Chapter 2

'I do not understand it all; perhaps you can explain to me?'

'I think I can,' answered the young man, smiling in spite of himself; 'that is, if you wish to learn.'

'Is it hard?'

'That depends upon the scholar; now, some minds--' Here a hideous face looked out through one of the little windows, and then vanished. 'Ah,' said Waring, pausing, 'one of the family?'

'That is Lorez, my dear old nurse.'

The face now came out on to the balcony and showed itself as part of an old negress, bent and wrinkled with age.

'He came in a boat, Lorez,' said Silver, 'and yet you see he is not Jacob. But he says he is tired and hungry, so we will have supper, now, without waiting for father.'

The old woman smiled and nodded, stroking the girl's glittering hair meanwhile with her black hand.

'As soon as the sun has gone it will be very damp,' said Silver, turning to her guest; 'you will come within. But you have not told me-your name.'

'Jarvis,' replied Waring promptly.

'Come, then, Jarvis.' And she led the way through a low door into a long narrow room with a row of little square windows on each side all covered with little square white curtains. The walls and ceiling were planked and the workmanship of the whole rude and clumsy; but a gay carpet covered the floor, a chandelier adorned with lustres, hung from a hook in the ceiling, large gilded vases and a mirror in a tarnished gilt frame adorned a shelf over the hearth, mahogany chairs stood in ranks against the wall under the little windows and a long narrow table ran down the centre of the apartment from end to end. It all seemed strangely familiar; of what did it remind him? His eyes fell upon the table-legs; they were riveted to the floor. Then it came to him at once,--the long narrow cabin of a lake steamer.

'I wonder if it is not anchored after all,' he thought.

'Just a few shavings and one little stick, Lorez,' said Silver; 'enough to give us light and drive away the damp.'

Up flared the blaze and spread abroad the dear home feeling. (O hearth-fire, good genius of home, with thee a log-cabin is cheery and bright, without thee the palace a dreary waste!)

'And now, while Lorez is preparing supper, you will come and see my pets,' said Silver, in her soft tone of unconscious command.

'By all means,' replied Waring. 'Anything in the way of mermaidens?'

'Mermaidens dwell in the water, they cannot live in houses as we can; did you not know that? I have seen them on moonlight nights, and so has Lorez; but Aunt Shadow never saw them.'

'Another member of the family,--Aunt Shadow?'

'Yes,' replied Silver; 'but she is not here now. She went away one night when I was asleep. I do not know why it is,' she added sadly, 'but if people go away from here in the night they never come back. Will it be so with you, Jarvis?'

'No; for I will take you with me,' replied the young man lightly.

'Very well; and father will go too, and Lorez,' said Silver.

To this addition, Waring, like many another man in similar circumstances, made no reply. But Silver did not notice the omission. She had opened a door, and behold, they stood together in a bower of greenery and blossom, flowers growing everywhere,--on the floor, up the walls, across the ceiling, in pots, in boxes, in baskets, on shelves, in cups, in shells, climbing, crowding each other, swinging, hanging, winding around everything,--a riot of beauty with perfumes for a language. Two white gulls stood in the open window and gravely surveyed the stranger.

'They stay with me almost all the time,' said the water-maiden; 'every morning they fly out to sea for a while, but they always come back.'

Then she flitted to and fro, kissed the opening blossoms and talked to them, tying back the more riotous vines and gravely admonishing them.

'They are so happy here,' she said; 'it was dull for them on shore. I would not live on the shore! Would you?'

'Certainly not,' replied Waring, with an air of having spent his entire life upon a raft. 'But you did not find all these blossoms on the shores about here, did you?'

'Father found them,--he finds everything; in his boat almost every night is something for me. I hope he will come soon; he will be so glad to see you.'

'Will he? I wish I was sure of that,' thought Waring. Then aloud, 'Has he any men with him?' he asked carelessly.

'O no; we live here all alone now,--father, Lorez, and I.'

'But you were expecting a Jacob?'

'I have been expecting Jacob for more than two years. Every night I watch for him, but he comes not. Perhaps he and Aunt Shadow will come together,--do you think they will?' said Silver, looking up into his eyes with a wistful expression.

'Certainly,' replied Waring.

'Now am I glad, so glad! For father and Lorez will never say so. I think I shall like you, Jarvis.' And, leaning on a box of mignonette, she considered him gravely with her little hands folded.

Waring, man of the world,--Waring, who had been, under fire,--Waring, the impassive,--Waring,--the unflinching,--turned from this scrutiny.

Supper was eaten at one end of the long table; the dishes, tablecloth, and napkins were marked with an anchor, the food simple but well cooked.

'Fish, of course, and some common supplies I can understand,' said the visitor; 'but how do you obtain flour like this, or sugar?'

'Father brings them,' said Silver, 'and keeps them locked in his storeroom. Brown sugar we have always, but white not always, and I like it so much! Don't you?'

'No; I care nothing for it,' said Waring, remembering the few lumps and the little white teeth.

The old negress waited, and peered at the visitor out of her small bright eyes; every time Silver spoke to her, she broke into a radiance of smiles and nods, but said nothing.

'She lost her voice some years ago,' explained the little mistress when the black had gone out for more coffee; 'and now she seems to have forgotten how to form words, although she understands us.'

Lorez returned, and, after refilling Waring's cup, placed something shyly beside his plate, and withdrew into the shadow. 'What is it?' said the young man, examining the carefully folded parcel.

'Why, Lorez, have you given him that!' exclaimed Silver as he drew out a scarlet ribbon, old and frayed, but brilliant still. 'We think it must have belonged to her young master,' she continued in a low tone. 'It is her most precious treasure, and long ago she used to talk about him, and about her old home in the South.'

The old woman came forward after a while, smiling and nodding like an animated mummy, and taking the red ribbon threw it around the young man's neck, knotting it under the chin. Then she nodded with treble radiance and made signs; of satisfaction.

'Yes, it is becoming,' said Silver, considering the effect thoughtfully, her small head with its veil of hair bent to one side, like a flower swayed by the wind.

The flesh-pots of Egypt returned to Jarvis Waring's mind: he remembered certain articles of apparel left behind in civilization, and murmured against the wilderness. Under the pretence of examining the vases, he took an early opportunity of, looking into the round mirror. 'I am hideous,' he said to himself, uneasily.

'Decidedly so,' echoed the Spirit in a cheerful voice. But he was not; only a strong dark young man of twenty-eight, browned by exposure, clad in a gray flannel shirt and the rough attire of a hunter.

The fire on the hearth sparkled gayly. Silver had brought one of her little white gowns, half finished, and sat sewing in its light, while the old negress came and went about her household tasks.

'So you can sew?' said the visitor.

'Of course I can. Aunt Shadow taught me,' answered the water-maiden, threading her needle deftly. 'There is no need to do it, for I have so many dresses; but I like to sew, don't you?'

'I cannot say that I do. Have you so many dresses then?'

'Yes; would you like to see them? Wait.'

Down went the little gown trailing along the floor, and away she flew, coming back with her arms full,--silks, muslins, laces, and even jewelry. 'Are they not beautiful?' she asked, ranging her splendor over the chairs.

'They are indeed,' said Waring, examining the garments with curious eyes. 'Where did you get them?'

'Father brought them. O, there he is now, there he is now! I hear the oars. Come, Lorez.'

She ran out; the old woman hastened, carrying a brand from the hearth; and after a moment Waring followed them. 'I may as well face the old rogue at once,' he thought.

The moon had not risen and the night was dark; under the balcony floated a black object, and Lorez, leaning over, held out her flaming torch. The face of the old rogue came out into the light under its yellow handkerchief, but so brightened and softened by loving gladness that the gazer above hardly knew it. 'Are you there, darling, safe and well?' said the old man, looking up fondly as he fastened his skiff.

'Yes, father; here I am and so glad to see you,' replied the water-maiden, waiting at the top of the ladder. 'We have a visitor, father dear; are you not glad, so glad to see him?'

The two men came face to face, and the elder started back. 'What are you doing here?' he said sternly.

'Looking for my property.'

'Take it, and begone!'

'I will, to-morrow.'

All this apart, and with the rapidity of lightning.

'His name is Jarvis, father, and we must keep him with us,' said Silver.

'Yes, dear, as long as he wishes to stay; but no doubt he has home and friends waiting for him.'

They went within, Silver leading the way. Old Fog's eyes gleamed and his hands were clinched. The younger man watched him warily.

'I have been showing Jarvis all my dresses, father, and he thinks them beautiful.'

'They certainly are remarkable,' observed Waring, coolly.

Old Fog's hands dropped, he glanced nervously towards the visitor.

'What have you brought for me to-night, father dear?'

'Nothing, child; that is, nothing of any consequence. But it is growing late; run off to your nest'

'O no, papa, you have had no supper, nor--'

'I am not hungry. Go, child, go; do not grieve me,' said the old man in a low tone.

'Grieve you? Dear papa, never!' said the girl, her voice softening to tenderness in a moment. 'I will run straight to my room.--Come, Lorez.'

The door closed. 'Now for us two,' thought Waring.

But the cloud had passed from old Fog's face, and he drew up his chair confidentially. 'You see how it is,' he began in an apologetic tone; 'that child is the darling of my life, and I could not resist taking those things for her; she has so few books, and she likes those little lumps of sugar.'

'And the Titian picture?' said Waring, watching him doubtfully.

'A father's foolish pride; I knew she was lovelier, but I wanted to see the two side by side. She is lovelier, isn't she?'

'I do not think so.'

'Don't you?' said old Fog in a disappointed tone. 'Well, I suppose I am foolish about her; we live here all alone, you see: my sister brought her up.'

'The Aunt Shadow who has gone away?'

'Yes; she was my sister, and--and she went away last year,' said the old man. 'Have a pipe?'

'I should think you would find it hard work to live here.'

'I do; but a poor man cannot choose. I hunt, fish, and get out a few furs sometimes; I traffic with the Beaver people now and then. I bought all this furniture in that way; you would not think it, but they have a great many nice things down at Beaver.'

'It looks like steamboat furniture.'

'That is it; it is. A steamer went to pieces down there, and they saved almost all her furniture and stores; they are very good sailors, the Beavers.'

'Wreckers, perhaps?'

'Well I would not like to say that; you know we do have terrible storms on these waters. And then there is the fog; this part of Lake Michigan is foggy half the time, why, I never could guess: but twelve hours out the twenty-four the gray mist lies on the water here and outside, shifting slowly backwards and forwards from Little Traverse to Death's Door, and up into this curve, like a waving curtain. Those silks, now, came from the steamer; trunks, you know. But I have never told Silver; she might ask where were the people to whom they belonged. You do not like the idea? Neither do I. But how could we help the drowning when we were not there, and these things were going for a song down at Beaver. The child loves pretty things; what could a poor man do? Have a glass of punch; I'll get it ready in no time.' He bustled about, and then came back with the full glasses. 'You won't tell her? I may have done wrong in the matter, but it would kill me to have the child lose faith in me,' he said, humbly.

'Are you going to keep the girl shut up here forever?' said Waring, half touched, half disgusted; the old fellow had looked abject as he pleaded.

'That is it; no,' said Fog, eagerly. 'She has been but a child all this time, you see, and my sister taught her well. We did the best we could. But as soon as I have a little more, just a little more, I intend to move to one of the towns down the lake, and have a small house and everything comfortable. I have planned it all out, I shall have--'

He rambled on, garrulously detailing all his fancies and projects while the younger man sipped his punch (which was very good), listened until he was tired, fell into a doze, woke and listened awhile longer, and then, wearied out, proposed bed.

'Certainly. But, as I was saying--'

'I can hear the rest to-morrow,' said Waring, rising with scant courtesy.

'I am sorry you go so soon; couldn't you stay a few days?' said the old man, lighting a brand. 'I am going over to-morrow to the shore where I met you. I have some traps there; you might enjoy a little hunting.'

'I have had too much of that already. I must get my dogs, and then I should like to hit a steamer or vessel going below.'

'Nothing easier; we'll go over after the dogs early in the morning, and then I'll take you right down to the islands if the wind is fair. Would you like to look around the castle,--I am going to draw up the ladders. No? This way, then; here is your room.'

It was a little side-chamber with one window high up over the water; there was an iron bolt on the door, and the walls of bare logs were solid. Waring stood his gun in one corner, and laid his pistols by the side of the bed,--for there was a bed, only a rude framework like a low-down shelf, but covered with mattress and sheets none the less,--and his weary body longed for those luxuries with a longing that only the wilderness can give,--the wilderness with its beds of boughs, and no undressing. The bolt and the logs shut him in safely; he was young and strong, and there were his pistols. 'Unless they burn down their old castle,' he said to himself, 'they cannot harm me.' And then he fell to thinking of the lovely childlike girl, and his heart grew soft. 'Poor old man,' he said, 'how he must have worked and stolen and starved to keep her safe and warm in this far-away nest of his hidden in the fogs! I won't betray the old fellow, and I'll go to-morrow. Do you hear that, Jarvis Waring? I'll go to-morrow!'

And then the Spirit, who had been listening as usual, folded himself up silently and flew away.

To go to sleep in a bed, and awake in an open boat drifting out to sea, is startling. Waring was not without experiences, startling and so forth, but this exceeded former sensations; when a bear had him, for instance, he at least understood it, but this was not a bear, but a boat. He examined the craft as well as he could in the darkness. 'Evidently boats in some shape or other are the genii of this region,' he said; 'they come shooting ashore from nowhere, they sail in at a signal without oars, canvas, or crew, and now they have taken to kidnapping. It is foggy too, I'll warrant; they are in league with the fogs.' He looked up, but could see nothing, not even a star.

'What does it all mean anyway? Where am I? Who am I? Am I anybody? Or has the body gone and left me only as an any?' But no one answered. Finding himself partly dressed, with the rest of his clothes at his feet, he concluded that he was not yet a spirit; in one of his pockets was a match, he struck it and came back to reality in a flash. The boat was his own dug-out, and he himself and no other was in it: so far, so good. Everything else, however, was fog and night. He found the paddle and began work. 'We shall see who will conquer,' he thought, doggedly, 'Fate or I!' So he paddled on an hour for more.

Then the wind arose and drove the fog helter-skelter across to Green Bay, where the gray ranks curled themselves down and lay hidden until morning. 'I'll go with the wind,' thought Waring, 'it must take me somewhere in time.' So he changed his course and paddled on. The wind grew strong, then stronger. He could see a few stars now as the ragged dark clouds scudded across the heavens, and he hoped for the late moon. The wind grew wild, then wilder. It took all his skill to manage his clumsy boat. He no longer asked himself where he was or who; he knew,--a man in the grasp of death. The wind was a gale now, and the waves were pressed down flat by its force as it flew along. Suddenly the man at the paddle, almost despairing, espied a light, high up, steady, strong. 'A lighthouse on one of the islands,' he said, and steered for it with all his might. Good luck was with him; in half an hour he felt the beach under him, and landed on the shore; but the light he saw no longer. 'I must be close in under it,' he thought. In the train of the gale came thunder and lightning. Waring sat under a bush watching the powers of the air in conflict, he saw the fury of their darts and heard the crash of their artillery, and mused upon the wonders of creation, and the riddle of man's existence. Then a flash came, different from the others in that it brought the human element upon the scene; in its light he saw a vessel driving helplessly before the gale. Down from his spirit-heights he came at once, and all the man within him was stirred for those on board, who, whether or not they had ever perplexed themselves over the riddle of their existence, no doubt now shrank from the violent solution offered to them. But what could he do? He knew nothing of the shore, and yet there must be a harbor somewhere, for was there not the light? Another flash showed the vessel still nearer, drifting broadside on; involuntarily he ran out on the long sandy point where it seemed that soon she must strike. But sooner came a crash, then a grinding sound; there was a reef outside then, and she was on it, the rocks cutting her, and the waves pounding her down on their merciless edges. 'Strange!' he thought. 'The harbor must be on the other side I suppose, and yet it seems as though I came this way.' Looking around, there was the light high up behind him, burning clearly and strongly, while the vessel was breaking to pieces below. 'It is a lure,' he said, indignantly, 'a false light.' In his wrath he spoke aloud; suddenly a shape came out of the darkness, cast him down, and tightened a grasp around his throat. 'I know you,' he muttered, strangling. One hand was free, he drew out his pistol, and fired; the shape fell back. It was old Fog. Wounded? Yes, badly.

Waring found his tinder-box, made a blaze of driftwood, and bound up the bleeding arm and leg roughly. 'Wretch,' he said, 'you set that light.'

Old Fog nodded.

'Can anything be done for the men on board? Answer or I'll end your miserable life at once; I don't know why, indeed, I have tried to save it.'

Old Fog shook his head. 'Nothing,' he murmured; 'I know every inch of the reef and shore.'

Another flash revealed for an instant the doomed vessel, and Waring raged at his own impotence as he strode to and fro, tears of anger and pity in his eyes. The old man watched him anxiously. 'There are not more than six of them,' he said; 'it was only a small schooner.'

'Silence!' shouted Waring; 'each man of the six now suffering and drowning is worth a hundred of such as you!'

'That may be,' said Fog.

Half an hour afterwards he spoke again. 'They're about gone now, the water is deadly cold up here. The wind will go down soon, and by daylight the things will be coming ashore; you'll see to them, won't you?'

'I'll see to nothing, murderer.'

'And if I die what are you?'

'An avenger.'

'Silver must die too then; there is but little in the house, she will soon starve. It was for her that I came out to-night.'

'I will take her away; not for your sake, but for hers.'

'How can you find her?'

'As soon as it is daylight I will sail over.'

'Over? Over where? That is it, you do not know,' said the old man, eagerly, raising himself on his unwounded arm. 'You might row and sail about here for days, and I'll warrant you'd never find the castle; it's hidden away more carefully than a nest in the reeds, trust me for that. The way lies through a perfect tangle of channels and islands and marshes, and the fog is sure for at least a good half of the time. The sides of the castle towards the channel show no light at all; and even when you're once through the outlying islets, the only approach is masked by a movable bed of sedge which I contrived, and which turns you skilfully back into the marsh by another way. No; you might float around there for days but you'd never find the castle.'

'I found it once.'

'That was because you came from the north shore. I did not guard that side, because no one has ever come that way; you remember how quickly I saw your light and rowed over to find out what it was. But you are miles away from there now.'

The moon could not pierce the heavy clouds, and the night continued dark. At last the dawn come slowly up the east and showed an angry sea, and an old man grayly pallid on the sands near the dying fire; of the vessel nothing was to be seen.

'The things will be coming ashore, the things will be coming. ashore,' muttered the old man, his anxious eyes turned towards the water that lay on a level with his face; he could not raise himself now.

'Do you see things coming ashore?'

Waring looked searchingly at him. 'Tell me the truth,' he said, 'has the girl no boat?'

'No.'

'Will any one go to rescue her; does any one know of the castle?'

'Not a human being on this earth.'

'And that aunt,--that Jacob?'

'Didn't you guess it? They are both dead. I rowed them out by night and buried them,--my poor old sister and the boy who had been our serving-lad. The child knows nothing of death. I told her they had gone away.'

'Is there no way for her to cross, to the islands or mainland?'

'No; there is a circle of deep water all around the castle, outside.'

'I see nothing for it, then, but to try to save your justly forfeited life,' said Waring, kneeling down with an expression of repugnance. He was something of a surgeon, and knew what he, was about. His task over, he made up the fire, warmed some food, fed the old man, and helped his waning strength with the contents of his flask. 'At least you placed all my property in the dug-out before you set me adrift,' he said; 'may I ask your motive?'

'I did not wish to harm you; only to get rid of you. You had provisions, and your chances were as good as many you had had in the woods.'

'But I might have found my way back to your castle?'

'Once outside, you could never do that,' replied the old man, securely.

'I could go back along-shore.'

'There are miles of piny-wood swamps where the streams come down; no, you could not do it, unless you went away round to Lake Superior again, and struck across the country as you did before. That would take you a month or two, and the summer is almost over. You would not risk a Northern snowstorm, I reckon. But say, do you see things coming ashore?'

'The poor bodies will come, no doubt,' said Waring, sternly.

'Not yet; and they don't often come in here, anyway; they're more likely to drift out to sea.'