Chapter 11

Drifting down through Ireland we heard another echo of Aunt Nancy. She had ridden on horseback through the Gap of Dunloe, no difficult feat in itself, and one achieved daily during Kallarney's tourist season by old ladies of various countries and creeds. In Aunt Nancy's case, however, it appeared that she had been able to enjoy that variety which is so gratifying a feature of human experience. Notwithstanding the fact that she had never been on the back of a horse in her life, she unerringly selected the freshest and most frolicsome of the Irish ponies as her mount. It appears further that she was finally lifted to the saddle of this animal as the result of a distinct understanding between Mr. James George Jackson and her guide that the latter gentleman was not only to accompany the lady every foot of the route, but was meantime to cling valiantly to the bridle with both hands. Unfortunately, this arrangement, so deeply satisfying to all, was not ratified by the mettlesome Irish pony; the result being that, after the guide had been swept off his feet by a sudden and unexpected lift of the animal's forelegs, Aunt Nancy and the pony continued the excursion alone. Judging from the terse words of one of the observers, it must have been an exciting spectacle while it lasted, though it passed all too rapidly beyond the line of the beholder's longing vision.

"Ye c'u'dn't tell," remarked this gentleman, sadly, in relating the accident, "which was the harse an' which the auld lady, an' which the Gap of Dunloe!"

Excited pursuers did not "catch 'em," as they were urged to do by the frenzied Mr. Jackson, but they were rewarded by finding various portions of Aunt Nancy's wearing apparel scattered along the trail. Items: one black bonnet, one cape, one handkerchief, one pair of steel-rimmed spectacles. Apparently only those garments securely fastened in place, such as shoes and lace mitts, had survived the experience. Apparently, also, Aunt Nancy had made in almost unbroken silence her exciting mountain ride. The exception seemingly occurred somewhere in the Dark Valley, where a mountain woman, seeing her fly by, had thoughtlessly urged her to stop and buy a glass of goat's milk. The woman's memory of the encounter was slightly vague, it having ended so abruptly, but she retained the impression that Aunt Nancy had expressed an unusual degree of regret at being unable to accept her invitation.

"'Twasn't till thin I saw the poor harse was crazy wid fright, an' the auld lady's close blowin' over his eyes," added the mountain woman, sympathetically. "An' I couldn't do nathin', becuz, begorra, whin I lifted me v'ice to call me big bye, the auld woman an' the harse was half-way down the valley."

Fortunately, five or six miles of this stimulating pace had a blighting effect on the wild Hibernian spirits of the pony, with the result that he and his rider ambled at a most sedate gait into the space where the row-boats were waiting their passengers for Ross Castle, and where the remaining members of the party were expected to meet. The remaining members of the party, for obvious reasons, were not yet there; and the long delay before their arrival gave Aunt Nancy time to replace the missing articles of her apparel with garments borrowed from the woman at the refreshment booth, and to eat a hearty luncheon. Thus refreshed, she was ready for the fourteen-mile journey in a row-boat to Ross Castle, which was the next item on the programme of the day; and she made it that afternoon, notwithstanding the almost hysterical expostulations of Mr. James George Jackson.

It was not until we sailed for America that we looked again into Aunt Nancy's dauntless eyes. She was the first passenger we saw when we reached the deck of the Columbia, and her joy in the encounter was as deep as our own. We chatted for a moment, and then she darted off to greet various members of her party from whom side excursions had temporarily separated her.

The sea was slumberously calm, bathed in hazy autumnal sunshine. Light-hearted men and women in white linen and pale flannel costumes strolled about the decks explaining to one another what good sailors they were, and how they hoped the sea would not remain monotonously smooth.

"One wants a little life and swing on a ship," explained one fat, blond man on whose face we were even then looking, though we knew it not, for the last time in seven sad days. To a unit the passengers poured into the dining-saloon at the first call for luncheon. To a unit they consumed everything on the bill of fare. All was peace and appetite.

That afternoon the sea roused herself drowsily, turned over, and yawned. The blue waves of the morning were gone. In their place were huge, oily, black swells, which lazily lifted the _Columbia_, held her suspended for a long minute, and then with slow, shuddering reluctance let her down, down, down. An interesting young Scotchman who was sitting by Jessica's side on deck stopped suddenly in the midst of an impassioned tribute to the character of Robert Brace, looked in her face for an instant with eyes full of a horrible fear, and hastily joined a stout German in a spirited foot-race to the nearest companionway. A High-church English divine, who had met me half an hour before and had hastened to spare me future heartaches by explaining at once that he was married, rose abruptly from his chair beside me and wobbled uncertainly to the deck-rail, where he hung suspended in an attitude of pathetic resignation. Thus recalled to the grim realities of life, Jessica and I looked up and down the deck. It was deserted--deserted save for a little black figure that trotted rapidly past us, clutching occasionally at the empty air for support as she was hurled from one side to the other of the glistening deck, but cheerful, undaunted, and happy.

"I got to have some exercise," panted Aunt Nancy, as she reclined for an instant in my lap, where a lurch of the ship had deposited her; "so I'm takin' a little walk." She was still walking when Jessica and I retreated hurriedly to our cabin.

The days that followed are too sad to be described by the most sympathetic pen. The sea, moved to her uttermost depths as she had not been in twenty-five years, resented fiercely the presence of the Columbia on her disturbed bosom. Madly she cast her from her; with feline treachery she drew her back again, and sought to tear apart her mighty timbers. Groaningly, agonizingly, pluckily, the Columbia bore all--and revenged herself on her passengers. She stood on her head, and sent them, so to speak, into her prow. She rose up on her stern, and scattered them aft. She stood still and shuddered. She lay down on her left side until she had imperilled the heart action of every person on board; she rolled over on her right side and started briskly toward the bottom of the sea. She recovered herself, leaped up and down a few times to prove that she was still intact, and did it all over again. Meanwhile the passengers, locked below and sternly commanded to keep to their cabins, held fast to the sides of their berths and prayed fervently for death.

Neither Jessica nor I was actively ill, but Jessica's indifference to food and social intercourse was marked in the extreme. Stretched on her back in the berth opposite my own, she lay day and night with closed eyes and forbidding demeanor, rousing herself only long enough to repel fiercely any suggestion that she take nourishment. Also, she furnished me with one life-long memory. From sheer ennui I ordered and devoured at noon on the third day a large portion of steamed peach dumpling, with hard sauce. The look which Jessica cast first upon this dish and then upon me will always, I think, remain the dominant feature of my most troubled dreams.

During this time I had not forgotten Aunt Nancy, though I am sure Jessica had. Her cabin, however, while on the same deck as our own, was at the other end of the ship, and I had grave doubts of my ability to cover safely the distance between. Finally I attempted it, and, aside from the slight incidents of blacking one eye in an unexpected diversion to the rail, and subsequently being hurled violently against the back of an axe nailed to the wall, I made the passage in safety. Aunt Nancy was not in her cabin, but a hollow groan from the upper berth betrayed the fact that her room-mate was. From this lady I was unfortunately unable to extract any information. She seemed to feel that I was mercifully sent to chloroform her out of existence, and her disappointment over my failure to play this Samaritan role was so bitter that I was forced to withdraw lest she should utter things unbefitting a gentlewoman.

Down the long corridor, as I groped my way back, something blew toward me like a wraith from the sea. It wore a gray, woolly bathrobe, a tiny wisp of white hair fastened precariously with one hair-pin, and a pair of knitted bedroom slippers. It was Aunt Nancy, and we executed then and there an intricate pas de deux in our common efforts to meet. Finally the Columbia ceased her individual evolutions long enough to enable us to grasp the passage-rail.

"I've been in your cabin," I explained, above the roar of wave and wind, as we stood facing each other. "I was afraid you were ill."

Aunt Nancy looked almost pained at such a suspicion.

"My, no," she disavowed, hastily; "but there's them that is," she conceded. "I've been to see--let me see--thirty of 'em to-day--men an' women both. Poor Mr. Jackson's about the worst. I never SEE such a sick man. I got this cracked ice for him," she added, looking down at the glass she was clasping to her bosom with her free hand. "I'd 'a' looked in on you," she added, kindly, "if I hadn't been so busy, but I heard you wa'n't neither of you sick."

I explained with some effort that I felt comfortable as long as I lay still, but that as soon as I was on my feet, the motion--We parted hurriedly.

On the morning of the sixth day Jessica turned over in her berth, removed from her spine a fork which had seemingly been there all the week, regarded it with strong disfavor, and announced briefly that she was going above. We went. The decks were still wet, and the steamer-chairs were securely lashed in place. The sky was gray and lowering, but the sea had sulkily subsided, showing its continued resentment of the whole experience only in the upheaval of an occasional wave which broke over the ship-rail and perished at our feet. As the hours passed, pale wraiths appeared at the companionways, supported one another feebly to the nearest chairs, sank into them, and veiled their faces from one another's gaze. They seemed the ghosts of the happy men and women who had come on board the Columbia six long days ago. Languidly as the hours passed they revived and confided to one another the simple record of the voyage. No, they had not been ill. It was, indeed, singular how few of them had been disturbed by the voyage, though they had all noticed that it was rough. But they had been injured by being knocked about or thrown from their berths, or they had been caring for friends or relatives who were ill. Several of them paused at my side on their way to and from their cabins to indulge in these artless confidences. It remained, however, for Aunt Nancy to make the most interesting of all.

She came along the deck about five in the afternoon and dropped with serene satisfaction into the empty steamer-chair at my right. She was fully dressed in the inevitable black, even to her wide bonnet. With a sigh of pleasure she folded her mittened hands and began to talk.

"It's been real interestin'," she said. "I must say I'm 'most sorry to have it over. I want to go to Europe again in two years; I ain't really enjoyed this trip very much; but when I come again I think I'll like it better, now that I know it. But of course at my age one can't really be sure one can come again."

She sank into silence for a moment, looking down at the mittened hands in her lap. Then her face brightened, and she turned to me again with her old, alert eagerness of expression.

"I dunno why I shouldn't come, though," she added, cheerfully. "I'm real well. Before I left home I was some worried. I didn't seem to be as strong as I used to be. That's why I come--to build up my health an' git strong. Lots of folks has wondered why I come, I guess, an' that was it, though I ain't told no one till now. I guess I did improve, too, for the stewardess told me with her own lips only this mornin' that she thought I was a healthy woman. But of course," she added, with lowly humility, "I can't do what I did when I was young."

I was speechless. The Columbia paused on the top of a wave, hesitated a moment, and sailed unsteadily onward. With eyes filled with a solemn content, Aunt Nancy gazed out over the cold, wet sea.

IX

THE HENRY SMITHS' HONEYMOON

When Jacob West suggested to Henry Smith that the latter's honeymoon should be spent in New York, Mr. Smith's ruddy countenance paled at the audacity of the words, and Miss Maria Tuttle, his fiancee, gasped audibly for breath. Unconsciously they clasped hands, as if better to meet together the rude shock of the moment; and seated side by side on the rustic bench which adorned the small veranda of the Tuttle homestead, they gazed helplessly at the speaker. Slowly and with the stiffness of age Jacob sat down on the steps below them and looked up at their startled faces with a twinkle in his dim old eyes. His enjoyment of the moment was intense.

"Why not?" he demanded, cajolingly and argumentatively. "Ain't yeh old enough t' have a good time? Ain't yeh waited long enough? Ain't yeh"--he turned directly to Maria--"bin nursin' yer poor mother fer six years past an' wearin' yerself out, an' ain't yeh bin sewin' day an' night fer three months, ever sence she died, t' git ready t' marry Henry?" He drew a long breath of gratification over the respectful silence which greeted these adroit points, and went on with hortatory sympathy. "Yeh bin a good daughter, Maria. They ain't no better in Clayton Centre. Yeh deserve th' best they is. Now be good t' yerself an' Henry. Let him take yeh to New York an' give yeh a good time on the weddin' tower."

Miss Tuttle blushed faintly. She was forty-five, and looked ten years older. She was a tired, worn out, faded little woman, drained of her youth and vitality by the hourly exactions of the fault-finding invalid mother whom she had so recently laid away in the church-yard with unselfish filial tears. But there was something attractive in the sweet patience of her thin face, and the look in her brown eyes as she turned them on her faithful middle-aged lover was one of the trump cards her sex has played since Eve first used it as she accompanied Adam to the gate out of paradise. In her embarrassment she laughed a little, consciously.

"Mebbe Henry don't want to go," she began. "He ain't said nothing about New York."

Henry whirled abruptly till he faced her on the rustic seat.

"Go! You bet I want to go!" he ejaculated, with fervor. "Don't I just--you bet I do. Say, Maria"--he fumbled nervously with the thin hand he still held in his own--"say, let's go."

Jacob West cackled delightedly. "That's the talk!" he cried, his thin, high tones taking on a shriller note in his excitement. "You jest do it, Henry! You make her! Neither of yeh'll be sorry, I swan!"

They sat silent, reflecting, and the old fellow rose slowly and painfully, instinctive delicacy telling him that, having done his part, it behooved him to leave them alone to solve for themselves the question he had raised. It was hard to go, but he went, chuckling reminiscently as he recalled the excited look on their faces and pictured the lively debate which would follow his departure.

It was a warm October evening, and the little village lay silent under the early stars. A light wind sang a droning lullaby in the grove of pines back of the Tuttle home, and a few belated birds twittered sleepily in near-by trees. Unconsciously Maria voiced the subtle charm of the hour when she spoke.

"I dunno, Henry," she said, lingeringly--"I dunno's I feel to go. Seems like we ought to be content to stay right here, where it's so quiet an' restful."

Her eyes roamed lovingly down the garden paths, lingering on trees and shrubs planted by Tuttle hands now a part of earth themselves. "I'm so glad you're comin' here," she sighed, happily. "I don't b'lieve you know yet how glad I am, Henry--not t' leave the old place."

He waived the discussion of this side interest, already settled between them.

"It'll be jest as nice when we come back from New York," he argued, logically, "an' jest as quiet."

The feminine intellect beside him took another tack on the sea of uncertainty with which old Jacob had surrounded it.

"Mebbe we can't afford it," she hazarded. "Prices is very high in New York, Henry. Joseph Hadley's daughter went there four years ago with her aunt, and she told me with her own lips they had to pay a dollar a day for their room at the hotel, without no meals. The hotel man wanted seventy-five cents apiece for dinner, so they paid it once a day an' the rest of the time they went into lunch-rooms an' had milk an' crackers. But with one dollar for the room, and another dollar 'n' a half for dinner, an' the crackers an' milk besides, they spent 'most twenty dollars the very first week. They had to come right straight home, 'n' they'd meant to stay two weeks."

Henry Smith's strong jaw set rather obstinately.

"I guess we won't have to come home till we git ready," he remarked, easily, "an' I guess we'll git our three meals a day, too. I don't see myself eatin' no milk an' crackers, nor you, neither. I guess I 'ain't bin savin' all these years, with a good carpenter business, without gittin' somethin' ahead. Say, 'Ria"--it was he who blushed now, his round face close to hers--"yeh can have anything yeh want. I'm that glad t' git yeh at last, I'd spend all I have!"

Her thin hand responded for an instant to the pressure of his and then coyly withdrew itself. She had few words at any time and none in moments of emotion, but he knew her and was satisfied.

"You've bin so good, Henry," she said, at last; "you've bin awful patient all these years. Fur's I'm concerned, I'd as lief stay here's anywhere, but if you want to go t' New York, I--I--want to do what yeh say."

"Then we'll go," he said, quietly; and the great question was settled.

When Mr. and Mrs. Henry Smith arrived in New York on the evening of their wedding-day, it is doubtful which of them was the more dazed and frightened by the bustle and confusion at the Grand Central station. Maria had at least the support of her husband's nearness to sustain her, and the comparative peace of mind of the one who, though facing untoward conditions, is without personal responsibility; but Henry experienced, in addition to his self-distrust, a sickening fear of failure in her presence. He was conscious of two dominant thoughts. Whatever happened, he must take care of his wife and spurn the advances of agreeable strangers. Also he and she must be transported by hack to the hotel they had chosen, without parting with the savings of years for the ride. He had heard of the extortions of cabmen. He bargained fiercely with a too-zealous independent who had already grasped his hand-bag and was leading the way to his cab, past the more inexpensive cabs supplied by the railroad company.

"You don't git one cent more'n two dollars for taking us, I can tell you that," announced Henry Smith, firmly but breathlessly, as he climbed clumsily into the cab after his wife. The hotel was in the fifties, and the cabman had intended to charge a dollar for the ride. He promptly protested against Mr. Smith's offer, however, inquiring anxiously if the gentleman wished an honest cabman's family to go supperless to bed. It appeared that the gentleman was indifferent to the fate of the cabman's family.

"You'll do it for two dollars or you'll let us git out," was his final word. As one overcome by superior force, the cabman yielded, climbed sulkily to his perch, and, bestowing a large, comprehensive wink upon the by-standers, started for the hotel his fare had indicated. Mr. Smith's spirits rose. Obviously, in this triumph he had demonstrated his fitness to cope with all the other grinding monopolies of New York. He smiled proudly at his wife as they drove toward Broadway, and his confidence grew as he discovered that he recognized the Times Building at the first glance and could also recognize the Hotel Astor by its resemblance to the picture of it in the Clayton Centre Weekly. At one point in their progress up-town the cab was caught in a crush of vehicles and Mrs. Henry Smith was privileged, for the first time in her life, to listen to the untrammelled conversation of New York cabmen on an occasion when they set their moral shoulders against congested traffic, knowing that it helps THEM, at all events. She shuddered and clung to Henry's arm. It was all too plain that they were in the vortex of godlessness, but even as the realization of this was borne to her on the winged speech of the driver, Mrs. Smith was conscious of an inward thrill. It was awful, but it was life--not life as lived in Clayton Centre, but certainly a life that already gained in excitement and interest from that fact. Unconsciously craning her thin neck farther out of the cab window, she drank in with a fearful joy the roar and excitement of Broadway, the shouts of drivers, the clang of trolley-cars. Her faded eyes gleamed as she saw the brilliant lights of the great thoroughfare whose illuminated signs met her glance at every turn.

Arrived at the hotel, the cabman accepted the two dollars, dumped the bride's trunk on the sidewalk, and drove off with an alacrity designed to prevent any further discussion of rates. Mr. Smith surrendered his hand-bag to the bell-boy who was reaching out impatient hands for it, grasped his wife's arm, and, following his small guide, walked firmly into the presence of the hotel clerk. It was a trying moment for him as he dragged that aloof personality down to his level, but details were arranged with surprising ease, barring so strange a lack of sympathy. As soon as he had expressed his few and simple wishes he found himself and his wife being guided to a lift, and with wonderful simplicity put in possession of a comfortable room on the third floor. Here the shades were drawn down, a pitcher of ice-water was hospitably placed on the stand, and a cheery fire was started on the small hearth. Over this last extravagance the bride faintly demurred, but Henry silenced her with his simple grandeur of insistence. It was a cool November evening, and he had noticed that she shivered in her thin wrap as they drove up-town.

"I jest intend makin' yeh comfortable," he announced, masterfully.