't go by train?”
“What? With Beriah postmaster at East Harniss and always nosin' through every train that stops there? You can't fetch Trumet by train without stoppin' at East Harniss and—What was that?”
“I don't know. What was it?”
“Sounded like somethin' outside that back winder.”
The two ran to the window and looked out. All they saw was an overturned sawhorse and two or three hens scratching vigorously.
“Guess 'twas the chickens, most likely,” observed the blacksmith. Then, striking his blackened palms together, he exclaimed:
“By time! I've thought of somethin'! Is McKay is in town to-day. Come over in the Lady May. She's a gasoline boat. Is would take Sam to Trumet for two or three dollars, I'll bet. And he's such a fool head that he wouldn't ask questions nor suspicion nothin'. 'Twould be faster'n a horse and enough sight less risky.”
And just then the “fool head,” his brain whirling under its carroty thatch, was hurrying blindly up the main street, bound somewhere, he wasn't certain where.
A mushy apple exploded between his shoulders, but he did not even turn around. So THIS was what the blacksmith meant! This was why Mr. Higgins watched his daughter so closely. This was why Gertie had been sent off to Trumet. She had met the Bartlett miscreant in Boston; they had been together there; had fallen in love and—He gritted his teeth and shook his fists almost in the face of old Deacon Pratt, who, knowing the McKay penchant for slaughter, had serious thoughts of sending for the constable.
Beriah Higgins must be warned, of course, but how? To telegraph was to put Pat Starkey in possession of the secret, and Pat was too good a friend of Gertie's to be trusted. There was no telephone at the store. Issy entered the combination grocery store and post office.
“Has the down mail closed yet?” he panted.
The postmaster looked out of his little window.
“Yes,” he replied. “Why? Got a letter you want to go? Take it up to the depot. The train's due, but 'tain't here yit. If you run you can make it.”
Issy took a card from his pocket. It was the business card of the firm to whom he sold his quahaugs. On the back of the card he wrote in pencil as follows:
“Mr. Beriah Higgins, your daughter Gertrude is going to meet Sam'l Bartlett at the Baptist Church in Trumet at 8 P.M. to-night and get married to him. LOOK OUT!!!”
After an instant's consideration he signed it “A True Friend,” this being in emulation of certain heroes of the Deadwood Dick variety. Then he put the card into an envelope and ran at top speed to the railway station. The train came in as he reached the platform. The baggage master was standing in the door of his car.
“Here, mister!” panted Issy. “Jest hand this letter to Beriah Higgins when he takes the mail bag at East Harniss, won't you? It's mighty important. Don't forgit. Thanks.”
The train moved off. Issy stared after it, grinning malevolently. Higgins would get that note in ample time to send word to the watchful Aunt Hannah. When the unsuspecting eloper reached the Trumet church, it would be the aunt, not the niece, who awaited him. Still grinning, Mr. McKay walked off the platform, and into the arms of Ed Burns, the stable keeper, and Sam Bartlett, his loathed and favored rival.
“Here he is!” shouted Burns. “Now we've got him.”
The foiler of the plot turned pale. Was his secret discovered? But no; his captors began talking eagerly, and gradually the sense of their pleadings became plain. They wanted him—HIM, of all people—to convey Bartlett to Trumet in the Lady May.
“You see, it's a business meetin',” urged Burns. “Sam's got to be there by ha'f past seven or he'll—he won't win on the deal, will you, Sam? Say yes, Issy; that's a good feller. He'll give you—I don't know's he won't give you five dollars.”
“Ten,” cried Bartlett. “And I'll never forget it, either. Will you, Is?”
A mighty “No!” was trembling on Issy's tongue. But before it was uttered Burns spoke again.
“McKay's got the best boat in these parts,” he urged. “She's got a tiptop engine in her, and—”
The word “engine” dropped into the whirlpool of Issy's thoughts with a familiar sound. In the chapter of “Vivian” that he had just finished, the beautiful shopgirl was imprisoned on board the yacht of the millionaire kidnaper, while the hero, in his own yacht, was miles astern. But the hero's faithful friend, disguised as a stoker, was tampering with the villain's engine. A vague idea began to form in Issy's brain. Once get the would-be eloper aboard the Lady May, and, even though the warning note should remain undelivered, he—
Issy smiled, and the ghastliness of that smile was unnoticed by his companions.
“I—I'll do it,” he cried. “By mighty! I WILL do it. You be at the wharf here at four o'clock. I wouldn't do it for everybody, Sam Bartlett, but for you I'd do consider'ble, just now. And I don't want your ten dollars nuther.”
Doctoring an engine may be easy enough—in stories. But to doctor a gasoline engine so that it will run for a certain length of time and THEN break down is not so easy. Three o'clock came and the problem was still unsolved. Issy, the perspiration running down his face, stood up in the Lady May's cockpit and looked out across the bay, smooth and glassy in the afternoon sun.
The sky overhead was clear and blue, but along the eastern and southern horizon was a gray bank of cloud, heaped in tumbled masses.
A sunburned lobsterman in rubber boots and a sou'wester was smoking on the wharf.
“What time you goin' to start for home, Is?” he asked.
“Oh, in an hour or so,” was the absent-minded reply.
“Humph! You'd better cast off afore that or you'll be fog bound. It'll be thicker'n dock mud toward sundown, and you'll fetch up in Waptomac 'stead of East Harniss, 'thout you've got a good compass.”
“Oh, my compass is all right,” began Issy, and stopped short. The lobsterman made other attempts at conversation, but they were unproductive. McKay was gazing at the growing fog bank and thinking hard. To doctor an engine may be difficult, but to get lost in a fog—He took the compass from the glass-lidded binnacle by the wheel, and carrying it into the little cabin, placed it in the cuddy forward.
It was nearer five than four when the Lady May, her engine barking aggressively, moved out of Denboro Harbor. Mr. Bartlett, the passenger, had been on time and had fumed and fretted at the delay. But Issy was deliberation itself. He had forgotten his quahaug rake, and the lapse of memory entailed a trip to the blacksmith's. Then the gasoline tank needed filling and the battery had to be overhauled.
“Are you sure you can make it?” queried Sam anxiously. “It's important, I tell you. Mighty important.”
The skipper snorted in disgust. “Make it?” he repeated. “If the Lady May can't make fourteen mile in two hours—let alone two'n a ha'f—then I don't know her. She's one of them boats you read about, she is.”
The Cape makes a wide bend between Denboro and Trumet. The distance between these towns is twenty long, curved miles over the road; by water it is reduced to a straight fourteen. And midway between the two, at the center of the curve, is East Harniss.
The Lady May coughed briskly on. There was no sea, and she sent long, widening ripples from each side of her bow. Bartlett, leaning over the rail, gazed impatiently ahead. Issy, sprawled on the bench by the wheel, was muttering to himself. Occasionally he glanced toward the east. The gray fog bank was now half way to the zenith and approaching rapidly. The eastern shore had disappeared.
“Is! Hi, Is! What are you doing? Don't kill him before my eyes.”
Issy came out of his trance with a start.
“What—what's that?” he asked. His passenger was grinning broadly.
“What? Kill who?”
“Why, the big chief, or whoever you had under your knee just then. You've been rolling your eyes and punching air with your fist for the last five minutes. I was getting scared. You're an unmerciful sinner when you get started, ain't you, Is? Who was the victim that time? 'Man Afraid of Hot Water'? or who?”
The skipper scowled. He shoved the fist into his pocket.
“Naw,” he growled. “'Twa'n't.”
“So? Not an Indian? Then it must have been a white man. Some fellow after your girl, perhaps. Hey?”
The disconcerted Issy was speechless. His companion's chance shot had scored a bull's-eye. Sam whooped.
“That's it!” he crowed. “Sure thing! Give it to him, Is! Don't spare him.”
Mr. McKay chokingly admitted that he “wa'n't goin' to.”
“Ho, ho! That's the stuff! But who's SHE, Is? When are you going to marry her?”
Issy grunted spitefully. “You ain't married yourself—not yit,” he observed, with concealed sarcasm.
The unsuspecting Bartlett laughed in triumph. “No,” he said. “I'm not, that's a fact; but maybe I'm going to be some of these days. It looked pretty dubious for a while, but now it's all right.”
“'Tis, hey? You're sure about that, be you?”
“Guess I am. Great Scott! what's that? Fog?”
A damp breath blew across the boat. The clouds covered the sky overhead and the bay to port. The fog was pouring like smoke across the water.
“Fog, by thunder!” exclaimed Bartlett.
Issy smiled. “Hum! Yes, 'tis fog, ain't it?” he observed.
“But what'll we do? It'll be here in a minute, won't it?”
“Shouldn't be a mite surprised. Looks 's if twas here now.”
The fog came on. It reached the Lady May, passed over her, and shut her within gray, wet walls. It was impossible to see a length from her side. Sam swore emphatically. The skipper was provokingly calm. He stepped to the engine, bent over it, and then returned to the wheel.
“What are you doing?” demanded Bartlett.
“Slowin' down, of course. Can't run more'n ha'f speed in a fog like this. 'Tain't safe.”
“Safe! What do I care? I want to get to Trumet.”
“Yes? Well, maybe we'll git there if we have luck.”
“You idiot! We've GOT to get there. How can you tell which way to steer? Get your compass, man! get your compass!”
“Ain't got no compass,” was the sulky answer. “Left it to home.”
“Why, no, you didn't. I—”
“I tell you I did. 'Twas careless of me, I know, but—”
“But I say you didn't. When you went uptown after that quahaug rake I explored this craft of yours some. The compass is in that little closet at the end of the cabin. I'll get it.”
He rose to his feet. Issy sprang forward and seized him by the arm.
“Set down!” he yelled. “Who's runnin' this boat, you or me?”
The astounded passenger stared at his companion.
“Why, you are,” he replied. “But that's no reason—What's the matter with you, anyway? Have your dime novels driven you loony?”
Issy hesitated. For a moment chagrin and rage at this sudden upset of his schemes had gotten the better of his prudence. But Bartlett was taller than he and broad in proportion. And valor—except of the imaginative brand—was not Issy's strong point.
“There, there, Sam!” he explained, smiling crookedly. “You mustn't mind me. I'm sort of nervous, I guess. And you mustn't hop up and down in a boat that way. You set still and I'll fetch the compass.”
He stumbled across the cockpit and disappeared in the dusk of the cabin. Finding that compass took a long time. Sam lost patience.
“What's the matter?” he demanded. “Can't you find it? Shall I come?”
“No, no!” screamed Issy vehemently. “Stay where you be. Catch a-holt of that wheel. We'll be spinnin' circles if you don't. I'm a-comin'.”
But it was another five minutes before he emerged from the cabin, carrying the compass box very carefully with both hands. He placed it in the binnacle and closed the glass lid.
“'Twas catched in a bluefish line,” he explained. “All snarled up, 'twas.”
Sam peered through the glass at the compass.
“Thunder!” he exclaimed. “I should say we had spun around. Instead of north being off here where I thought it was, it's 'way out to the right. Queer how fog'll mix a fellow up. Trumet's about northeast, isn't it?”
“No'theast by no'th's the course. Keep her just there.”
The Lady May, still at half speed, kept on through the mist. Time passed. The twilight, made darker still by the fog, deepened. They lit the lantern in order to see the compass card. Issy had the wheel now. Sam was forward, keeping a lookout and fretting at the delay.
“It's seven o'clock already,” he cried. “For Heaven's sake, how late will you be? I've got to be there by quarter of eight. D'you hear? I've GOT to.”
“Well, we're gittin' there. Can't expect to travel so fast with part of the power off. You'll be where you're goin' full as soon as you want to be, I cal'late.”
And he chuckled.
Another half hour and, through the wet dimness, a light flashed, vanished, and flashed again. Issy saw it and smiled grimly. Bartlett saw it and shouted.
“'What's that light?” he cried. “Did you see it? There it is, off there.”
“I see it. There's a light at Trumet Neck, ain't there?”
“Humph! It's been years since I was there, but I thought Trumet light was steady. However—”
“Ain't that the wharf ahead?”
Sure enough, out of the dark loomed the bulk of a small wharf, with catboats at anchor near it. Higher up, somewhere on the shore, were the lighted windows of a building.
“By thunder, we're here!” exclaimed Sam, and drew a long breath.
Issy shut off the power altogether, and the Lady May slid easily up to the wharf. Feverishly her skipper made her fast.
“Yes, sir!” he cried exultantly. “We're here. And no Black Rover nor anybody else ever done a better piece of steerin' than that, nuther.”
He clambered over the stringpiece, right at the heels of his impatient but grateful passenger. Sam's thanks were profuse and sincere.
“I'll never forget it, Is,” he declared. “I'll never forget it. And you'll have to let me pay you the—What makes you shake so?”
Issy pulled his arm away and stepped back.
“I'll never forget it, Is,” continued Sam. “I—Why! What—?”
He was standing at the shore end of the wharf, gazing up at the lighted windows. They were those of a dwelling house—an old-fashioned house with a back yard sloping down to the landing.
And then Issy McKay leaned forward and spoke in his ear.
“You bet you won't forgit it, Sam Bartlett!” he crowed, in trembling but delicious triumph. “You bet you won't! I've fixed you just the same as the Black Rover fixed the mutineers. Run off with my girl, will ye? And marry her, will ye? I—”
Sam interrupted him. “Why! WHY!” he cried. “That's—that's Gertie's house! This isn't Trumet! IT'S EAST HARNISS!”
The next moment he was seized from behind. The skipper's arms were around his waist and the skipper's thin legs twisted about his own. They fell together upon the sand and, as they rolled and struggled, Issy's yells rose loud and high.
“Mr. Higgins!” he shrieked. “Mr. Higgins! Come on! I've got him! I've got the feller that's tryin' to steal your daughter! Come on! I've got him! I'm hangin' to him!”
A door banged open. Some one rushed down the walk. And then a girl's voice cried in alarm:
“What is it? Who is it? What IS the matter?”
And from the bundle of legs and arms on the ground two voices exclaimed: “GERTIE!”
“But where IS your father?” asked Sam. Issy asked nothing. He merely sat still and listened.
“Why, he's at Trumet. At least I suppose he is. Mrs. Jones—she's gone to telephone to him now—says that he came home this morning with one of those dreadful 'attacks' of his. And after dinner he seemed so sick that, when she went for the doctor, she wired me at Auntie's to come home. I didn't want to come—you know why—but I COULDN'T let him die alone. And so I caught the three o'clock train and came. I knew you'd forgive me. But it seems that when Mrs. Jones came back with the doctor they found father up and dressed and storming like a crazy man. He had received some sort of a letter; he wouldn't say what. And, in spite of all they could do, he insisted on going out. And Cap'n Berry—the depot master—says he went to Trumet on the afternoon freight. We must have passed each other on the way. And I'm so—But why are you HERE? And what were you and Issy doing? And—”
Her lover broke in eagerly. “Then you're alone now?” he asked.
“Yes, but—”
“Good! Your father can't get a train back from Trumet before to-morrow morning. I don't know what this letter was—but never mind. Perhaps friend McKay knows more about it. It may be that Mr. Higgins is waiting now outside the Baptist church. Gertie, now's our chance. You come with me right up to the minister's. He's a friend of mine. He understands. He'll marry us, I know. Come! We mustn't lose a minute. Your dad may take a notion to drive back.”
He led her off up the lane, she protesting, he urging. At the corner of the house he turned.
“I say, Is!” he called. “Don't you want to come to the wedding? Seems to me we owe you that, considering all you've done to help it along. Or perhaps you want to stay and fix that compass of yours.”
Issy didn't answer. Some time after they had gone he arose from the ground and stumbled home. That night he put a paper novel into the stove. Next morning, before going to the depot, he removed an iron spike from the Lady May's compass box. The needle swung back to its proper position.
The eleventh of July. The little Berry house stood high on its joists and rollers, in the middle of the Hill Boulevard, directly opposite the Edwards lot. Close behind it loomed the big “Colonial.” Another twenty-four hours, and, even at its one-horse gait, the depot master's dwelling would be beyond the strip of Edwards fence. The “Colonial” would be ready to move on the lot, and Olive Edwards, the widow, would be obliged to leave her home. In fact, Mr. Williams had notified her that she and her few belongings must be off the premises by the afternoon of the twelfth.
The great Williams was in high good-humor. He chuckled as he talked with his foreman, and the foreman chuckled in return. Simeon Phinney did not chuckle. He was anxious and worried, and even the news of Gertie Higgins's runaway marriage, brought to him by Obed Gott, who—having been so recently the victim of another unexpected matrimonial alliance—was wickedly happy over the postmaster's discomfiture, did not interest him greatly.
“Well, I wonder who'll be the next couple,” speculated Obed. “First Polena and old Hardee, then Gertie Higgins and Sam Bartlett! I declare, Sim, gettin' married unbeknownst to anybody must be catchin', like the measles. Nobody's safe unless they've got a wife or husband livin'. Me and Sol Berry are old baches—we'd better get vaccinated or WE may come down with the disease. Ho! ho!”
After dinner Mr. Phinney went from his home to the depot. Captain Sol was sitting in the ticket office, with the door shut. On the platform, forlornly sprawled upon the baggage truck, was Issy McKay, the picture of desolation. He started nervously when he heard Simeon's step. As yet Issy's part in the Bartlett-Higgins episode was unknown to the townspeople. Sam and Gertie had considerately kept silence. Beriah had not learned who sent him the warning note, the unlucky missive which had brought his troubles to a climax. But he was bound to learn it, he would find out soon, and then—No wonder Issy groaned.
“Come in here, Sim,” said the depot master. Phinney entered the ticket office.
“Shut the door,” commanded the Captain. The order was obeyed. “Well, what is it?” asked Berry.
“Why, I just run in to see you a minute, Sol, that's all. What are you shut up in here all alone for?”
“'Cause I want to be alone. There's been more than a thousand folks in this depot so far to-day, seems so, and they all wanted to talk. I don't feel like talkin'.”
“Heard about Gertie Higgins and—”
“Yes.”
“Who told you?”
“Hiram Baker told me first. He's a fine feller and he's so tickled, now that his youngster's 'most well, that he cruises around spoutin' talk and joy same as a steamer's stack spouts cinders. He told me. Then Obed Gott and Cornelius Rowe and Redny Blount and Pat Starkey, and land knows how many more, came to tell me. I cut 'em short. Why, even the Major himself condescended to march in, grand and imposin' as a procession, to make proclamations about love laughin' at locksmiths, and so on. Since he got Polena and her bank account he's a bigger man than the President, in his own estimate.”
“Humph! Well, he better make the best of it while it lasts. P'lena ain't Hetty Green, and her money won't hold out forever.”
“That's a fact. Still Polena's got sense. She'll hold Hardee in check, I cal'late. I wouldn't wonder if it ended by her bossin' things and the Major actin' as a sort of pet poodle dog—nice and pretty to walk out with, but always kept at the end of a string.”
“You didn't go to Higgins's for dinner to-day, did you?”
“No. Nor I shan't go for supper. Beriah's bad enough when he's got nothin' the matter with him but dyspepsy. Now that his sufferin's are complicated with elopements, I don't want to eat with him.”
“Come and have supper with us.”
“I guess not, thank you, Sim. I'll get some crackers and cheese and such at the store. I—I ain't very hungry these days.”
He turned his head and looked out of the window. Simeon fidgeted.
“Sol,” he said, after a pause, “we'll be past Olive's by to-morrer night.”
No answer. Sim repeated his remark.
“I know it,” was the short reply.
“Yes—yes, I s'posed you did, but—”
“Sim, don't bother me now. This is my last day here at the depot, and I've got things to do.”
“Your last day? Why, what—?”
Captain Sol told briefly of his resignation and of the coming of the new depot master.
“But you givin' up your job!” gasped Phinney. “YOU! Why, what for?”
“For instance, I guess. I ain't dependent on the wages, and I'm sick of the whole thing.”
“But what'll you do?”
“Don't know.”
“You—you won't leave town, will you? Lawsy mercy, I hope not!”
“Don't know. Maybe I'll know better by and by. I've got to think things out. Run along now, like a good feller. Don't say nothin' about my quittin'. All hands'll know it to-morrow, and that's soon enough.”
Simeon departed, his brain in a whirl. Captain Solomon Berry no longer depot master! The world must be coming to an end.
He remained at his work until supper time. During the meal he ate and said so little that his wife wondered and asked questions. To avoid answering them he hurried out. When he returned, about ten o'clock, he was a changed man. His eyes shone and he fairly danced with excitement.
“Emeline!” he shouted, as he burst into the sitting room. “What do you think? I've got the everlastin'est news to tell!”
“Good or bad?” asked the practical Mrs. Phinney.
“Good! So good that—There! let me tell you. When I left here I went down to the store and hung around till the mail was sorted. Pat Starkey was doin' the sortin', Beriah bein' too upsot by Gertie's gettin' married to attend to anything. Pat called me to the mail window and handed me a letter.
“'It's for Olive Edwards,' he says. 'She's been expectin' one for a consider'ble spell, she told me, and maybe this is it. P'r'aps you'd just as soon go round by her shop and leave it.'
“I took the letter and looked at it. Up in one corner was the printed name of an Omaha firm. I never said nothin', but I sartinly hustled on my way up the hill.
“Olive was in her little settin' room back of the shop. She was pretty pale, and her eyes looked as if she hadn't been doin' much sleepin' lately. Likewise I noticed—and it give me a queer feelin' inside—that her trunk was standin', partly packed, in the corner.”
“The poor woman!” exclaimed Mrs. Phinney.
“Yes,” went on her husband. “Well, I handed over the letter and started to go, but she told me to set down and rest, 'cause I was so out of breath. To tell you the truth, I was crazy to find out what was in that envelope and, being as she'd give me the excuse, I set.
“She took the letter over to the lamp and looked at it for much as a minute, as if she was afraid to open it. But at last, and with her fingers shakin' like the palsy, she fetched a long breath and tore off the end of the envelope. It was a pretty long letter, and she read it through. I see her face gettin' whiter and whiter and, when she reached the bottom of the last page, the letter fell onto the floor. Down went her head on her arms, and she cried as if her heart would break. I never felt so sorry for anybody in my life.
“'Don't, Mrs. Edwards,' I says. 'Please don't. That cousin of yours is a darn ungrateful scamp, and I'd like to have my claws on his neck this minute.'
“She never even asked me how I knew about the cousin. She was too much upset for that.
“'Oh! oh!' she sobs. 'What SHALL I do? Where shall I go? I haven't got a friend in the world!'
“I couldn't stand that. I went acrost and laid my hand on her shoulder.
“'Mrs. Edwards,' says I, 'you mustn't say that. You've got lots of friends. I'm your friend. Mr. Hilton's your friend. Yes, and there's another, the best friend of all. If it weren't for him, you'd have been turned out into the street long before this.'”
Mrs. Phinney nodded. “I'm glad you told her!” she exclaimed. “She'd ought to know.”
“That's what I thought,” said Simeon.
“Well, she raised her head then and looked at me.
“'You mean Mr. Williams?' she asks.
“That riled me up. 'Williams nothin'!' says I. 'Williams let you stay here 'cause he could just as well as not. If he'd known that this other friend was keepin' him from gettin' here, just on your account, he'd have chucked you to glory, promise or no promise. But this friend, this real friend, he don't count cost, nor trouble, nor inconvenience. Hikes his house—the house he lives in—right out into the road, moves it to a place where he don't want to go, and—'
“'Mr. Phinney,' she sighs out, 'what do you mean?'
“And then I told her. She listened without sayin' a word, but her eyes kept gettin' brighter and brighter and she breathed short.
“'Oh!' she says, when I'd finished. 'Did he—did he—do that for ME?'
“'You bet!' says I. 'He didn't tell me what he was doin' it for—that ain't Sol's style; but I'm arithmetiker enough to put two and two together and make four. He did it for you, you can bet your last red on that.'
“She stood up. 'Oh!' she breathes. 'I—I must go and thank him. I—'
“But, knowin' Sol, I was afraid. Fust place, there was no tellin' how he'd act, and, besides, he might not take it kindly that I'd told her.
“'Wait a jiffy,' I says. 'I'll go out and see if he's home. You stay here. I'll be back right off.'
“Out I put, and over to the Berry house, standin' on its rollers in the middle of the Boulevard. And, just as I got to it, somebody says:
“'Ahoy, Sim! What's the hurry? Anybody on fire?'
“'Twas the Cap'n himself, settin' on a pile of movin' joist and smokin' as usual. I didn't waste no time.
“'Sol,' says I, 'I've just come from Olive's. She's got that letter from the Omaha man. Poor thing! all alone there—'
“He interrupted me sharp. 'Well?' he snaps. 'What's it say? Will the cousin help her?'
“'No,' I says, 'drat him, he won't!'
“The answer I got surprised me more'n anything I ever heard or ever will hear.
“'Thank God!' says Sol Berry. 'That settles it.'
“And I swan to man if he didn't climb down off them timbers and march straight across the street, over to the door of Olive Edwards's home, open it, and go in! I leaned against the joist he'd left, and swabbed my forehead with my sleeve.”
“He went to HER!” gasped Mrs. Phinney.
“Wait,” continued her husband. “I must have stood there twenty minutes when I heard somebody hurryin' down the Boulevard. 'Twas Cornelius Rowe, all red-faced and het up, but bu'stin' with news.
“''Lo, Sim!' says he to me. 'Is Cap'n Sol home? Does he know?'
“'Know? Know what?” says I.
“'Why, the trick Mr. Williams put up on him? Hey? You ain't heard? Well, Mr. Williams's fixed him nice, HE has! Seems Abner Payne hadn't answered Sol's letter tellin' him he'd accept the offer to swap lots, and Williams went up to Wareham where Payne's been stayin' and offered him a thumpin' price for the land on Main Street, and took it. The deed's all made out. Cap'n Sol can't move where he was goin' to, and he's left with his house on the town, as you might say. Ain't it a joke, though? Where is Sol? I want to be the fust to tell him and see how he acts. Is he to home?'
“I was shook pretty nigh to pieces, but I had some sense left.
“'No, he ain't,' says I. 'I see him go up street a spell ago.'”
“Why, Simeon!” interrupted Mrs. Phinney once more. “Was that true? How COULD you see him when—”
“Be still! S'pose I was goin' to tell him where Sol HAD gone? I'd have lied myself blue fust. However, Cornelius was satisfied.
“'That so?' he grunts. 'By jings! I'm goin' to find him.'
“Off he went, and the next thing I knew the Edwards door opened, and I heard somebody callin' my name. I went acrost, walkin' in a kind of daze, and there, in the doorway, with the lamp shinin' on 'em, was Cap'n Sol and Olive. The tears was wet on her cheeks, but she was smilin' in a kind of shy, half-believin' sort of way, and as for Sol, he was one broad, satisfied grin.
“'Cap'n,' I begun, 'I just heard the everlastin'est news that—'
“'Shut up, Sim!' he orders, cheerful. 'You've been a mighty good friend to both of us, and I want you to be the fust to shake hands.'
“'Shake hands?' I stammers, lookin' at 'em. 'WHAT? You don't mean—'
“'I mean shake hands. Don't you want to?'
“Want to! I give 'em both one more look, and then we shook, up to the elbows; and my grin had the Cap'n's beat holler.
“'Sim,' he says, after I'd cackled a few minutes, 'I cal'late maybe that white horse is well by this time. P'r'aps we might move a little faster. I'm kind of anxious to get to Main Street.'
“Then I remembered. 'Great gosh all fish-hooks!' I sings out. 'Main Street? Why, there AIN'T no Main Street!'
“And I gives 'em Cornelius's news. The widow's smile faded out.
“'Oh!' says she. 'O Solomon! And I got you into all this trouble!'
“Cap'n Sol didn't stop grinnin', but he scratched his head. 'Huh!' says he. 'Mark one up for King Williams the Great. Humph!'
“He thought for a minute and then he laughed out loud. 'Olive,' he says, 'if I remember right, you and I always figgered to live on the Shore Road. It's the best site in town. Sim, I guess if that white horse IS well, you can move that shanty of mine right to Cross Street, down that, and back along the Shore Road to the place where it come from. THAT land's mine yet,' says he.
“If that wa'n't him all over! I couldn't think what to say, except that folks would laugh some, I cal'lated.
“'Not at us, they won't,' says he. 'We'll clear out till the laughin' is over. Olive, to-morrer mornin' we'll call on Parson Hilton and then take the ten o'clock train. I feel's if a trip to Washin'ton would be about right just now.'
“She started and blushed and then looked up into his face. 'Solomon,' she says, low, 'I really would like to go to Niagara.'
“He shook his head. 'Old lady,' says he, 'I guess you don't quite understand this thing. See here'—p'intin' to his house loomin' big and black in the roadway—'see! the mountain has come to Mahomet.'”
Mrs. Phinney had heard enough. She sprang from her chair and seized her husband's hands.
“Splendid!” she cried, her face beaming. “Oh, AIN'T it lovely! Ain't you glad for 'em, Simeon?”
“Glad! Say, Emeline; there's some of that wild-cherry bounce down cellar, ain't there? Let's break our teetotalism for once and drink a glass to Cap'n and Mrs. Solomon Berry. Jerushy! I got to do SOMETHIN' to celebrate.”
On the Hill Boulevard the summer wind stirred the silverleaf poplars. The thick, black shadows along the sidewalks were heavy with the perfume of flowers. Captain Sol, ex-depot master of East Harniss, strolled on in the dark, under the stars, his hands in his pockets, and in his heart happiness complete and absolute.
Behind him twinkled the lamp in the window of the Edwards house, so soon to be torn down. Before him, over the barberry hedge, blazed the windows of the mansion the owner of which was responsible for it all. The windows were open, and through them sounded the voices of the mighty Ogden Hapworth Williams and his wife, engaged in a lively altercation. It was an open secret that their married life was anything but peaceful.
“What are you grumbling about now?” demanded 'Williams. “Don't I give you more money than—”
“Nonsense!” sneered Mrs. Williams, in scornful derision. “Nonsense, I say! Money is all there is to you, Ogden. In other things, the real things of this world, those you can't buy with money, you're a perfect imbecile. You know nothing whatever about them.”
Captain Sol, alone on the walk by the hedge, glanced in the direction of the shrill voice, then back at the lamp in Olive's window. And he laughed aloud.
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