Chapter 2

which no man livin' can either please or rise in the world), which hitherto I fear ye wants,'" quotes he, most glibly, "'an' which only require your care an' attention t' possess.' Volume II., page 24. '_An' perfeckly well dressed, accordin' t' the fashion, be that what it will._' There you haves it," says he, "an' underlined by Sir Harry hisself!" 'Twas a boresome thing, to be sure, as a lad of eleven, to come from boyish occupations to this maidenly concern for appearances: but now, when I am grown older, 'tis a delight to escape the sweat and uniform of the day's work; and I am grateful to the broad hand that scorched my childish parts to teach me the value and pleasures of gentility.

At the same time, as you may believe, I was taught a manner of entering, in the way, by the hints of Sir Harry and the philosophy of the noble Lord Chesterfield, of a gentleman. It had to do with squared shoulders, the lift of the head, a strut, a proud and contemptuous glance. Many a night, as a child, when I fair fainted of vacancy and the steam and smell of salt pork was an agony hardly to be endured, I must prance in and out, to please my fastidious uncle, while he sat critical by the fire--in the unspeakable detachment of critics from the pressing needs (for example) of a man's stomach--and indulged his artistic perceptions to their completest satisfaction. He would watch me from his easy-chair by the fire as though 'twere the most delectable occupation the mind of man might devise: leaning forward in absorption, his ailing timber comfortably bestowed, his great head cocked, like a canary-bird's, his little eyes watchful and sparkling.

"Once again, Dannie," says he. "Head throwed higher, lad. An' ye might use yer chest a bit more."

Into the hall and back again.

"Fair," says he. "I'll not deny that ye're doin' better. But Sir Harry, lad," says he, concerned, with a rub at his weathered nose, "uses more chest. Head high, lad; shoulders back, chest out. Come now! An' a mite more chest."

This time at a large swagger.

"Very good," says he, in a qualified way. "But could ye not scowl t' more purpose?"

'Twas fair heroic to indulge him--with the room full of the smell of browned meat. But, says I, desperately, "I'll try, sir."

"Jus' you think, Dannie," says he, "that that there ol' rockin'-chair with the tidy is a belted knight o' the realm. Come now! Leave me see how ye'd deal with _he_. An' a mite more chest, Dannie, if ye're able."

A withering stare for the rocking-chair--superior to the point of impudence--and a blank look for the unfortunate assemblage of furniture.

"Good!" cries my uncle. "Ecod! but I never knowed Sir Harry t' do it better. That there belted rockin'-chair o' the realm, Dannie, would swear you was a lord! An' now, lad," says he, fondly smiling, "ye may feed."[5]

This watchful cultivation, continuing through years, had flowered in a pretty swagger, as you may well believe. In all my progress to this day I have not observed a more genteelly insolent carriage than that which memory gives to the lad that was I. I have now no regret: for when I am abroad, at times, for the health and pleasure of us all, 'tis a not ungrateful thing, not unamusing, to be reminded, by the deferential service and regard this ill-suited manner wins for the outport man that I am, of those days when my fond uncle taught me to scowl and strut and cry, "What the devil d'ye mean, sir!" to impress my quality upon the saucy world. But when Judith came into our care--when first she sat with us at table, crushed, as a blossom, by the Hand that seems unkind: shy, tender-spirited, alien to our ways--'twas with a tragical shock I realized the appearance of high station my uncle's misguided effort and affection had stamped me with.

She sat with my uncle in the steerage; and she was lovely, very gentle and lovely, I recall, sitting there, with exquisitely dropping grace, under the lamp--in the shower of soft, yellow light: by which her tawny hair was set aglow, and the shadows, lying below her great, blue eyes, were deepened, in sympathy with her appealing grief. Came, then, this Dannie Callaway, in his London clothes, arrived direct per S.S. _Cathian_: came this enamoured young fellow, with his educated stare, his legs (good and bad) long-trousered for the first time in his life, his fingers sparkling, his neck collared and his wrists unimpeachably cuffed, his chest "used" in such a way as never, God knows! had it swelled before. 'Twas with no desire to indulge his uncle that he had managed these adornments. Indeed not! 'Twas a wish, growing within his heart, to compass a winning and distinguished appearance in the presence of the maid he loved.

By this magnificence the maid was abashed.

"Hello!" says I, as I swaggered past the steerage.

There was no response.

"Is you happy, child," says I, catching the trick of the thing from my uncle, "along o' ol' Nick Top an' me an' John Cather?"

My tutor laughed.

"Eh, Judy?" says I.

The maid's glance was fallen in embarrassment upon her plate.

"Dannie," says my uncle, severely, "ye better get under way with your feedin'."

The which, being at once hungry and obedient, I did: but presently, looking up, caught the poor maid unself-conscious. She no longer grieved--no longer sat sad and listless in her place. She was peering greedily into the cabin, as my uncle was wont to do, her slim, white neck something stretched and twisted (it seemed) to round a spreading cluster of buttercups. 'Twas a moving thing to observe. 'Twas not a shocking thing; 'twas a thing melting to the heart--'twas a thing, befalling with a maid, at once to provide a lad with chivalrous opportunity. The eyes were the great, blue eyes of Judith--grave, wide eyes, which, beneficently touching a lad, won reverent devotion, flushed the heart with zeal for righteousness. They were Judith's eyes, the same, as ever, in infinite depth of shadow, like the round sky at night, the same in light, like the stars that shine therein, the same in black-lashed mystery, like the firmament God made with His own hand. But still 'twas with a most marvellously gluttonous glance that she eyed the roast of fresh meat on the table before me. 'Twas no matter to _me_, to be sure! for a lad's love is not so easily alienated: 'tis an actual thing--not depending upon a neurotic idealization: therefore not to be disillusioned by these natural appearances.

"Judy," says I, most genially, "is you ever tasted roast veal?"

She was much abashed.

"Is you never," I repeated, "tasted roast veal?"

"No, sir," she whispered.

"'_Sir_!'" cries I, astounded. "'Sir!'" I gasped. "Maid," says I, now in wrathful amazement forgetting her afflicted state, "is you lost your senses?"

"N-n-no, sir," she stammered.

"For shame!" I scolded. "T' call me so!"

"Daniel," my uncle interjected, "volume II., page 24. '_A distinguished politeness o' manners._'"

By this my tutor was vastly amused, and delightedly watched us, his twinkling glance leaping from face to face.

"I'll not have it, Judy!" I warned her. "You'll vex me sore an you does it again."

The maid would not look up.

"Volume II., page 25," my uncle chided. "Underlined by Sir Harry. '_An' this address an' manner should be exceedin'ly respeckful._'"

"Judy!" I implored.

She ignored me.

"An you calls me that again, maid," I threatened, in a rage, "you'll be sorry for it. I'll--"

"Holy Scripture!" roared my uncle, reaching for his staff. "'_Spare the rod and spoil the child._'"

I was not to be stopped by this. 'Twas an occasion too promising in disaster. She had sirred me like a house-maid. Sir? 'Twas past believing. That Judith should be so overcome by fine feathers and a roosterly strut! 'Twas shocking to discover the effect of my uncle's teaching. It seemed to me that the maid must at once be dissuaded from this attitude of inferiority or my solid hope would change into a dream. Inferiority? She must have no such fancy! Fixed within her mind 'twould inevitably involve us in some catastrophe of feeling. The torrent of my wrath and supplication went tumbling on: there was no staying it. My uncle's hand fell short of his staff; he sat stiff and agape with astonished admiration: perceiving which, my tutor laughed until my hot words were fair extinguished in the noise he made. By this my uncle was set laughing: whence the infection spread to me. And then Judith peeped at me through the cluster of buttercups with the ghost of a roguish twinkle.

"I'll call you Dannie," says she, slyly--"t' save you the lickin'!"

"Daniel," cries my uncle, delighted, "one slug-shot. Box with the star t' the box with the cross. Judy," says he, "move aft alongside o' that there roast veal!"

'Twas the beginning and end of this seeming difference of station....

* * * * *

John Cather took us in hand to profit us. 'Twas in the learning he had--'twas in every genteel accomplishment he had himself mastered in the wise world he came from--that we were instructed. I would have Judy for school-fellow: nor would I be denied--not I! 'Twas the plan I made when first I knew John Cather's business in our house: else, thinks I, 'twould be a mean, poor match we should make of it in the end. I would have her: and there, says I, with a toss and a stamp, to my uncle's delight, was an end of it! It came about in this way that we three spent the days together in agreeable employment: three young, unknowing souls--two lads and a maid. In civil weather, 'twas in the sunlight and breeze of the hills, 'twas in shady hollows, 'twas on the warm, dry rocks, which the breakers could not reach, 'twas on the brink of the cliff, that Cather taught us, leaving off to play, by my uncle's command, when we were tired of study; and when the wind blew with rain, or fog got the world all a-drip, or the task was incongruous with sunshine and fresh air (like multiplication), 'twas within doors that the lesson proceeded--in my library, which my uncle had luxuriously outfitted for me, when still I was an infant, against this very time.

"John Cather," says I, one day, "you've a wonderful tongue in your head."

'Twas on the cliff of Tom Tulk's Head. We had climbed the last slope hand in hand, with Judith between, and were now stretched out on the brink, resting in the cool blue wind from the sea.

"A nimble tongue, Dannie," he replied, "I'll admit."

"A wonderful tongue!" I repeated. "John Cather," I exclaimed, in envious admiration, "you've managed t' tell Judy in ten thousand ways that she's pretty."

Judith blushed.

"I wisht," says I, "that _I_ was so clever as that."

"I know still another way," said he.

"Ay; an' a hundred more!"

"Another," said he, softly, turning to Judith, who would not look at him. "Shall I tell you, Judith?"

She shook her head.

"No?" said he. "Why not?"

The answer was in a whisper--given while the maid's hot face was still turned away. "I'm not wantin' you to," she said.

"Do, maid!" I besought her.

"I'm not wantin' him to."

"'Tis your eyes, I'll be bound!" said I. "'Twill be so clever that you'll be glad to hear."

"But I'm not _wantin'_ him to," she persisted.

My tutor smiled indulgently--but with a pitiful little trace of hurt remaining. 'Twas as though he must suffer the rebuff with no offended question. In the maid 'twas surely a wilful and bewildering thing to deny him. I could not make it out: but wished, in the breeze and sunlight of that day, that the wound had not been dealt. 'Twas an unkind thing in Judith, thinks I; 'twas a thing most cruel--thus to coquette with the friendship of John Cather.

"Ah, Judy," I pleaded, "leave un have his way!"

She picked at the moss.

"Will ye not, maid?"

"I'm afraid!" she whispered in my ear.

"An' you'd stop for that!" I chided, not knowing what she meant: as how should a lad?

It seemed she would.

"'Tis an unkind thing," says I, "t' treat John Cather so. He've been good," says I, "t' _you_, Judy."

"Dannie!" she wailed.

"Don't, Dannie!" Cather entreated.

"I'd have ye listen, Judy," said I, in earnest, kind reproach, "t' what John Cather says. I'd have ye heed his words. I'd have ye care for him." Being then a lad, unsophisticated in the wayward, mercilessly selfish passion of love, ignorant of the unmitigated savagery of the thing, I said more than that, in my folly. "I'd have ye love John Cather," says I, "as ye love me." 'Tis a curious thing to look back upon. That I should snarl the threads of our destinies! 'Tis an innocency hard to credit. But yet John Cather and I had no sensitive intuition to warn us. How should we--being men? 'Twas for Judith to perceive the inevitable catastrophe; 'twas for the maid, not misled by reason, schooled by feeling into the very perfection of wisdom, to control and direct the smouldering passion of John Cather and me in the way she would, according to the power God gives, in infinite understanding of the hearts of men, to a maid to wield. "I'd have ye love John Cather," says I, "as ye love me." It may be that a lad loves his friend more than any other. "I'd have ye t' know, Judy," says I, gently, "that John Cather's my friend. I'd have ye t' know--"

"Dannie," Cather interrupted, putting an affectionate hand on my shoulder, "you don't know what you're saying."

Judith turned.

"I do, John Cather," says I. "I knows full well."

Judith's eyes, grown all at once wide and grave, looked with wonder into mine. I was made uneasy--and cocked my head, in bewilderment and alarm. 'Twas a glance that searched me deep. What was this? And why the warning? There was more than warning. 'Twas pain I found in Judith's great, blue eyes. What had grieved her? 'Twas reproach, too--and a flash of doubt. I could not read the riddle of it. Indeed, my heart began to beat in sheer fright, for the reproach and doubt vanished, even as I stared, and I confronted a sparkling anger. But presently, as often happened with that maid, tears flushed her eyes, and the long-lashed lids fell, like a curtain, upon her grief: whereupon she turned away, troubled, to peer at the sea, breaking far below, and would not look at me again. We watched her, John Cather and I, for an anxious space, while she sat brooding disconsolate at the edge of the cliff, a sweep of cloudless sky beyond. The slender, sweetly childish figure--with the tawny hair, I recall, all aglow with sunlight--filled the little world of our thought and vision. There was a patch of moss and rock, the green and gray of our land--there was Judith--there was an infinitude of blue space. John Cather's glance was frankly warm; 'twas a glance proceeding from clear, brave, guileless eyes--springing from a limpid soul within. It caressed the maid, in a fashion, thinks I, most brotherly. My heart warmed to the man; and I wondered that Judith should be unkind to him who was our friend.

'Twas a mystery.

"You will not listen, Judith?" he asked. "'Tis a very pretty thing I want to say."

Judith shook her head.

A flash of amusement crossed his face. "Please do!" he coaxed.

"No!"

"I'm quite proud of it," says he, with a laugh in his fine eyes. He leaned forward a little, and made as if to touch her, but withdrew his hand. "I did not know," says he, "that I was so clever. I have it all ready. I have every word in place. I'd like to say it--for my own pleasure, if not for yours. I think it would be a pity to let the pretty words waste themselves unsaid. I--I--hope you'll listen. I--I--really hope you will. And you will not?"

"No!" she cried, sharply. "No, no!"

"Why not?"

"No!" she repeated; and she slipped her hand into mine, and hid them both snugly in the folds of her gown, where John Cather could not see. "God wouldn't like it, John Cather," says she, her little teeth all bare, her eyes aflash with indignation, her long fingers so closely entwined with mine that I wondered. "He wouldn't _'low_ it," says she, "an He knowed."

I looked at John Cather in vague alarm.

[5] This Sir Harry Airworthy, K.C.M.G., I must forthwith explain, was that distinguished colonial statesman whose retirement to the quiet and bizarre enjoyments of life was so sincerely deplored at the time. His taste for the picturesque characters of our coast was discriminating and insatiable. 'Twas no wonder, then, that he delighted in my uncle, whose familiar companion he was in St. John's. I never knew him, never clapped eyes on him, that I recall; he died abroad before I was grown presentable. 'Twas kind in him, I have always thought, to help my uncle in his task of transforming me, for 'twas done with no personal responsibility whatsoever in the matter, but solely of good feeling. I owed him but one grudge, and that a short-lived one, going back to the year when I was seven: 'twas by advice o' Sir Harry that I was made to tub myself, every morning, in the water of the season, be it crusted with ice or not, with my uncle listening at the door to hear the splash and gasp.

XVII

RUM AND RUIN

In these days at Twist Tickle, his perturbation passed, my uncle was most blithe: for the _Shining Light_ was made all ready for sea, with but an anchor to slip, sails to raise, for flight from an army of St. John's constables; and we were a pleasant company, well fallen in together, in a world of fall weather. And, says he, if the conduct of a damned little Chesterfieldian young gentleman was a labor t' manage, actin' accordin' t' that there fashionable ol' lord of the realm, by advice o' Sir Harry, whatever the lad in the case, whether good or bad, why, then, a maid o' the place, ecod! was but a pastime t' rear, an' there, says he, you had it! 'Twas at night, when he was come in from the sea, and the catch was split, and we sat with him over his rum, that he beamed most widely. He would come cheerily stumping from his mean quarters above, clad in the best of his water-side slops, all ironed and brushed, his great face glossy from soap and water, his hair dripping; and he would fall into the arms of his great-chair by the fire with a genial grunt of satisfaction, turning presently to regard us, John Cather and Judy and me, with a grin so wide and sparkling and benevolently indulgent and affectionate--with an aspect so patriarchal--that our hearts would glow and our faces responsively shine.

"Up with un, Dannie!" says he.

I would lift the ailing bit of timber to the stool with gingerly caution.

"Easy, lad!" groans he. "Ouch! All ship-shape," says he. "Is you got the little brown jug o' water?"

'Twould surely be there.

"Green pastures!" says he, so radiantly red, from his bristling gray stubble of hair to the folds of his chin, that I was reminded of a glowing coal. "There you haves it, Dannie!" cries he. "I knowed they was some truth in that there psa'm. Green pastures! '_He maketh me t' lie down in green pastures._' Them ol' bullies was wise as owls.... Pass the bottle, Judy. Thank 'e, maid. Ye're a wonderful maid t' blush, thank God! for they's nothin' so pretty as that. I'm a old, old man, Judy; but t' this day, maid, 'tis fair painful t' keep from kissin' red cheeks, whenever I sees un. Judy," says he, with a wag, his hand on the bottle, "I'd rather be tempted by mermaids or angels--I cares not which--than by a mortal maid's red cheeks! 'Twould be wonderful easy," says he, "t' resist a angel.... Green pastures! Eh, Dannie, b'y? Times is changed, isn't they? Not like it used t' be, when you an' me sot here alone t' drink, an' you was on'y a wee little lad. I wisht ye was a wee little lad again, Dannie; but Lord love us!" cries he, indignant with the paradox, "when ye _was_ a wee little lad I wisht ye was growed. An' there you haves it!" says he, dolefully. "There you haves it!... I 'low, Dannie," says he, anxiously, his bottle halted in mid-air, "that _you'd_ best pour it out. I'm a sight too happy, the night," says he, "t' be trusted with a bottle."

'Tis like he would have gone sober to bed had I not been there to measure his allowance.

"Ye're not so wonderful free with the liquor," he pouted, "as ye used t' be."

'Twas Judy who had put me up to it.

"Ye might be a _drop_ more free!" my uncle accused.

'Twas reproachful--and hurt me sore. That I should deny my uncle who had never denied me! I blamed the woman. 'Tis marvellous how this frailty persists. That Judith, Twist Tickle born, should deliberately introduce the antagonism--should cause my uncle to suffer, me to regret! 'Twas hard to forgive the maid her indiscretion. I was hurt: for, being a lad, not a maid of subtle perceptions, I would not have my uncle go lacking that which comforted his distress and melancholy. Faith! but I had myself been looking forward with a thirsty gullet to the day--drawn near, as I thought--when I should like a man drink hard liquor with him in the glow of our fire: as, indeed, had he, by frank confession, indiscreetly made when he was grown horrified or wroth with my intemperance with ginger-ale.

"God save ye, Dannie!" he would expostulate, most heartily, most piously; "but I _wisht_ ye'd overcome the bilge-water habit."

I would ignore him.

"'Tis on'y a matter o' _will_," says he. "'Tis nothin' more than that. An' I'm fair ashamed," he groaned, in sincere emotion, "to think ye're shackled, hand an' foot, to a bottle o' ginger-ale. For shame, lad--t' come t' such a pass." He was honest in his expostulation; 'twas no laughing matter--'twas an anxiously grave concern for my welfare. He disapproved of the beverage--having never tasted it. "_You_," cries he, with a pout and puff of scorn, "an' your bilge-water! In irons with a bottle o' ginger-ale! Could ye but see yourself, Dannie, ye'd quit quick enough. 'Tis a ridiculous picture ye make--you an' your bottle. 'Twould not be hard t' give it up, lad," he would plead. "Ye'll manage it, Dannie, an ye'd but put your mind to it. Ye'd be nervous, I've no doubt, for a spell. But what's that? Eh, what's that--ag'in your health?"

I would sip my ginger-ale unheeding.

"An' what about Chesterfield?" says he.

"I'll have another bottle, sir," says I.

"Lord love us!" he would complain, in such distress that I wish I had not troubled him with this passion. "Ye're fair bound t' ruin your constitution with drink."

Pop went the cork.

"An' here's _me_" says he, in disgusted chagrin, "tryin' t' make a gentleman out o' ye!"

Ah, well! 'twas now a mean, poor lookout for the cosey conviviality I had all my life promised myself with my uncle. Since the years when late o' nights I occupied the arms and broad knee of Cap'n Jack Large at the Anchor and Chain--with a steaming comfort within and a rainy wind blowing outside--my uncle and I had dwelt upon the time when I might drink hard liquor with him like a man. 'Twould be grand, says my uncle, to sit o' cold nights, when I was got big, with a bottle o' Long Tom between. A man grown--a man grown able for his bottle! For him, I fancy, 'twas a vision of successful achievement and the reward of it. Lord love us! says he, but the talk o' them times would be lovely. The very thought of it, says he--the thought o' Dannie Callaway grown big and manly and helpfully companionable--fair warmed him with delight. But now, at Twist Tickle, with the strong, sly hands of Judith upon our ways, with her grave eyes watching, now commending, now reproaching, 'twas a new future that confronted us. Ay, but that maid, dwelling responsibly with us men, touched us closely with control! 'Twas a sharp eye here, a sly eye there, a word, a twitch of her red lips, a lift of the brow and dark lashes--and a new ordering of our lives. 'Tis marvellous how she did it: but that she managed us into better habits, by the magic mysteriously natural to a maid, I have neither the wish nor the will to gainsay. I grieved that she should deprive my uncle of his comfort; but being a lad, devoted, I would not add one drop to my uncle's glass, while Judith sat under the lamp, red-cheeked in the heat of the fire, her great eyes wishful to approve, her mind most captivatingly engaged, as I knew, with the will of God, which was her own, dear heart! though she did not know it.

"Dannie," says she, in private, "God wouldn't 'low un more'n a quarter of a inch at a time."

"'Twas in the pantry while I got the bottle."

"An' how," quoth I, "is you knowin' that?"

"Why, child," she answered, "God tol' me so."

I writhed. 'Twas a fancy so strange the maid had: but was yet so true and reverent and usefully efficient--so high in leading to her who led us with her into pure paths--that I must smile and adore her for it. 'Twas to no purpose, as I knew, to thresh over the improbability of the communication: Judith's eyes were round and clear and unwavering--full of most exalted truth, concern, and confidence. There was no pretence anywhere to be descried in their depths: nor evil nor subterfuge of any sort. And it seems to me, now, grown as I am to sager years, that had the Guide whose hand she held upon the rough road of her life communed with His sweet companion, 'twould have been no word of reproach or direction he would whisper for her, who needed none, possessing all the wisdom of virtue, dear heart! but a warning in my uncle's behalf, as she would have it, against the bottle he served. The maid's whimsical fancy is not incomprehensible to me, neither tainted with irreverence nor untruth: 'twas a thing flowering in the eyrie garden of her days at Whisper Cove--a thing, as I cannot doubt, of highest inspiration.

"But," I protested, glibly, looking away, most wishful, indeed, to save my uncle pain, "I isn't able t' measure a quarter of a inch."

"_I_ could," says she.

"Not with the naked eye, maid!"

"Well," says she, "you might try, jus' t' please God."

To be sure I might: I might pour at a guess. But, unhappily (and it may be that there is some philosophy in this for a self-indulgent world), I was not in awe of Judith's fantastic conception of divinity, whatever I thought of my own, by whom, however, I was not conjured. Moreover, I loved my uncle, who had continued to make me happy all my life, and would venture far in the service of his comfort. The twinkling, benevolent aspect of the maid's Deity could not compel a lad to righteousness: I could with perfect complacency conduct myself perversely before it. And must we then, lads and men, worship a God of wrath, quick to punish, niggardly in fatherly forgiveness, lest we stray into evil ways? I do not know. 'Tis beyond me to guess the change to be worked in the world by a new conception of the eternal attributes.

"An' will you not?" says she.

It chanced, now, that she held the lamp near her face, so that her beauty was illumined and transfigured. 'Twas a beauty most tender--most pure and elfin and religious. 'Tis a mean, poor justification, I know, to say that I was in some mysterious way--by the magic resident in the beauty of a maid, and virulently, wickedly active within its sphere, which is the space the vision of a lad may carry--that I was by this magic incapacitated and overcome. 'Tis an excuse made by fallen lads since treason was writ of; 'tis a mere excuse, ennobling no traitorious act: since love, to be sure, has no precedence of loyalty in hearts of truth and manful aspiration. Love? surely it walks with glorious modesty in the train of honor--or is a brazen baggage. But, as it unhappily chanced, whatever the academic conception, the maid held the lamp too close for my salvation: so close that her blue, shadowy eyes bewildered me, and her lips, red and moist, with a gleam of white teeth between, I recall, tempted me quite beyond the endurance of self-respect. I slipped, indeed, most sadly in the path, and came a shamefaced, ridiculous cropper.

"An' will you not," says she, "pour but a quarter of a inch t' the glass?"

"I will," I swore, "for a kiss!"

'Twas an outrageous betrayal of my uncle.

"For shame!" cries she.

"I will for a kiss," I repeated, my soul offered on a platter to the devil, "regardless o' the consequences."

She matched my long words with a great one caught from my tutor. "God isn't inclined," says she, with a toss, "in favor o' kisses."

And there you had it!

* * * * *

When we sat late, our maid-servant would indignantly whisk Judith off to bed--crying out upon us for our wickedness.

"Cather," my uncle would drawl, Judith being gone, "ye're all wore out along o' too much study."

"Not at all, Skipper Nicholas!" cries my tutor.

"Study," says my uncle, in solemn commiseration, "is a bitter thing t' be cotched by. Ye're all wore out, parson, along o' the day's work."

My tutor laughed.

"Too much study for the brain," says my uncle, sympathetically, his eye on the bottle. "I 'low, parson, if I was you I'd turn in."

Cather was unfailingly obedient.

"Dannie," says my uncle, with reviving interest, "have he gone above?"

"He have," says I.

"Take a look," he whispered, "t' see that Judy's stowed away beyond hearin'."

I would step into the hall--where was no nightgowned figure listening on the stair--to reassure him.

"Dannie," says he, wickedly gleeful, "how's the bottle?"

I would hold it up to the lamp and rattle its contents. "'Tis still stout, sir," says I. "'Tis a wonderful bottle."

"Stout!" cries he, delighted. "Very good."

"Still stout," says I; "an' the third night!"

"Then," says he, pushing his glass towards me, "I 'low they's no real need o' puttin' me on short allowance. Be liberal, Dannie, b'y--be liberal when ye pours."

I would be liberal.

"'Tis somehow sort o' comfortable, lad," says he, eying me with honest feeling, "t' be sittin' down here with a ol' chum like you. 'Tis very good, indeed."

I was glad that he thought so.

And now I must tell that I loved Judith. 'Tis enough to say so--to write the bare words down. I'm not wanting to, to be sure: for it shames a man to speak boldly of sacred things like this. It shames a lad, it shames a maid, to expose the heart of either, save sacredly to each other. 'Tis all well enough, and most delightful, when the path is moonlit and secluded, when the warmth and thrill of a slender hand may be felt, when the stars wink tender encouragement from the depths of God's own firmament, when all the world is hushed to make the opportunity: 'tis then all well enough to speak of love. There is nothing, I know, to compare in ecstasy with the whisper and sigh and clinging touch of that time--to compare with the awe and mystery and solemnity of it. But 'tis sacrilegious and most desperately difficult and embarrassing, I find, at this distant day, to write of it. I had thought much upon love, at that wise age--fifteen, it was, I fancy--and it seemed to me, I recall, a thing to cherish within the heart of a man, to hide as a treasure, to dwell upon, alone, in moments of purest exaltation. 'Twas not a thing to bandy about where punts lay tossing in the lap of the sea; 'twas not a thing to tell the green, secretive old hills of Twin Islands; 'twas not a thing to which the doors of the workaday world might be opened, lest the ribaldry to which it come offend and wound it: 'twas a thing to conceal, far and deep, from the common gaze and comment, from the vulgar chances, the laugh and cynical exhaustion and bleared wit of the life we live. I loved Judith--her eyes and tawny hair and slender finger-tips, her whimsical way, her religious, loving soul. I loved her; and I would not have you think 'twas any failure of adoration to pour my uncle an honest dram of rum when she was stowed away in innocency of all the evil under the moon. 'Tis a thing that maids have nothing to do with, thinks I; 'tis a knowledge, indeed, that would defile them....

* * * * *

"Dannie," says my uncle, once, when we were left alone, "he've begun t' fall."

I was mystified.

"The parson," he explained, in a radiant whisper; "he've begun t' yield."

"T' what?" I demanded.

"Temptation. He've a dark eye, lad, as I 'lowed long ago, an' he've begun t' give way t' argument."

"God's sake, Uncle Nick!" I cried, "leave the poor man be. He've done no harm."

He scratched his stubble of hair, and contemplatively traced a crimson scar with his forefinger. "No," he mused, his puckered, weathered brow in a doubtful frown; "not so far. But," he added, looking cheerily up, "I've hopes that I'll manage un yet."

"Leave un alone," I pleaded.

"Ay," says he, with a hitch of his wooden leg; "but I _needs_ un."

I protested.

"Ye don't s'pose, Dannie," he complained, in a righteous flash, "that I'm able t' live forever, does ye?"

I did not, but heartily wished he might; and by this sincere expression he was immediately mollified.

"Well," says he, his left eyelid drooping in a knowing way, his whole round person, from his topmost bristle to his gouty wooden toe, braced to receive the shock of my congratulation, "I've gone an' worked that there black-an'-white young parson along! Sir Harry hisself," he declared, "couldn't have done it no better. Nor ol' Skipper Chesterfield, neither," says he.

'Twas a pity.

"No," he boasted, defiantly; "nor none o' them wise ol' bullies of old!"

I sighed.

"Dannie," says he, with the air of imparting a grateful secret, "I got that there black-an'-white young parson corrupted. I got un," he repeated, leaning forward, his fantastic countenance alight with pride and satisfaction--"I got un corrupted! I've got un t' say," says he, "that 'tis sometimes wise t' do evil that good may come. An' when a young feller says that," says he, with a grave, grave nodding, so that his disfigurements were all most curiously elongated, "he've sold his poor, mean soul t' the devil."

"I wisht," I complained, "that you'd leave the poor man alone."

"Why, Dannie," says my uncle, simply, "he's paid for!"

"Paid for!" cries I.

"Ay, lad," he chided; "t' be sure, that there young black-an'-white parson is paid for."

I wondered how that might be.

"Paid for!" my uncle repeated, in a quivering, indrawn breath, the man having fallen, all at once, into gloom and terror. "'Tis all paid for!"

Here again was the disquieting puzzle of my childish years: my uncle, having now leaned forward to come close to me, was in a spasmodic way indicating the bowels of the earth with a turned thumb. Down, down: it seemed he pointed to infinite depths of space and woe. Down, down--continuing thus, with a slow, grevious wagging of the great, gray head the sea had in the brutal passion of some wild night maltreated. The familiar things of the room, the simple, companionable furniture of that known place, with the geometrically tempestuous ocean framed beyond, were resolved into a background of mysterious shadows as I stared; there was nothing left within the circle of my vision but a scared gargoyle, leaning into the red glow of the fire. My uncle's round little eyes protruded--started from the bristles and purpling scars and brown flesh of his broad face--as many a time before I had in sad bewilderment watched them do. Paid for--all the pride and comfort and strange advantages of my life! All paid for in the black heart of this mystery! And John Cather, too! I wondered again, with an eye upon my uncle's significantly active thumb, having no courage to meet his poignant glance, how that might be. According to my catechism, severely taught in other years, I must ask no questions, but must courteously await enlightenment at my uncle's pleasure; and 'twas most marvellously hard--this night of all the nights--to keep my soul unspotted from the sin of inquisitiveness.

"Paid for," my uncle repeated, hoarse with awe, "by poor Tom Callaway!"

'Twas kind in my father, thinks I, to provide thus bounteously for my welfare.

"Poor Tom!" my uncle sighed, now recovering his composure. "Poor, poor ol' Tom--in the place he's to!"

"Still an' all, Uncle Nick," I blundered, "I wisht you'd leave my tutor be."

"Ye're but a child!" he snapped. "Put the stopper in the bottle. 'Tis time you was in bed."

'Twas an unexpected rebuke. I was made angry with him, for the only time in all my life; and to revenge myself I held the bottle to the lamp, and deliberately measured its contents, before his astonished eyes, so that, though I left it with him, he could not drink another drop without my knowing it; and I stoppered the bottle, as tight as I was able, and left him to get his wooden toe from the stool with the least agony he could manage, and would not bank the fire or light his night-lamp. I loved my tutor, and would not have him corrupted; 'twas a hateful thought to conceive that he might come unwittingly to ruin at our hands. 'Twas a shame in my old uncle, thinks I, to fetch him to despair. John Cather's soul bargained for and bought! 'Twas indeed a shame to say it. There was no evil in him when he came clear-eyed from the great world beyond us; there should be no evil in him when he left us, whenever that might be, to renew the life he would not tell us of. I looked my uncle in the eye in a way that hurt and puzzled him. I wish I had not; but I did, as I pounded the cork home, and boldly slipped the screw into my pocket. He would go on short allowance, that night, thinks I: for his nails, broken by toil, would never pick the stopper out. And I prepared, in a rage, to fling out of the room, when--

"Dannie!" he called.

I halted.

"What's this?" says he, gently. "It never happened afore, little shipmate, betwixt you an' me. What's this?" he begged. "I'm troubled."

I pulled the cork of his bottle, and poured a dram, most liberally, to delight his heart; and I must turn my face away, somehow, to hide it from him, because of shame for this mean doubt of him, ungenerous and ill-begotten.

"I'm troubled," he repeated. "What's this, lad?"

I could not answer him.

"Is I been unkind, Dannie?"

"No," I sobbed. "'Tis that I've been wicked t' _you_!"

He looked at me with eyes grown very grave. "Ah!" says he, presently, comprehending. "That's good," says he, in his slow, gentle way. "That's very good. But ye'll fret no more, will ye, Dannie? An' ye've growed too old t' cry. Go t' bed, lad. Ye're all wore out. I'll manage the lamp alone. God bless ye. Go t' bed."

I waited.

"That's good," he repeated, in a muse, staring deep into the red coals in the grate. "That's very good."

I ran away--closed my door upon this wretched behavior, but could not shut its ghastly sauciness and treachery from the chambers of my memory. The habit of faith and affection was strong: I was no longer concerned for my friend John Cather, but was mightily ashamed of this failure in duty to the grotesque old hook-and-line man who had without reserve of sacrifice or strength nourished me to the lusty years of that night. As I lay in bed, I recall, downcast, self-accusing, flushed with shame, I watched the low clouds scud across the starlit sky, and I perceived, while the torn, wind-harried masses rushed restlessly on below the high, quiet firmament, that I had fallen far away from the serenity my uncle would teach me to preserve in every fortune.

"I'll not fail again!" thinks I. "Not I!"

'Twas an experience profitable or unprofitable, as you shall presently judge.

XVIII

A LEGACY OF LOVE

Moses Shoos, I recall, carried the mail that winter. 'Twas a thankless task: a matter of thirty miles to Jimmie Tick's Cove and thirty back again. Miles hard with peril and brutal effort--a way of sleet and slush, of toilsome paths, of a swirling mist of snow, of stinging, perverse winds or frosty calm, of lowering days and the haunted dark o' night--to be accomplished, once a week, afoot and alone, by way of barren and wilderness and treacherous ice. 'Twas a thankless task, indeed; but 'twas a task to which the fool of Twist Tickle addressed himself with peculiar reverence.

"Mother," says he, "always 'lowed that a man ought t' serve his Queen: an' mother knowed. 'Moses,' says she, afore she died, 'a good man haves just _got_ t' serve the Queen: for an good men don't,' says she, 'the poor Lady is bound t' come t' grief along o' rascals. Poor, _poor_ Lady!' says she. 'She've a wonderful lot t' put up with along o' stupid folk an' rascals. I'm not knowin' how she bears it an' lives. 'Tis a mean, poor dunderhead, with heart an' brains in his gullet,' says she, 'that wouldn't serve the Queen. God save the Queen!' says mother. 'What's a man worth,' says she, 'that on'y serves hisself?'"

Not much, thinks I!

"An' mother knowed," says Moses, softly. "Ay, Dannie," he declared, with a proud little grin, "I bet you _mother_ knowed!"

'Twas this exalted ideal of public service, fashioned in the wisdom of the simple by the amazing mother who bore him, that led the fool, as by the hand, from a wilderness of snow and night and bewildered visions, wherein no aspiration of his own shaped itself, to the warm hearth of Twist Tickle and the sleep of a child by night.

* * * * *

Once I watched him stagger, white and bent with weather and labor, from the ice of Ship's Run, his bag on his back, to the smoking roofs of Twist Tickle, which winter had spread with a snowy blanket and tucked in with anxious hands. 'Twas a bitter day, cold, windy, aswirl with the dust of snow, blinding as a mist. I sat with Judith in the wide, deeply cushioned window-seat of my lib'ry, as my uncle called the comfortable, book-shelved room he had, by advice o' Sir Harry, provided for my youth. John Cather was not about; and I caressed, I recall, the long, slender fingers of her hand, which unfailingly and without hesitation gave themselves to my touch. She would never deny me that, this maid; 'twas only kisses she would hold me from. She would snuggle close and warmly, when John Cather was not about, but would call her God to witness that kisses were prohibited where happiness would continue.

"'Tis not _'lowed_, child," says she.

Her cheek was so close, so round and soft and delicately tinted, that I touched my lips to it, quite unable to resist.

"I don't mind _that_," says she.

'Twas vastly encouraging.

"'Twas so brotherly," she added.

"Judy," I implored, "I'm in need of another o' that same kind."

"No, no!" she cried. "You'd never find the spot!"

'Twas with the maid, then, I sat in the window-seat of my warm room, content with the finger-tips I might touch and kiss as I would, lifted into a mood most holy and aspiring by the weight of her small head upon my shoulder, the bewildering light and mystery of her great, blue eyes, the touch and sweet excitement of her tawny hair, which brushed my cheek, as she well knew, this perverse maid! John Cather was not about, and the maid was yielding, as always in his absence; and I was very happy. 'Twas Moses we observed, all this time, doggedly staggering, upon patriotic duty, from the white, swirling weather of that unkind day, in the Queen's service, his bag on his back.

"He've his mother t' guide un," says she.

"An' his father?"

"'Tis said that he was lost," she answered, "in the Year o' the Big Shore Catch; but I'm knowin' nothin' about that."

I remembered the secret Elizabeth would impart to my uncle Nicholas.

"_My_ father," says Judith, in challenge, "was a very good man."

I was not disposed to deny it.

"A very good man," she repeated, eying me sharply for any sign of incredulity.

'Twas her fancy: I might indulge it.

"I 'low, Dannie," says she, "that he was a wonderful handsome man, though I never seed un. God's sake!" cries she, defiantly, "he'd be hard t' beat for looks in this here harbor." She was positive; there was no uncertainty--'twas as though she had known him as fathers are known. And 'twas by no wish of mine, now, that our hands came close together, that her eyes were bent without reserve upon my own, that she snuggled up to my great, boyish body: 'twas wholly a wish of the maid. "'Twas blue eyes he had," says she, "an' yellow hair an' big shoulders. He was a parson, Dannie," she proceeded. "I 'low he must have been. He--he--_was_!" she declared; "he was a great, big parson with blue eyes." I would not be a parson, thinks I, whatever the maid might wish. "An' he 'lowed," she continued, pursuing her wilful fancy, "that he'd come back, some day, an' love my mother as she knowed he could." We watched Moses Shoos come across the harbor ice and break open the door of the postmaster's cottage. "But he was wrecked an' drowned," says Judith, "an' 'twas an end of my mother's hope. 'Twas on'y that," says she, "that she would tell Skipper Nicholas on the night she died. 'Twas just the wish that he would bring me up, as he've fetched up you, Dannie," she added: "jus' that--an' the name o' my father. I'm not sorry," says she, with her head on my shoulder, "that she never told the name."

Elizabeth carried her secret into the greater mystery to which she passed; 'twas never known to us, nor to any one....

* * * * *

"Moses," says I, in delight, when the news got abroad, "I hears you got the contract for the mail?"

"I is," says he.

"An' how in the name o' Heaven," I demanded, "did you manage so great a thing?"

There had been competition, I knew: there had been consideration and consultation--there had been the philosophy of the aged concerning the carrying of mail in past years, the saucy anarchy of the young with regard to the gruelling service, the chatter of wishful women upon the spending value of the return, the speculatively saccharine brooding of children--there had been much sage prophecy and infinitely knowing advice--there had been misleading and secrecy and sly devising--there had been envy, bickering, disruption of friendship--there had been a lavish waste and disregard of character--there had been all this, as I knew, and more pitiable still, in competition for the weekly four dollars of government money. 'Twas a most marvellous achievement, thinks I, that the fool of Twist Tickle had from this still weather of reason and tempest of feeling emerged with the laurel of wisdom (as my tutor said) to crown him. 'Twas fair hard to credit! I must know the device--the clever political trick--by which the wags and wiseacres of Twist Tickle had been discomfited. 'Twas with this hungry curiosity that I demanded of the fool of Twist Tickle how he had managed so great a thing.

"Eh, Moses," says I; "how _was_ it?"

"Dannie," he gravely explained, "'tis very simple. My bid," says he, impressively, "was the lowest."

"An' how much was that, Moses?"

"Mother," he observed, "didn't hold a wonderful lot with half measures."

'Twas no answer to my question.

"She always 'lowed," says he, with a mystifyingly elaborate wave and accent, "that _doin'_ was better than _gettin'_."

I still must wait.

"'Moses,' says she," he pursued, "'don't you mind the price o' fish; you _cotch_ un. Fish,' says she, 'is fish; but prices goes up an' down, accordin' t' the folly o' men. You _do_,' says she; 'an' you leave what you _gets_ t' take care of itself.' An' I 'low," says Moses, gently, a smile transfiguring his vacant face, "that mother knowed."

'Twas all, it seemed to me, a defensive argument.

"An' mother 'lowed, afore she died," he added, looking up to a gray sky, wherein a menace of snow dwelt, "that a good man would save his Queen from rascals."

"Ay," I complained; "but what was the bid that won from Eli Flack?"

"The bid?"

"Ay; the bid."

"Not expensive," says he.

"But how much, Moses?"

"Well, Dannie," he answered, with a sigh and a rub of his curly, yellow beard, "I 'lowed mother wouldn't charge much for servin' the Queen: for," says he, enlivened, "'twould be too much like common labor t' carry Her Majesty's mail at a price. An' I bid," he added, eying me vaguely, "accordin' t' what I 'lowed mother would have me do in the Queen's service. _Fac' is, Dannie_," says he, in a squall of confidence, "_I 'lowed I'd carry it free!_"

* * * * *

'Twas this contact with the world of Jimmie Tick's Cove that embarked the fool upon an adventurous enterprise. When, in the spring of that year, the sea being open, the _Quick as Wink_ made our harbor, the first of all the traders, Tumm, the clerk, was short-handed for a cook, having lost young Billy Rudd overboard, in a great sea, beating up in stress of weather to the impoverished settlement at Diamond Run. 'Twas Moses, the choice of necessity, he shipped in the berth of that merry, tow-headed lad of tender voice, whose songs, poor boy! would never again be lifted, o' black nights in harbor, in the forecastle of the _Quick as Wink_. "Ay, Dannie," says Moses, "you'd never think it, maybe, but I'm shipped along o' Tumm for the French shore an' the Labrador ports. I've heared tell a wonderful lot about Mother Burke, but I've never seed the ol' rock; an' I've heared tell a wonderful lot about Coachman's Cove an' Conch an' Lancy Loop an' the harbors o' the straits shores, but I've never seed un with my own eyes, an' I'm sort o' wantin' t' know how they shapes up alongside o' Twist Tickle. I 'low," says he, "you don't find many harbors in the world like Twist Tickle. Since I been travellin' t' Jimmie Tick's Cove with the mail," he continued, with a stammer and flush, like a man misled from an austere path by the flesh-pots of earth, "I've cotched a sinful hankerin' t' see the world."

I wished he had not.

"But mother," he added, quickly, in self-defence, "always 'lowed a man _ought_ t' see the world. So," says he, "I'm shipped along o' Tumm, for better or for worse, an' I'm bound down north in the _Quick as Wink_ with the spring supplies."

'Twas a far journey for that sensitive soul.

"Dannie," he asked, in quick alarm, a fear so sudden and unexpected that I was persuaded of the propriety of my premonition, "what you thinkin' about? Eh, Dannie?" he cried. "What you lookin' that way for?"

I would not tell him that I knew the skipper of the _Quick as Wink_, whose butt the fool must be.

"You isn't 'lowin'," Moses began, "that mother--"

"Not at all, Moses!" says I.

'Twas instant and complete relief he got from this denial. "We sails," says he, with all a traveller's importance, "at dawn o' to-morrow. I'll be gone from Twist Tickle by break o' day. I'll be gone t' new places--t' harbors I've heared tell of but never seed with my own eyes. I'm not quite knowin'," says he, doubtfully, "how I'll get along with the cookin'. Mother always 'lowed," he continued, with a greater measure of hope, "that I was more'n fair on cookin' a cup o' tea. 'Moses,' says she, 'you can brew a cup o' tea so well as any fool I ever knowed.' But that was on'y mother," he added, in modest self-deprecation. "Jus' mother."

I wished again that the fool had not fallen into the mercilessly facetious company of Skipper Saucy Bill North of the schooner _Quick as Wink_.

"An', Dannie," says Moses, "I'm scared I'll fail with all but the tea."

'Twas come near the evening of that mellow Sunday. On the Whisper Cove road and the greening hills of Twin Islands, where Moses and I had walked in simple companionship, the birds had been mating and nesting in the thick sunshine of the afternoon. Chirp and flutter and shrill song! 'Twas a time for the mating of birds. The haste and noise and pomposity of this busy love-making! The loud triumph and soft complaint of it! All the world of spruce and alder and sunlit spaces had been a-flutter. But the weather was now fallen gloomy, the sky overcast, the wind blowing in from the black, uneasy sea, where floes and gigantic bergs of ice drifted, like frozen ghosts, cold and dead and aimlessly driven; and the hopeful sunshine had left the hills, and the piping and chirping were stilled, and I heard no more fluttering wings or tender love-songs. The fool of Twist Tickle paused in the road to stare vacantly northward. 'Twas there dark with menacing clouds--thick, sombre clouds, tinged with a warning blue, rising implacably above the roughening black of the sea. He wondered, it may be, in his dull, weakling way, concerning the coasts beyond the grave curtain, which he must discover--new coasts, dealing with us variously, as we disclose them to our hearts. I watched him with misgiving. To be sure, the skipper of the _Quick as Wink_ was an unkind man, cynical and quick to seek selfish laughter, whatever the wound he dealt; but Tumm, our friend and the genial friend of all the world, thinks I, more hopefully, would not have the poor fool wronged.

"Dannie," says Moses, turning, "I'm scared my cookin' won't quite fit the stomachs o' the crew o' the _Quick as Wink_."

"Ay, Moses," says I, to hearten him; "but never a good man was that didn't fear a new task."

He eyed me doubtfully.

"An'," I began, "your mother, Moses--"

"But," he interrupted, "mother wasn't quite t' be trusted in all things."

"Not trusted!" I cried.

"You'll not misunderstand me, Dannie?" he besought me, putting a hand on my shoulder. "You'll not misunderstand, will you? But mother wasn't quite t' be trusted," says he, "when it come t' the discussion," says he, pausing to permit a proper appreciation of the learned word, which he had appropriated from my tutor's vocabulary, "o' my accomplishments."

It had never occurred before.

"For mother," he explained, "was somehow wonderful fond o' me."

The church-bell called him.

"Hear her voice, Dannie?" said he. "Hear her voice in that there bell? 'Come--dear!' says she. 'Come--dear! Come--dear!' Hear it ring out? 'Come--dear! Come--dear! Come--dear!'"

I bade him God-speed with a heart that misgave me.

"I'll answer," said he, his face lifted to the sky, "to that voice!"

* * * * *

The clouds in the west broke, and through the rift a shaft of sunlight shot, glad to be free, and touched our world of sea and rock with loving finger-tips, but failed, as I turned homeward, hearing no voice of my unknown mother in the wandering call of the bell; and all the world went gray and sullenly mute, as it had been....

XIX

A WORD OF WARNING

Presently my uncle and I made ready to set out for St. John's upon the sinister business which twice a year engaged his evil talents at the wee waterside place wherein he was the sauciest dog in the pack. There was now no wandering upon the emotionless old hills of Twin Islands to prepare him, no departure from the fishing, no unseemly turning to the bottle, to factitious rage; but he brooded more despairingly in his chair by the window when the flare of western glory left the world. At evening, when he thought me gone upon my pleasure, I watched him from the shadows of the hall, grave with youth, wishing, all the while, that he might greet the night with gratitude for the mercy of it; and I listened to his muttering--and I saw that he was grown old and weak with age: unequal, it might be, to the wickedness he would command in my service. "_For behold the Lord will come with fire, and with his chariots like a whirlwind, to render his anger with fury, and his rebuke with the flames of fire._" For me 'twas still sweet to watch the tender shadows creep upon the western fire, to see the great gray rocks dissolve, to hear the sea's melodious whispering; but to him the sea spoke harshly and the night came with foreboding. I wished that he would forsake the evil he followed for my sake. I would be a club-footed, paddle-punt fisherman, as the gray little man from St. John's had said, and be content with that fortune, could my uncle but look into the eyes of night without misgiving.

But I must not tell him so....

* * * * *

We left John Cather behind.

"Uncle Nick," says I, "I 'low we'd best have un along."

"An' why?" cries he.

"I don't know," says I, honestly puzzled.

He looked at me quizzically. "Is you sure?" he asked. His eyes twinkled. "Is you sure you doesn't know?"

"I don't know," I answered, frowning. "I don't know at all."

"Dannie," says he, significantly, "'tisn't time yet for John Cather t' go t' St. John's. You got t' take your chance."

"What chance?" I demanded.

"I don't know," says he.

I scowled.

"But," says he, "an I was you I wouldn't fear on no account whatever. No," he repeated, "_I_ wouldn't fear--an I was you."

So John Cather was left with Judy and the watchful maid-servant who loved her, having no child of her own, when my uncle and I fared out of the tickle upon the outside boat. I was troubled in the dark and wash and heave of that night, but could not for the life of me tell why. John Cather had bade me good-bye with a heartening laugh and clap on the shoulder. 'Twas with gratitude--and sure persuasion of unworthiness--that I remembered his affection. And Judy had given me a sisterly kiss of farewell which yet lingered upon my lips so warmly that in my perplexity I was conscious of it lying there and must like a thirsty man feel the place her moist mouth had touched. 'Twas grief, thinks I, because of parting with my friend John Cather; and I puzzled no longer, but devoted myself to the accomplishment of manners, as I had been taught, and now attended with interest, having grown old and wise. 'Twas rainy weather, windy, with the sea in an ugly pother off the rocks of our hard coast. 'Twas wet, blustering weather, indeed, all the hapless time we were gone from Twist Tickle: the tap-rooms of St. John's, I recall, disagreeably steamed and reeked. My uncle put me to bed that night with a motherly injunction to recite the twenty-third psalm for safety against the perils of the sea and the machinations of wicked men, and to regard the precepts of the noble Lord Chesterfield for guidance in more difficult waters: the man being quite sober for the first time in all my life upon these occasions of departure.

"Dannie, lad," says he, "you cling t' that there little anchor I'm give ye t' hold to."

I asked him mechanically what that was.

"The twenty-third psa'm," says he.

To this I promised.

"An', Dannie," says he, drawing the great bandanna handkerchief from his trousers-pocket to blow his nose, "don't ye be gettin' lonely: for Dannie--"

I must sharply attend.

"I'm for'ard," he declared, "standin' by!"

He could not perceive, poor man! that I was no longer to be dealt with as a child.

* * * * *

There befell me in the city a singular encounter. 'Twas of a soggy, dismal day: there was a searching wind abroad, I recall, to chill the marrow of impoverished folk, a gray light upon all the slimy world, a dispiriting fog flowing endlessly in scowling clouds over the hills to thicken and eddy and drip upon the streets and harbor. It being now at the crisis of my uncle's intoxication, I was come from my hotel alone, wandering without aim, to speed the anxious hours. Abreast of the familiar door of the Anchor and Chain, where long ago I had gratefully drunk with Cap'n Jack Large, I paused; and I wondered, as I stared at the worn brass knob, now broken into beads of cold sweat with the weather, whether or not I might venture some persuasion upon my perverse uncle, but was all at once plucked by the tail of my coat, and turned in a rage to resent the impudence. 'Twas but a scrawny, brass-buttoned boy, however, with an errand for the lad with the rings, as they called me. I followed, to be sure, and was by this ill-nourished messenger led to the crossing of King Street with Water, where my uncle was used to tap-tapping the pavement. Thence in a moment we ascended to a group of office-rooms, on the opposite side of the street, wherein, having been ceremoniously ushered, I found the gray stranger who had called me a club-footed, ill-begotten young whelp, on that windy night at Twist Tickle, and had with meaning complacency threatened my uncle's assassination.

I had not expected it.

"Ha!" snaps he. "Here you are, eh?"

To my amazement.

"You know me?" he demanded.

I did not know his quality, which seemed, however, by the state he dwelt in, by the deference he commanded from the scrawny, brass-buttoned, ill-nourished, tragically obsequious child who had fetched me, to be of distinction.

"Sit down," he bade me.

I would not.

"Well, well!" cries he. "You've manners as brief as your memory."

'Twas a vivid recollection that had shorn my manner to the bare. My uncle had not been quick enough to sweep the lamp from the table: I remembered this man. 'Twas he who had of that windy night most cruelly damned me; 'twas he who had struck my uncle.

"I've not forgot you, sir," says I.

He was gray: he was indeed most incredibly gray--gray of hair and eye and brow and flesh, gray of mood and outlook upon the world, forever dwelling, as it seemed, in a gray fog of suspicion and irascibility. I was gone over, from pate to shrinking club-foot, with more intimate and intelligently curious observation than ever a 'longshore jack or coast-wise skipper had achieved in the years when I wore rings. Never before had I suffered a stare more keen and unabashed: 'twas an assurance stripped of insolence by some tragical need and right. He sat beyond a broad, littered table, leaning forward upon it, his back to the riley light, his drawn face nestled within the lean, white hands of him; and 'twas now a brooding inspection I must bear--an unself-conscious thing, remote from my feeling, proceeding from eyes as gray as winter through narrow slits that rapidly snapped shut and flashed open in spasmodic winking. He was a man of fashion, of authority, of large affairs, it seemed--a gentleman, according to my uncle's code and fashion-plates. But he was now by my presence so wretchedly detached from the great world he moved in that for a moment I was stirred to pity him. What had this masterful little man, thinks I, to fear from Dannie Callaway of Twist Tickle?

Enough, as it turned out; but 'twas all an unhappy mystery to me on that drear, clammy day.

"Come, sir!" says I, in anger. "You've fetched me here?"

He seemed not to hear.

"What you wantin' of me?" I brusquely asked.

"Yes," says he, sighing; "you are here, aren't you?" He fingered the papers on his table in a way so desultory and weak that once more I was moved to pity him. Then, with blank eyes, and hopelessly hanging lip, a lean finger still continuing to rustle the forgotten documents, he looked out of the window, where 'twas all murky and dismal, harbor and rocky hill beyond obliterated by the dispiriting fog. "I wish to warn you," he continued. "You think, perhaps," he demanded, looking sharply into my eyes, "that you are kin of mine?"

I had no such dreadful fear, and, being an unkind lad, frankly told him.

"You dream," he pursued, "that you were born to some station?"

I would not have him know.

"Daniel," says he, with a faint twinkle of amusement and pity, "tell me of that wretched dream."

'Twas a romantic hope that had lingered with me despite my wish to have it begone: but I would not tell this man. I had fancied, as what lad would not? but with no actual longing, because of love for Judith, that the ultimate revelation would lift me high in the world. But now, in the presence of this gray personage, under his twinkle and pitying grin, the fancy forever vanished from me. 'Twas comforting to know, at any rate, that I might wed Judith without outrage. There would be small difficulty, then, thinks I, in winning the maid; and 'twas most gratifying to know it.

"Daniel," says he, in distress, "has that rascally Top misled you to this ridiculously romantic conclusion?"

"No, sir," I answered.

"You are the son," he declared, with thin-lipped deliberation, by which I was persuaded and sorely chagrined, "of Tom Callaway, who was lost, with all hands but the chiefest rascal it has been my lot to encounter, in the wreck of the _Will-o'-the-Wisp_. Tom Callaway, master: he was your father. Your mother," he continued, "was a St. John's water-side maid--a sweet and lovely wife, who died when you were born. I was myself not indifferent to her most pure and tender charms. There is your pedigree," says he, his voice fallen kind. "No mystery, you see--no romance. Tom Callaway, master: he was your father. This man Top," he snapped, "this vulgar, drunken, villanous fellow, into whose hands you have unhappily fallen and by whose mad fancies you will inevitably be ruined, is the sole survivor of the _Will-o'-the-Wisp_, with which your father very properly went down. He is nothing to you--nothing--neither kith nor kin! He is an intruder upon you: he has no natural right to your affection; nor have you a natural obligation to regard him. He has most viciously corrupted you into the fantastic notion that you are of gentle and fortunate birth. With what heart, in God's name!" the gray man cried, clapping his lean hands in a passion, "he will face you when he must disclose the truth, I cannot conceive. Mad! The man is stark mad: for tell you he must, though he has in every way since your childhood fostered within you a sense of honor that will break in contempt upon him! Your attitude, I warn you, will work wretchedness to you both; you will accuse and flout him. Daniel," the man solemnly asked, "do you believe me?"

I was glad to know that my mother had been both sweet and lovely. 'Twas a conception I had long cherished. 'Twas what Judith was--both sweet and lovely.

"You will accuse him, I warn you!" he repeated.

Still gray weather, I observed through the grimy panes: fog sweeping by with a northeast wind. For a moment I watched the dripping passengers on the opposite pavement.

"Well," says the gray stranger, with a harsh little laugh, "God help Top when the tale is told!"

I should never, of course, treat my uncle with unkindness.

"My boy," he most earnestly besought me, "will you not heed me?"

"I'll hear you, sir," I answered.

"Attend, then," says he. "I have brought you here to warn you, and my warning is but half spoken. Frankly, in this I have no concern for your happiness, with which I have nothing to do: I have been moved to this ungrateful and most dangerous interview by a purely selfish regard for my own career. Do you know the word? A political career of some slight importance," he added, with a toss of the head, "which is now menaced, at a most critical moment, by that merciless, wicked old pirate whom you have shamelessly been deceived into calling your uncle Nicholas. To be frank with you, you are, and have been for several years, an obstacle. My warning, however, as you will believe, is advanced upon grounds advantageous to yourself. Put the illusions of this designing old bay-noddie away from you," says he, now accentuating his earnestness with a lean, white forefinger. "Rid yourself of these rings and unsuitable garments: they disgrace you. When the means of their possession is disclosed to you--when the wretched crime of it is made known--you will suffer such humiliation as you did not dream a man could feel. Put 'em away. Put 'em out of sight and mind. Send that young man from London back to the business he came from. A tutor! Your tutor! Tom Callaway's son with an English tutor! You are being made a ghastly fool of; and I warn you that you will pay for every moment of the illusion. Poor lad!" cries he, in genuine distress. "Poor lad!"

It might be: I had long thought so.

"And as for this grand tour abroad," he began, with an insolently curling lip, "why, for God's sake! don't be a--"

"Sir!" I interrupted, in a rage.

There had been talk of a trip abroad: it seemed I was bound upon it, by advice of Sir Harry, to further my education and to cure my foot of its twist.

"Well," the gray personage laughed, "being what you are, remembering what I have with candor and exact honesty told you, if you can permit this old pirate--"

I stopped him. I would have no more of it--not I, by Heaven!

"This extortionate old--"

"I'll not hear it!" I roared.

"In this fine faith," sneers he, "I find at least the gratifying prospect of being some day privileged to observe Top broil as on a griddle in hell."

'Twas most obscure.

"I refer," says he, "to the moment of grand climax when this pirate tells you where your diamonds came from. Your diamonds?" he flashed. "You may get quit of your diamonds; but the fine gentleman this low villain has fashioned of a fishing-skipper's whelp will all your days keep company at your elbow. And you won't love Top for this," says he, with malevolent satisfaction; "you won't love Top!"

I walked to the window for relief from him. 'Twas all very well that he should discredit and damn my uncle in this way; 'twas all very well that he should raise spectres of unhappiness before me: but there, on the opposite pavement, abroad in the foggy wind, jostled by ill-tempered passengers, was this self-same old foster-father of mine, industriously tap-tapping the pavement with his staff, as he had periodically done, whatever the weather, since I could remember the years of my life. I listened to the angry tapping, watched the urchins and curious folk gather for the show; and I was moved to regard the mystifying spectacle with an indulgent grin. The gray stranger, however, at that instant got ear of the patter of the staff and the clamor of derision. He cried upon me sharply to stand from the window; but I misliked this harsh manner of authority, and would not budge: whereupon he sprang upon me, caught me about the middle, and violently flung me back. 'Twas too late to avert the catastrophe: my uncle had observed me, and was even then bound across the street, flying all sail, to the terrified confusion of the exalted political personage whose career he menaced. 'Twas a pitiable spectacle of fright and helpless uncertainty the man furnished, seeming at one moment bent on keeping my uncle out, whom he feared to admit, at another to wish him well in, whom he dared not exclude.

"The man's stark mad!" he would repeat, in his panic of gesture and pacing. "The man's stark mad to risk this!"

My uncle softly closed the door behind him. "Ah, Dannie!" says he. "You here?" He was breathless, and gone a ghastly color; there was that about his scars and eyes, too, to make me wonder whether 'twas rage or fear had mastered him: I could not tell, but mightily wished to determine, since it seemed that some encounter impended. "Ye're an unkind man," says he, in a passionless way, to the gray stranger, who was now once more seated at his desk, fingering the litter of documents. "Ye've broke your word t' me. I must punish ye for the evil ye've done this lad. I'll not ask ye what ye've told un till I haves my way with ye; but then," he declared, his voice betraying a tremor of indignation, "I'll have the talk out o' ye, word for word!" The gray stranger was agitated, but would not look up from his aimlessly wandering hand to meet my uncle's lowering, reproachful eyes. "Dannie," says my uncle, continuing in gentle speech, "pass the cushion from the big chair. Thank 'e, lad. I'm not wantin' the man t' hurt his head." He cast the cushion to the floor. "Now, sir," says he, gently, "an ye'll be good enough t' step within five-foot-ten o' that there red cushion, I'll knock ye down an' have it over with."

The man looked sullenly out of the window.

"Five-foot-ten, sir," my uncle repeated, with some cheerfulness.

"Top," was the vicious response, "you invite assassination."

My uncle put his hand on my shoulder. "'Tis not fit for ye t' see, lad," says he. "Ye'd best be off t' the fresh air. 'Tis so wonderful stuffy here that ye'll be growin' pale an ye don't look out. An' I'm not wantin' ye t' see me knock a man down," he repeated, with feeling. "I'm not wantin' ye even t' _think_ that I'd do an unkind thing like that."

I moved to go.

"Now, sir!" cries my uncle to the stranger.

As I closed the door behind me the man was passing with snarling lips to the precise spot my uncle had indicated....

XX

NO APOLOGY

My uncle knocked on my door at the hotel and, without waiting to be bidden, thrust in his great, red, bristling, monstrously scarred head. 'Twas an intrusion most diffident and fearful: he was like a mischievous boy come for chastisement.

"You here, Dannie?" he gently inquired.

"Come in, sir," says I.

'Twas awkwardly--with a bashful grin and halting, doubtful step--that he stumped in.

"Comfortable?" he asked, looking about. "No complaint t' make ag'in this here hotel?"

I had no complaint.

"Not troubled, is you?"

I was not troubled.

"Isn't bothered, is you?" he pursued, with an inviting wink. "Not bothered about nothin', lad, is you?"

Nor bothered.

"Come now!" cries he, dissembling great candor and heartiness, "is you got any questions t' ask ol' Nick Top?"

"No, sir," I answered, quite confidently.

"Dannie, lad," says my uncle, unable to contain his delight, with which, indeed, his little eyes brimmed over, "an ye'd jus' be so damned good as t' tweak that there--"

I pulled the bell-cord.

"A nip o' the best Jamaica," says he.

Old Elihu Wall fetched the red dram.

"Lad," says my uncle, his glass aloft, his eyes resting upon me in pride, his voice athrill with passionate conviction, "here's t' _you_! That's good o' you," says he. "That's very good. I 'low I've fetched ye up very well. Ecod!" he swore, with most reverent and gentle intention, "ye'll be a gentleman afore ye knows it!"

He downed the liquor with a grin that came over his lurid countenance like a burst of low sunshine.

"A gentleman," he repeated, "in spite o' Chesterfield!"

When my uncle was gone, I commanded my reflections elsewhere, prohibited by honor from dwelling upon the wretched mystery in which I was enmeshed. They ran with me to the fool of Twist Tickle. The weather had turned foul: 'twas blowing up from the north in a way to make housed folk shiver for their fellows at sea. Evil sailing on the Labrador! I wondered how the gentle weakling fared as cook of the _Quick as Wink_. I wondered in what harbor he lay, in the blustering night, or off what coast he tossed. I wondered what trouble he had within his heart. I wished him home again: but yet remembered, with some rising of hope, that his amazing legacy of wisdom had in all things been sufficient to his need. Had he not in peace and usefulness walked the paths of the world where wiser folk had gone with bleeding feet? 'Twas dwelling gratefully upon this miracle of wisdom and love, a fool's inheritance, that I, who had no riches of that kind, fell asleep, without envy or perturbation, that night.

* * * * *

'Twas not long I had to wait to discover the fortune of the fool upon that voyage. We were not three days returned from the city when the _Quick as Wink_ slipped into our harbor. She had been beating up all afternoon; 'twas late of a dark night when she dropped anchor. John Cather was turned in, Judith long ago whisked off to bed by our maid-servant; my uncle and I sat alone together when the rattle of the chain apprised us that the schooner was in the shelter of the Lost Soul.

By-and-by Moses came.

"You've been long on the road," says I.

"Well, Dannie," he explained, looking at his cap, which he was awkwardly twirling, "I sort o' fell in with Parson Stump by the way, an' stopped for a bit of a gossip."

I begged him to sit with us.

"No," says he; "but I'm 'bliged t' you. Fac' is, Dannie," says he, gravely, "I isn't got time."

My uncle was amazed.

"I've quit the ship," Moses went on, "not bein' much of a hand at cookin'. I'll be t' home now," says he, "an' I'd be glad t' have you an' Skipper Nicholas drop in, some day soon, when you're passin' Whisper Cove."

We watched him twirl his cap.

"You'd find a wonderful warm welcome," says he, "from Mrs. Moses Shoos!"

With that he was gone.

XXI

FOOL'S FORTUNE

"Close the door, Dannie," says Tumm, in the little cabin of the _Quick as Wink_, late that night, when the goods were put to rights, and the bottle was on the counter, and the schooner was nodding sleepily in the spent waves from the open sea. "This here yarn o' the weddin' o' Moses Shoos is not good for everybody t' hear." He filled the glasses--chuckling all the time deep in his chest. "We was reachin' up t' Whoopin' Harbor," he began, being a great hand at a story, "t' give the _Quick as Wink_ a night's lodgin', it bein' a wonderful windish night; clear enough, the moon sailin' a cloudy sky, but with a bank o' fog sneakin' round Cape Muggy like a fish-thief. An' we wasn't in no haste, anyhow, t' make Sinners' Tickle, for we was the first trader down this season, an' 'twas pick an' choose for we, with a clean bill t' every harbor from Starvation Cove t' the Settin' Hen. So the skipper he says we'll hang the ol' girl up t' Whoopin' Harbor 'til dawn; an' we'll all have a watch below, says he, with a cup o' tea, says he, if the cook can bile the water 'ithout burnin' it. Now, look you! Saucy Bill North is wonderful fond of his little joke; an' 'twas this here habit o' burnin' the water he'd pitched on t' plague the poor cook with, since we put out o' Twist Tickle on the v'y'ge down.

"'Cook, you dunderhead!' says the skipper, with a wink t' the crew, which I was sorry t' see, 'you been an' scarched the water agin.'

"Shoos he looked like he'd give up for good on the spot--just like he _knowed_ he was a fool, an' _had_ knowed it for a long, long time--sort o' like he was sorry for we an' sick of hisself.

"'Cook,' says the skipper, 'you went an' done it agin. Yes, you did! Don't you go denyin' of it. You'll kill us, cook,' says he, 'if you goes on like this. They isn't nothin' worse for the system,' says he, 'than this here burned water. The almanacs,' says he, shakin' his finger at the poor cook, ''ll tell you _that!_'

"'I 'low I did burn that water, skipper,' says the cook, 'if you says so. But I isn't got all my wits,' says he; 'an' God knows I'm doin' my best!'

"'I always did allow, cook,' says the skipper, 'that God knowed more'n I ever thunk.'

"'An' I never _did_ burn no water,' says the cook, 'afore I shipped along o' you in this here ol' flour-sieve of a _Quick as Wink._'

"'This here _what?_' snaps the skipper.

"'This here ol' basket,' says the cook.

"'Basket!' says the skipper. Then he hummed a bit o' 'Fishin' for the Maid I Loves,' 'ithout thinkin' much about the toon. 'Cook,' says he 'I loves you. You is on'y a half-witted chance-child,' says he, 'but I loves you like a brother.'

"'Does you, skipper?' says the cook, with a nice, soft little smile, like the poor fool he was. 'I isn't by no means hatin' you, skipper,' says he. 'But I can't _help_ burnin' the water,' says he, 'an' I 'low it fair hurts me t' get blame for it. I'm sorry for you an' the crew,' says he, 'an' I wisht I hadn't took the berth. But when I shipped along o' you,' says he, 'I 'lowed I _could_ cook, for mother always told me so, an' I 'lowed she knowed. I'm doin' my best, anyhow, accordin' t' how she'd have me do, an' I 'low if the water gets scarched,' says he, 'the galley fire's bewitched.'

"'Basket!' says the skipper. 'Ay, ay, cook,' says he. 'I just _loves_ you.'

"They wasn't a man o' the crew liked t' hear the skipper say that; for, look you! the skipper doesn't know nothin' about feelin's, an' the cook has more feelin's 'n a fool can make handy use of aboard a tradin' craft. There sits the ol' man, smoothin' his big, red beard, singin' 'I'm Fishin' for the Maid I Loves,' while he looks at poor Moses Shoos, which was washin' up the dishes, for we was through with the mug-up. An' the devil was in his eyes--the devil was fair grinnin' in them little blue eyes. Lord! it made me sad t' see it, for I knowed the cook was in for bad weather, an' he isn't no sort o' craft t' be out o' harbor in a gale o' wind like that.

"'Cook,' says the skipper.

"'Ay, sir?' says the cook.

"'Cook,' says the skipper, 'you ought t' get married.'

"'I on'y wisht I could,' says the cook.

"'You ought t' try, cook,' says the skipper, 'for the sake o' the crew. We'll all die,' says he, 'afore we sights ol' Bully Dick agin,' says he, 'if you keeps on burnin' the water. You _got_ t' get married, cook, t' the first likely maid you sees on the Labrador,' says he, 't' save the crew. She'd do the cookin' for you. It'll be the loss o' all hands,' says he, 'an you don't. This here burned water,' says he, 'will be the end of us, cook, an you keeps it up.'

"'I'd be wonderful glad t' 'blige you, skipper,' says the cook, 'an' I'd like t' 'blige all hands. 'Twon't be by my wish,' says he, 'that anybody'll die o' the grub they gets, for mother wouldn't like it.'

"'Cook,' says the skipper, 'shake! I knows a _man,_' says he, 'when I sees one. Any man,' says he, 'that would put on the irons o' matrimony,' says he, 't' 'blige a shipmate,' says he, 'is a better man 'n me, an' I loves un like a brother.'

"The cook was cheered up considerable.

"'Cook,' says the skipper, 'I 'pologize. Yes, I do, cook,' says he, 'I 'pologize.'

"'I isn't got no feelin' ag'in' matrimony,' says the cook. 'But I isn't able t' get took. I been tryin' every maid t' Twist Tickle,' says he, 'an' they isn't one,' says he, 'will wed a fool.'

"'Not _one_ maid t' wed a fool!' says the skipper.

"'Nar a one,' says the cook.

"'I'm s'prised,' says the skipper.

"'Nar a maid t' Twist Tickle,' says the cook, 'will wed a fool, an' I 'low they isn't one,' says he, 'on the Labrador.'

"'It's been done afore, cook,' says the skipper, 'an' I 'low 'twill be done agin, if the world don't come to an end t' oncet. Cook,' says he, 'I _knows_ the maid t' do it.'

"'I'd be wonderful glad t' find _she_,' says the cook. 'Mother,' says he, 'always 'lowed a man didn't ought t' live alone.'

"'Ay, b'y,' says the skipper, 'I got the girl for _you_. An' she isn't a thousand miles,' says he, 'from where that ol' basket of a _Quick as Wink_ lies at anchor,' says he, 'in Whoopin' Harbor. She isn't what you'd call handsome an' tell no lie,' says he, 'but--'

"'Never you mind about that, skipper,' says the cook.

"'No,' says the skipper, 'she isn't handsome, as handsome goes, even in these parts, but--'

"'Never you mind, skipper,' says the cook: 'for mother always 'lowed that looks come off in the first washin'.'

"'I 'low that Liz Jones would take you, cook,' says the skipper. 'You ain't much on wits, but you got a good-lookin' figure-head; an' I 'low she'd be more'n willin' t' skipper a craft like you. You better go ashore, cook, when you gets cleaned up, an' see what she says. Tumm,' says he, 'is sort o' shipmates with Liz,' says he, 'an' I 'low he'll see you through the worst of it.'

"'Will you, Tumm?' says the cook.

"'Well,' says I, 'I'll see.'

"I knowed Liz Jones from the time I fished Whoopin' Harbor with Skipper Bill Topsail in the _Love the Wind_, bein' cotched by the measles thereabouts, which she nursed me through; an' I 'lowed she _would_ wed the cook if he asked her, so, thinks I, I'll go ashore with the fool t' see that she don't. No; she isn't handsome--not Liz. I'm wonderful fond o' yarnin' o' good-lookin' maids, as you knows, Skipper Nicholas, sir; but I can't say much o' Liz: for Liz is so far t' l'eward o' beauty that many a time, lyin' sick there in the fo'c's'le o' the _Love the Wind_, I wished the poor girl would turn inside out, for, thinks I, the pattern might be a sight better on the other side. I _will_ say she is big and well-muscled; an' muscles, t' my mind, counts enough t' make up for black eyes, but not for cross-eyes, much less for fuzzy whiskers. It ain't in my heart t' make sport o' Liz; but I _will_ say she has a bad foot, for she was born in a gale, I'm told, when the _Preacher_ was hangin' on off a lee shore 'long about Cape Harrigan, an' the sea was raisin' the devil. An', well--I hates t' say it, but--well, they call her 'Walrus Liz.' No; she isn't handsome, she haven't got no good looks; but once you gets a look into whichever one o' them cross-eyes you is able to cotch, you see a deal more'n your own face; an' she _is_ well-muscled, an' I 'low I'm goin' t' tell you so, for I wants t' name her good p'ints so well as her bad. Whatever--

"'Cook,' says I, 'I'll go along o' you.'

"With that Moses Shoos fell to on the dishes, an' 'twasn't long afore he was ready to clean hisself; which done, he was ready for the courtin'. But first he got out his dunny-bag, an' he fished in there 'til he pulled out a blue stockin', tied in a hard knot; an' from the toe o' that there blue stockin' he took a brass ring. 'I 'low,' says he, talkin' to hisself, in the half-witted way he has, 'it won't do no hurt t' give her mother's ring. "Moses," says mother, "you better take the ring off my finger. It isn't no weddin'-ring," says she, "for I never was what you might call wed by a real parson in the fashionable way, but on'y accordin' t' the customs o' the land," says she, "an' I got it from the Jew t' make believe I was wed in the way they does it in these days; for it didn't do nobody no hurt, an' it sort o' pleased me. You better take it, Moses, b'y," says she, "for the dirt o' the grave would only spile it," says she, "an' I'm not wantin' it no more. Don't wear it at the fishin', dear," says she, "for the fishin' is wonderful hard," says she, "an' joolery don't stand much wear an' tear." 'Oh, mother!' says the cook, 'I done what you wanted!' Then the poor fool sighed an' looked up at the skipper. 'I 'low, skipper,' says he, ''twouldn't do no hurt t' give the ring to a man's wife, would it? For mother wouldn't mind, would she?'

"The skipper didn't answer that.

"'Come, cook,' says I, 'leave us get under way,' for I couldn't stand it no longer.

"So the cook an' me put out in the punt t' land at Whoopin' Harbor, with the crew wishin' the poor cook well with their lips, but thinkin', God knows what! in their hearts. An' he was in a wonderful state o' fright. I never _seed_ a man so took by scare afore. For, look you! poor Moses thinks she might have un. 'I never had half a chance afore,' says he. 'They've all declined in a wonderful regular way. But now,' says he, 'I 'low I'll be took. I jus' _feels_ that way; an', Tumm, I--I--I'm scared!' I cheered un up so well as I could; an' by-an'-by we was on the path t' Liz Jones's house, up on Gray Hill, where she lived alone, her mother bein' dead an' her father shipped on a bark from St. John's t' the West Indies. An' we found Liz sittin' on a rock at the turn o' the road, lookin' down from the hill at the _Quick as Wink_; all alone--sittin' there in the moonlight, all alone--thinkin' o' God knows what!

"'Hello, Liz!' says I.

"'Hello, Tumm!' says she. 'What vethel'th that?'

"'That's the _Quick as Wink_, Liz,' says I. 'An' here's the cook o' that there craft,' says I, 'come up the hill t' speak t' you.'

"'That's right,' says the cook. 'Tumm, you're right.'

"'T' thpeak t' _me_!' says she.

"I wisht she hadn't spoke quite that way. Lord! it wasn't nice. It makes a man feel bad t' see a woman put her hand on her heart for a little thing like that.

"'Ay, Liz,' says I, 't' speak t' you. An' I'm thinkin', Liz,' says I, 'he'll say things no man ever said afore--t' you.'

"'That's right, Tumm,' says the cook. 'I wants t' speak as man t' man,' says he, 't' stand by what I says,' says he, 'accordin' as mother would have me do!'

"Liz got off the rock. Then she begun t' kick at the path; an' she was lookin' down, but I 'lowed she had an eye on Moses all the time. 'For,' thinks I, 'she's sensed the thing out, like all the women.'

"'I'm thinkin',' says I, 'I'll go up the road a bit.'

"'Oh no, you won't, Tumm,' says she. 'You thtay right here. Whath the cook wantin' o' me?'

"'Well,' says the cook, 'I 'low I wants t' get married.'

"'T' get married!' says she.

"'T' get married,' says the cook, 'accordin' as mother would have me; an' I 'low you'll do.'

"'Me?' says she.

"'Liz,' says he, as solemn as church, 'I means you.'

"It come to her all of a suddent--an' she begun t' breathe hard, an' pressed her hands against her breast an' shivered. But she looked away t' the moon, an' somehow that righted her.

"'You better thee me in daylight,' says she.

"'Don't you mind about that,' says he. 'Mother always 'lowed that sort o' thing didn't matter: an' she knowed.'

"She put a finger under his chin an' tipped his face t' the light.

"'You ithn't got all your thentheth, ith you?' says she.

"'Well,' says he, 'bein' born on Hollow-eve,' says he, 'I _isn't_ quite got all my wits. But,' says he, 'I wisht I had. An' I can't do no more.'

"'An' you wanth t' wed me?' says she. 'Ith you sure you doth?'

"'I got mother's ring,' says the cook, 't' prove it.'

"'Tumm,' says Liz t' me, '_you_ ithn't wantin' t' get married, ith you?'

"'No, Liz,' says I. 'Not,' says I, 't' you.'

"'No,' says she. 'Not--t' me.' She took me round the turn in the road. 'Tumm,' says she, 'I 'low I'll wed that man. I wanth t' get away from here,' says she, lookin' over the hills. 'I wanth t' get t' the thouthern outporth, where there'th life. They ithn't no life here. An' I'm tho wonderful tired o' all thith! Tumm,' says she, 'no man ever afore athked me t' marry un, an' I 'low I better take thith one. He'th on'y a fool,' says she, 'but not even a fool ever come courtin' me, an' I 'low nobody but a fool would. On'y a fool, Tumm!' says she. 'But _I_ ithn't got nothin' t' boatht of. God made me,' says she, 'an' I ithn't mad that He done it. I 'low He meant me t' take the firth man that come, an' be content. I 'low _I_ ithn't got no right t' thtick up my nothe at a fool. For, Tumm,' says she, 'God made that fool, too. An', Tumm,' says she, 'I wanth thomethin' elthe. Oh, I wanth thomethin' elthe! I hateth t' tell you, Tumm,' says she, 'what it ith. But all the other maidth hath un, Tumm, an' I wanth one, too. I 'low they ithn't no woman happy without one, Tumm. An' I ithn't never had no chanth afore. No chanth, Tumm, though God knowth they ithn't nothin' I wouldn't do,' says she, 't' get what I wanth! I'll wed the fool,' says she. 'It ithn't a man I wanth tho much; no, it ithn't a man. Ith--'

"'What you wantin', Liz?' says I.

"'It ithn't a man, Tumm,' says she.

"'No?' says I. 'What is it, Liz?'

"'Ith a baby,' says she.

"God! I felt bad when she told me that...."

* * * * *

Tumm stopped, sighed, picked at a knot in the table. There was silence in the cabin. The _Quick as Wink_ was still nodding to the swell--lying safe at anchor in a cove of Twist Tickle. We heard the gusts scamper over the deck and shake the rigging; we caught, in the intervals, the deep-throated roar of breakers, far off--all the noises of the gale. And Tumm picked at the knot with his clasp-knife; and we sat watching, silent, all. And I felt bad, too, because of the maid at Whooping Harbor--a rolling waste of rock, with the moonlight lying on it, stretching from the whispering mystery of the sea to the greater desolation beyond; and an uncomely maid, alone and wistful, wishing, without hope, for that which the hearts of women must ever desire....

* * * * *

"Ay," Tumm drawled, "it made me feel bad t' think o' what she'd been wantin' all them years; an' then I wished I'd been kinder t' Liz.... An', 'Tumm,' thinks I, 'you went an' come ashore t' stop this here thing; but you better let the skipper have his little joke, for 'twill on'y s'prise him, an' it won't do nobody else no hurt. Here's this fool,' thinks I, 'wantin' a wife; an' he won't never have another chance. An' here's this maid,' thinks I, 'wantin' a baby; an' _she_ won't never have another chance. 'Tis plain t' see,' thinks I, 'that God A'mighty, who made un, crossed their courses; an' I 'low, ecod!' thinks I, 'that 'twasn't a bad idea He had. If He's got to get out of it somehow,' thinks I, 'why, _I_ don't know no better way. Tumm,' thinks I, 'you sheer off. Let Nature,' thinks I, 'have course an' be glorified.' So I looks Liz in the eye--an' says nothin'.

"'Tumm,' says she, 'doth you think he--'

"'Don't you be scared o' nothin',' says I. 'He's a lad o' good feelin's,' says I, 'an' he'll treat you the best he knows how. Is you goin' t' take un?'

"'I wathn't thinkin' o' that,' says she. 'I wathn't thinkin' o' _not_. I wath jutht,' says she, 'wonderin'.'

"'They isn't no sense in that, Liz,' says I. 'You just wait an' find out.'

"'What'th hith name?' says she.

"'Shoos,' says I. 'Moses Shoos.'

"With that she up with her pinny an' begun t' cry like a young swile.

"'What you cryin' for, Liz?' says I.

"I 'low I couldn't tell what 'twas all about. But she was like all the women. Lord! 'tis the little things that makes un weep when it comes t' the weddin'.

"'Come, Liz,' says I, 'what you cryin' about?'

"'I lithp,' says she.

"'I knows you does, Liz,' says I; 'but it ain't nothin' t' cry about.'

"'I can't say Joneth,' says she.

"'No,' says I; 'but you'll be changin' your name,' says I, 'an' it won't matter no more.'

"'An' if I can't say Joneth,' says she, 'I can't thay--'

"'Can't say what?' says I.

"'Can't thay Thooth!' says she.

"Lord! No more she could. An' t' say Moses Shoos! An' t' say Mrs. Moses Shoos! Lord! It give me a pain in the tongue t' think of it.

"'Jutht my luck,' says she; 'but I'll do my betht.'

"So we went back an' told poor Moses Shoos that he didn't have t' worry no more about gettin' a wife; an' he said he was more glad than sorry, an', says he, she'd better get her bonnet, t' go aboard an' get married right away. An' she 'lowed she didn't want no bonnet, but _would_ like to change her pinny. So we said we'd as lief wait a spell, though a clean pinny wasn't _needed_. An' when she got back, the cook said he 'lowed the skipper could marry un well enough 'til we overhauled a real parson; an' she thought so, too, for, says she, 'twouldn't be longer than a fortnight, an' _any_ sort of a weddin', says she, would do 'til then. An' aboard we went, the cook an' me pullin' the punt, an' she steerin'; an' the cook he crowed an' cackled all the way, like a half-witted rooster; but the maid didn't even cluck, for she was too wonderful solemn t' do anything but look at the moon.

"'Skipper,' said the cook, when we got in the fo'c's'le, 'here she is. _I_ isn't afeared,' says he, 'an' _she_ isn't afeared; an' now I 'lows we'll have you marry us.'

"Up jumps the skipper; but he was too much s'prised t' say a word.

"'An' I'm thinkin',' says the cook, with a nasty little wink, such as never I seed afore get into the eyes o' Moses Shoos, 'that they isn't a man in this here fo'c's'le,' says he, 'will _say_ I'm afeared.'

"'Cook,' says the skipper, takin' the cook's hand, 'shake! I never knowed a man like you afore,' says he. 'T' my knowledge, you're the on'y man in the Labrador fleet would do it. I'm proud,' says he, 't' take the hand o' the man with nerve enough t' marry Walrus Liz o' Whoopin' Harbor.'

"But 'twas a new Moses he had t' deal with. The devil got in the fool's eyes--a jumpin' little brimstone devil, ecod! I never knowed the man could look that way.

"'Ay, lad,' says the skipper, 'I'm proud t' know the man that isn't afeared o' Walrus--'

"'Don't you call her that!' says the cook. 'Don't you do it, skipper!'

"I was lookin' at Liz. She was grinnin' in a holy sort o' way. Never seed nothin' like that afore--no, lads, not in all my life.

"'An' why not, cook?' says the skipper.

"'It ain't her name,' says the cook.

"'It ain't?' says the skipper. 'But I been sailin' the Labrador for twenty year,' says he, 'an' I 'ain't never heared her called nothin' but Walrus--'

"'Don't you do it, skipper!'

"The devil got into the cook's hands then. I seed his fingers clawin' the air in a hungry sort o' way. An' it looked t' me like squally weather for the skipper.

"'Don't you do it no more, skipper,' says the cook. 'I isn't got no wits,' says he, an' I'm feelin' wonderful queer!'

"The skipper took a look ahead into the cook's eyes. 'Well, cook,' says he, 'I 'low,' says he, 'I won't.'

"Liz laughed--an' got close t' the fool from Twist Tickle. An' I seed her touch his coat-tail, like as if she loved it, but didn't dast do no more.

"'What you two goin' t' do?' says the skipper.

"'We 'lowed you'd marry us,' says the cook, ''til we come across a parson.'

"'I will,' says the skipper. 'Stand up here,' says he. 'All hands stand up!' says he. 'Tumm,' says he, 'get me the first Book you comes across.'

"I got un a Book.

"'Now, Liz,' says he, 'can you cook?'

"'Fair t' middlin',' says she. 'I won't lie.'

"'Twill do,' says he. 'An' does you want t' get married t' this here dam' fool?'

"'An it pleathe you,' says she.

"'Shoos,' says the skipper, 'will you let this woman do the cookin'?'

"'Well, skipper,' says the cook, 'I will; for I don't want nobody t' die o' my cookin' on this here v'y'ge, an' I _knows_ that mother wouldn't mind.'

"'An' will you keep out o' the galley?'

"'I 'low I'll _have_ to.'

"'An' look you! cook, is you sure--is you _sure_,' says the skipper, with a shudder, lookin' at the roof, 'that you wants t' marry this here--'

"'Don't you do it, skipper!' says the cook. 'Don't you say that no more! By the Lord!' says he, 'I'll kill you if you does!'

"'Is you sure,' says the skipper, 'that you wants t' marry this here--woman?'

"'I will.'

"'Well,' says the skipper, kissin' the Book, 'I 'low me an' the crew don't care; an' we can't help it, anyhow.'

"'What about mother's ring?' says the cook. 'She might's well have that,' says he, 'if she's careful about the wear an' tear. For joolery,' says he t' Liz, 'don't stand it.'

"'It can't do no harm,' says the skipper.

"'Ith we married, thkipper?' says Liz, when she got the ring on.

"'Well,' says the skipper, 'I 'low that knot'll hold 'til we puts into Twist Tickle, where Parson Stump can mend it, right under my eye. For,' says he, 'I got a rope's-end an' a belayin'-pin t' _make_ it hold,' says he, ''til we gets 'longside o' _some_ parson that knows more about matrimonial knots 'n me. We'll pick up your goods, Liz,' says he, 'on the s'uthard v'y'ge. An' I hopes, ol' girl,' says he, 'that you'll be able t' boil the water 'ithout burnin' it.'

"'Ay, Liz,' says the cook, 'I been makin' a awful fist o' b'ilin' the water o' late.'

"She give him one look--an' put her clean pinny to her eyes.

"'What you cryin' about?' says the cook.

"'I don't know,' says she; 'but I 'low 'tith becauthe now I knowth you _ith_ a fool!'

"'She's right, Tumm,' says the cook. 'She's got it right! Bein' born on Hollow-eve,' says he, 'I couldn't be nothin' else. But, Liz,' says he, 'I'm glad I got you, fool or no fool.'

"So she wiped her eyes, an' blowed her nose, an' give a little sniff, an' looked up an' smiled.

"'I isn't good enough for you,' says the poor cook. 'But, Liz,' says he, 'if you kissed me,' says he, 'I wouldn't mind a bit. An' they isn't a man in this here fo'c's'le,' says he, lookin' round, 'that'll say I'd mind. Not one,' says he, with the little devil jumpin' in his eyes.

"Then she stopped cryin' for good.

"'Go ahead, Liz!' says he. 'I ain't afeared. Come on!' says he. 'Give us a kiss!'

"'Motheth Thooth,' says she, 'you're the firtht man ever athked me t' give un a kith!'

"She kissed un. 'Twas like a pistol-shot. An', Lord! her poor face was shinin'...."

* * * * *

In the cabin of the _Quick as Wink_ we listened to the wind as it scampered over the deck; and my uncle and I watched Tumm pick at the knot in the table.

"He don't _need_ no sense," said Tumm, looking up, at last; "for he've _had_ a mother, an' he've _got_ a memory."

'Twas very true, I thought.

XXII

GATHERING WINDS

'Twas by advice of Sir Harry, with meet attention to the philosophy of Lord Chesterfield in respect to the particular accomplishments essential to one who would both please and rise in the world, that my uncle commanded the grand tour to further my education and to cure my twisted foot. "'Tis the last leg o' the beat, lad;" he pleaded; "ye'll be a gentleman, made t' order, accordin' t' specifications, when 'tis over with; an' I'll be wonderful glad," says he, wearily, "when 'tis done, for I'll miss ye sore, lad--ecod! but I'll miss ye sore." Abroad, then, despite the gray warning, went John Cather and I, tutor and young gentleman, the twain not to be distinguished from a company of high birth. 'Twas a ghastly thing: 'twas a thing so unfit and grotesque that I flush to think of it--a thing, of all my uncle's benefits, I wish undone and cannot to this day condone. But that implacable, most tender old ape, when he bade us God-speed on the wharf, standing with legs and staff triangularly disposed to steady him, rippled with pride and admiration to observe the genteel performance of our departure, and in the intervals of mopping his red, sweaty, tearful countenance, exhibited, in unwitting caricature, the defiant consciousness of station he had with infinite pains sought to have me master.

"Made t' order, lad," says he, at last, when he took my hand, "accordin' t' the plans an' specifications o' them that knows, an' quite regardless of expense."

I patted him on the shoulder.

"I wisht," says he, with a regretful wag, "that Tom Callaway could see ye now. You an' your tooter! If on'y Tom Callaway _could_! I bet ye 'twould perk un up a bit in the place he's to! 'Twould go a long way towards distractin' his mind," says he, "from the fire an' fumes they talks so much about in church."

You will be good enough to believe, if you please, that there were sympathetic tears in my uncle's eyes....

* * * * *

Upon this misguided mission we were gone abroad two years and a fortnight (deducting one day): and pursuing it we travelled far. And we came to magnificent cities, and beheld the places and things that are written of in books, and ate of curious foods, and observed many sorts of people and singular customs, and fell in with strange companions, and sojourned in many houses; but from the spectacle of the world I caught no delight, nor won a lesson, nor gained in anything, save, it may be, in knowledge of the book of my own heart. As we went our way in new paths, my mind dwelt continually with Judith, whom I loved; the vision of her face, wistful and most fair in the mirage of Twist Tickle, and the illusion of her voice, whispering from the vacant world, were the realities of these wanderings--the people and palaces a fantasy. Of this I said nothing to John Cather, who was himself cast down by some obscure ailment of the spirit, so that I would not add to his melancholy with my love-sickness, but rather sought by cheerful behavior to mitigate the circumstances of his sighs, which I managed not at all. And having journeyed far in this unhappy wise, we came again to the spacious sea and sky and clean air of Twist Tickle, where Judith was with my uncle on the neck of land by the Lost Soul, and the world returned to its familiar guise of coast and ocean and free winds, and the _Shining Light_, once more scraped and refitted against the contingencies of my presence, awaited the ultimate event in the placid waters of Old Wives' Cove....

* * * * *

Judith was grown to womanly age and ways and perfected in every maidenly attraction. When she came shyly from the shadows of the house into the glowing sunset and spring weather of our landing, I stopped, amazed, in the gravelled walk of our garden, because of the incredible beauty of the maid, now first revealed in bloom, and because of her modesty, which was yet slyly aglint with coquetry, and because of the tender gravity of her years, disclosed in the first poignant search of the soul I had brought back from my long journeying. I thought, I recall, at the moment of our meeting, that laboring in a mood of highest exaltation God had of the common clay fashioned a glory of person unsuspected of the eager, evil world out of which I had come: I rejoiced, I know, that He had in this bleak remoteness hidden it from the eyes of the world. I fancied as she came--'twas all in a flash--that into this rare creation He had breathed a spirit harmonious with the afflatus of its conception. And being thus overcome and preoccupied, I left the maid's coy lips escape me, but kissed her long, slender-fingered hand, which she withdrew, at once, to give to John Cather, who was most warm and voluble in greeting. I was by this hurt; but John Cather was differently affected: it seemed he did not care. He must be off to the hills, says he, and he must go alone, instantly, at the peril of his composure, to dwell with his mind, says he, upon the thoughts that most elevated and gratified him. I watched him off upon the Whisper Cove road with improper satisfaction, for, thinks I, most ungenerously, I might now, without the embarrassment of his presence, which she had hitherto rejected, possess Judith's lips; but the maid was shy and perverse, and would have none of it, apprising me sweetly of her determination.

By this I was again offended.

"Judy," says my uncle, when we were within, "fetch the bottle. Fetch the bottle, maid!" cries he; "for 'tis surely an occasion."

Judith went to the pantry.

"Dannie," my uncle inquired, leaning eagerly close when she was gone from the room, "is ye been good?"

'Twas a question put in anxious doubt: I hesitated--wondering whether or not I had been good.

"Isn't ye?" says he. "Ye'll tell _me_, won't ye? I'll love ye none the less for the evil ye've done."

Still I could not answer.

"I've been wantin' t' know," says he, his three-fingered fist softly beating the table, shaking in an intense agitation of suspense. "I've been waitin' an' waitin' for months--jus' t' hear ye say!"

I was conscious of no evil accomplished.

"Ye've a eye, Dannie!" says he.

I exposed my soul.

"That's good," says he, emphatically; "that's very good. I 'low I've fetched ye up very well."

Judith came with the bottle and little brown jug: she had displaced me from this occupation.

"O' course," says my uncle, in somewhat doubtful and ungenerous invitation, "ye'll be havin' a little darn ol' rum with a ol' shipmate. Ye've doubtless learned manners abroad," says he.

'Twas a delight to hear the fond fellow tempt me against his will: I smiled.

"Jus' a little darn, Dannie," he repeated, but in no convivial way. "Jus' a little nip--with a ol' shipmate?"

I laughed most heartily to see Judith's sisterly concern for me.

"A wee drop?" my uncle insisted, more confidently.

"I'm not used to it, sir," says I.

"That's good," he declared; "that's very good. Give the devil his due, Dannie: I've fetched ye up very well."

'Twas with delight he challenged a disputation....

* * * * *

After this ceremony I sat with Judith on the peak of the Lost Soul. My uncle paced the gravelled walk, in the gathering dusk below, whence, by an ancient courtesy, he might benignantly spy upon the love-making. We were definite against the lingering twilight: I smiled to catch the old man pausing in the path with legs spread wide and glowing face upturned. But I had no smile for the maid, poor child! nor any word to say, save only to express a tenderness it seemed she would not hear. 'Twas very still in the world: there was no wind stirring, no ripple upon the darkening water, no step on the roads, no creak of oar-withe, no call or cry or laugh of humankind, no echo anywhere; and the sunset clouds trooped up from the rim of the sea with ominous stealth, throwing off their garments of light as they came, advancing, grim and gray, upon the shadowy coast. Across the droch, lifted high above the maid and me, his slender figure black against the pale-green sky, stood John Cather on the brink of Tom Tulk's cliff, with arms extended in some ecstasy to the smouldering western fire. A star twinkled serenely in the depths of space beyond, seeming, in the mystery of that time, to be set above his forehead; and I was pleased to fancy, I recall, that 'twas a symbol and omen of his nobility. Thus the maid and I: thus we four folk, who played the simple comedy--unknowing, every one, in the departing twilight of that day.

I reproached the maid. "Judith," says I, "you've little enough, it seems, to say to me."

"There is nothing," she murmured, "for a maid to say."

"There is much," I chided, "for a man to hear."

"Never a word, Dannie, lad," she repeated, "that a maid may tell."

I turned away.

"There is a word," says she, her voice fallen low and very sweet, soft as the evening light about us, "that a lad might speak."

"And what's that, Judith?"

"'Tis a riddle," she answered; "and I fear, poor child!" says she, compassionately, "that you'll find it hard to rede."

'Twas unkind, I thought, to play with me.

"Ah, Dannie, child!" she sighed, a bit wounded and rebuffed, it seems to me now, for she smiled in a way more sad and tenderly reproachful than anything, as she looked away, in a muse, to the fading colors in the west. "Ah, Dannie," she repeated, her face grown grave and wistful, "you've come back the same as you went away. Ye've come back," says she, with a brief little chuckle of gratification, "jus' the same!"

I thrust out my foot: she would not look at it.

"The self-same Dannie," says she, her eyes steadfastly averted.

"I've _not_!" I cried, indignantly. That the maid should so flout my new, proud walk! 'Twas a bitter reward: I remembered the long agony I had suffered to please her. "I've _not_ come back the same," says I. "I've come back changed. Have you not seen my foot?" I demanded. "Look, maid!" I beat the rock in a passion with that new foot of mine--straight and sound and capable for labor as the feet of other men. It had all been done for her--all borne to win the love I had thought withheld, or stopped from fullest giving, because of this miserable deformity. A maid is a maid, I had known--won as maids are won. "Look at it!" cries I. "Is it the same as it was? Is it crooked any more? Is it the foot of a man or a cripple?" She would not look: but smiled into my eyes--with a mist of tears gathering within her own. "No," I complained; "you will not look. You would not look when I walked up the path. I wanted you to look; but you would not. You would not look when I put my foot on the table before your very eyes. My uncle looked, and praised me; but you would not look." 'Twas a frenzy of indignation I had worked myself into by this time. I could not see, any more, the silent glow of sunset color, the brooding shadows, the rising masses of cloud, darkening as they came: I have, indeed, forgotten, and strangely so, the appearance of sea and sky at that moment. "You would not look," I accused the maid, "when I leaped the brook. I leaped the brook as other men may leap it; but you would not look. You would not look when I climbed the hill. Who helped you up the Lost Soul turn? Was it I? Never before did I do it. All my life I have crawled that path. Was it the club-footed young whelp who helped you?" I demanded. "Was it that crawling, staggering, limping travesty of the strength of men? But you do not care," I complained. "You do not care about my foot at all! Oh, Judith," I wailed, in uttermost agony, "you do not care!"

I knew, then, looking far away into the sea and cloud of the world, that the night was near.

"No," says she.

"Judith!" I implored. "Judith ... Judith!"

"No," says she, "I cannot care."

"Just _say_ you do," I pleaded, "to save me pain."

"I will not tell you otherwise."

I was near enough to feel her tremble--to see her red lips draw away, in stern conviction, from her white little teeth.

"You do not care?" I asked her.

"I do not care."

'Twas a shock to hear the words repeated. "Not care!" I cried out.

"I do not care," says she, turning, all at once, from the sullen crimson of the sky, to reproach me. "Why should I care?" she demanded. "I have never cared--never cared--about your foot!"

I should have adored her for this: but did not know enough.

"Come!" says she, rising; "there is no sunset now. 'Tis all over with. The clouds have lost their glory. There is nothing to see. Oh, Dannie, lad," says she--"Dannie, boy, there is nothing here to see! We must go home."

I was cast down.

"No glory in the world!" says she.

"No light," I sighed; "no light, at all, Judith, in this gloomy place."

And we went home....

* * * * *

For twelve days after that, while the skirt of winter still trailed the world, the days being drear and gray, with ice at sea and cold rain falling upon the hills, John Cather kept watch on Judith and me. 'Twas a close and anxiously keen surveillance. 'Twas, indeed, unremitting and most daring, by night and day: 'twas a staring and peering and sly spying, 'twas a lurking, 'twas a shy, not unfriendly, eavesdropping, an observation without enmity or selfish purpose, ceasing not at all, however, upon either, and most poignant when the maid and I were left together, alone, as the wretched man must have known, in the field of sudden junctures of feeling. I remember his eyes--dark eyes, inquiring in a kindly way--staring from the alders of the Whisper Cove road, from the dripping hills, from the shadowy places of our house: forever in anxious question upon us. By this I was troubled, until, presently, I divined the cause: the man was disquieted, thinks I, to observe my happiness gone awry, but would not intrude even so much as a finger upon the tangle of the lives of the maid and me, because of the delicacy of his nature and breeding. 'Twas apparent, too, that he was ill: he would go white and red without cause, and did mope or overflow with a feverish jollity, and would improperly overfeed at table or starve his emaciating body. But after a time, when he had watched us narrowly to his heart's content, he recovered his health and amiability, and was the same as he had been. Judith and I were then cold and distant in behavior with each other, but unfailing in politeness: 'twas now a settled attitude, preserved by each towards the other, and betraying no feeling of any sort whatever.

"John Cather," says I, "you've been ill."

He laughed. "You are a dull fellow!" says he, in his light way. "'Tis the penalty of honesty, I suppose; and nature has fined you heavily. I have not been ill: I have been troubled."

"By what, John Cather?"

"I fancied," he answered, putting his hands on my shoulders, very gravely regarding me as he spoke, "that I must sacrifice my hope. 'Twas a hope I had long cherished, Dannie, and was become like life to me." His voice was fallen deep and vibrant and soft; and the feeling with which it trembled, and the light in the man's eyes, and the noble poise of his head, and the dramatic arrangement of his sentences, so affected me that I must look away. "Miserable necessity!" says he. "A drear prospect! And with no more than a sigh to ease the wretched fate! And yet," says he, quite heartily, "the thing had a pretty look to it. Really, a beautiful look. There was a fine reward. A good deed carries it. Always remember that, Dannie--and remember that I told you. There was a fine reward. No encouragement of applause, Dannie--just a long sigh in secret: then a grim age of self-command. By jove! but there was a splendid compensation. A compensation within myself, I mean--a recollection of at least one heroically unselfish act. There would have been pain, of course; but I should never have forgotten that I had played a man's part--better than a man's part: a hero's part, a god's part. And that might have been sufficiently comforting: I do not know--perhaps. I'll tell you about it, Dannie: the thing was to have been done," he explained, in sincere emotion, every false appearance gone from him, "for whom, do you think?"

I did not know.

"For a friend," says he.

"But John Cather," says I, "'twas too much to require of you."

His eyes twinkled.

"You've no trouble now, have you?" I asked.

"Not I!" cries he. "I have read a new fortune for myself. Trouble? Not I! I am very happy, Dannie."

"That's good," says I; "that's very good!"

XXIII

THE TIDE-RIP

Next day 'twas queer weather. 'Twas weather unaccountable, weather most mysteriously bent, weather that laughed at our bewilderment, as though 'twere sure of wreaking its own will against us by some trick recently devised. Never before had I known a time so subtly, viciously, confidently to withhold its omens. Queer weather, indeed! here, in early spring, with drift-ice still coming in vast floes from the north, queer weather to draw the sweat from us, while a midsummer blue loom of the main-land hung high and fantastically shaped in the thick air. Breathless, ominously colored weather! Why, the like, for stillness and beggarly expression of intention, had never been known to Twist Tickle: they talked with indignation of it on Eli Flack's stage; 'twas a day that bred wrecks, said they. Ay, and 'twas an outrage upon the poor fishermen of that coast: what was a man to do, said they--what was he to do with his salmon-gear and cod-traps--in this evil, wilful departure from traditional procedure? And what did the weather mean? would it blow wet or dry? would it come with snow? would the wind jump off shore or from the northeast? and how long, in the name o' Heaven, would the weather sulk in distance before breaking in honest wrath upon the coast? 'Twas enough, said they, to make a man quit the grounds; 'twas enough, with _this_ sort o' thing keepin' up, t' make a man turn carpenter or go t' Sydney!

All this I heard in passing.

"Ah, well, lads," says my uncle, "ye'll find winter skulkin' jus' over the horizon. An' he'll be down," he added, confidently, "within a day or two."

I led John Cather to the brink of Tom Tulk's cliff, where, in the smoky sunshine, I might talk in secret with him. 'Twas in my mind to confide my perplexity and miserable condition of heart, without reserve of feeling or mitigation of culpable behavior, and to lean upon his wisdom and tactful arts for guidance into some happier arrangement with the maid I loved. It seemed to me, I recall, as I climbed the last slope, that I had been, all my life, an impassive lover, as concerned the welfare of the maid: that I had been ill-tempered and unkind, marvellously quick to find offence, justified in this cruel and stupid conduct by no admirable quality or grace or achievement--a lad demanding all for nothing. I paused, I recall, at the cairn, to sigh, overcome and appalled by this revelation; and thereupon I felt such a rush of strenuous intention in my own behalf--a determination to strive and scheme--that I had scarce breath to reach the edge of the cliff, and could not, for the life of me, begin to narrate my desperate state to John Cather. But John Cather was not troubled by my silence: he was sprawled on the thick moss of the cliff, his head propped in his hands, smiling, like the alien he was, upon the ice at sea and the untimely blue loom of the main-land and the vaguely threatening color of the sky. I could not begin, wishful as I might be for his wise counsel: but must lie, like a corpse, beyond all feeling, contemplating that same uneasy prospect. I wished, I recall, that I might utter my errand with him, and to this day wish that I had been able: but then could not, being overwhelmed by this new and convincing vision of all my communion with the maid.

"By Jove!" John Cather ejaculated.

"What is it?" cries I.

"I must tell you," says he, rising to his elbow. "I can keep it no longer."

I waited.

"I'm in love," he declared. "Dannie," cries he, "I--I'm--_in love_!"

And now a peculiar change came upon the world, of which I must tell: whatever there had been of omen or beauty or curious departure from the natural appearance of sea and sky--whatever of interest or moment upon the brooding shore or abroad on the uttermost waters beyond it--quite vanished from my cognizance. 'Twas a drear day and place I dwelt in, a very dull world, not enlivened by peril or desirable object or the difficulty of toil, not excused or in any way made tolerable by a prospect of sacrificial employment. I had been ill brought up to meet this racking emergency. What had there been, in all my life, fostered in body and happiness, expanding in the indulgent love and pitiably misdirected purpose of my uncle, to fit me for this denial of pure and confident desire? I tried, God knows I tried! summoning to my help all the poor measure of nobility the good Lord had endowed me with and my uncle had cultivated--I tried, God knows! to receive the communication with some wish for my friend's advancement in happiness. In love: 'twas with Judith--there was no other maid of Twist Tickle to be loved by this handsome, learned, brilliantly engaging John Cather. Nay, but 'twas all plain to me now: my deformity and perversity--my ridiculously assured aspiration towards the maid. I had forgot John Cather--the youth and person of him, his talents and winning accomplishments of speech and manner.

"And there she comes!" cries he.

'Twas Judith on the Whisper Cove road.

"You'll wish me luck, Dannie?" says he, rising. "I'll catch her on the way. I'll tell her that I love her. I can wait no longer. Wish me luck!" says he. "Wish me luck!"

I took his hand.

"Wish me luck!" he repeated.

"I wish you luck," says I.

"Thanks," says he: and was off.

I lied in this way because I would not have Judith know that I grieved for her, lest she suffer, in days to come, for my disappointment....

* * * * *

I was faint and very thirsty, I recall: I wished that I might drink from a brook of snow-water. 'Twas Calling Brook I visualized, which flows from the melting ice of cold, dark crevices, musically falling, beneath a canopy of springing leaves, to the waters of Sister Bight. I wished to drink from Calling Brook, and to lie down, here alone and high above the sea, and to sleep, without dreaming, for a long, long time. I lay me down on the gray moss. I did not think of Judith and John Cather. I had forgotten them: I was numb to the passion and affairs of life. I suffered no agony of any sort; 'twas as though I had newly emerged from unconsciousness--the survivor of some natural catastrophe, fallen by act of God, conveying no blame to me--a survivor upon whom there still lingered a beneficent stupor of body. Presently I discovered myself in a new world, with which, thinks I, brisking up, I must become familiar, having no unmanly regret, but a courageous heart to fare through the maze of it; and like a curious child I peered about upon this strange habitation. Near by there was a gray, weathered stone in the moss: I reached to possess it--and was amazed to find that my hand neither overshot nor fell short, but accurately performed its service. I cast the stone towards heaven: 'twas a surprise to see it fall earthward in obedience to some law I could not in my daze define--some law I had with impatient labor, long, long ago, made sure I understood and would remember. I looked away to sea, stared into the sky, surveyed the hills: 'twas the self-same world I had known, constituted of the same materials, cohering in the self-same way, obedient to the self-same laws, fashioned and adorned the same as it had been. 'Twas the self-same world of sea and sky and rock, wherein I had so long dwelt--a world familiar to my feet and eyes and heart's experience: a world of tree-clad, greening hills, of known paths, of children's shouting and the chirp and song of spring-time. But there had come a change upon its spirit: nay! thinks I, quite proud of the conceit, its spirit had departed--the thing had died to me, and was become without meaning, an inimical mystery. Then I felt the nerves of my soul tingle with awakening: then I suffered very much.

And evening came....

* * * * *

By-and-by, having heartened myself with courageous plans, I stepped out, with the feet of a man, upon the Whisper Cove road. I had it in mind to enjoy with Judith and John Cather the tender disclosure of their love. I would kiss Judith, by Heaven! thinks I: I would kiss her smile and blushes, whatever she thought of the deed; and I would wring John Cather's fragile right hand until his teeth uncovered and he groaned for mercy. 'Twas fearsome weather, then, so that, overwrought in the spirit as I was, I did not fail to feel the oppression of it and the instinctive alarm it aroused. 'Twas very still and heavy and sullen and uneasy, 'twas pregnant of fears, like a moment of suspense: I started when an alder branch or reaching spruce limb struck me. In this bewildering weather there were no lovers on the road; the valleys, the shadowy nooks, the secluded reaches of path, lay vacant in the melancholy dusk. 'Twas not until I came to the last hill, whence the road tumbled down to a cluster of impoverished cottages, listlessly clinging to the barren rock of Whisper Cove, that I found Judith. John Cather was not about: the maid was with Aunt Esther All, the gossip, and was now so strangely agitated that I stopped in sheer amazement. That the child should be abject and agonized before the grim, cynical tattler of Whisper Cove! That she should gesticulate in a way so passionate! That she should fling her arms wide, that she should cover her face with her hands, that she should in some grievous disturbance beat upon her heart! I could not make it out. 'Twas a queer way, thinks I, to express the rapture of her fortune; and no suspicion enlightened me, because, I think, of the paralysis of despair upon my faculties.

I approached.

"Go 'way!" she cried.

I would not go away: 'twas Aunt Esther, the gossip, that went, and in a rout--with a frightened backward glance.

"Go 'way!" Judith pleaded. "I'm not able to bear it, Dannie. Oh, go back!"

'Twas an unworthy whim, and I knew it to be so, whatever the vagaries of maids may be, however natural and to be indulged, at these crises of emotion. She had sent John Cather away, it seemed, that she might be for a space alone, in the way of maids at such times, as I had been informed; and she would now deny to me the reflection of her happiness.

"'Tis unkind," I chided, "not to share this thing with me."

She started: I recall that her eyes were round and troubled with incomprehension.

"I've come to tell you, Judith," says I, "that I do not care."

'Twas a brave lie: I am proud of it.

"'Tis kind," she whispered.

We were alone. 'Twas dusk: 'twas dusk, to be sure, of a disquieting day, with the sky most confidently foreboding some new and surprising tactics in the ancient warfare of the wind against us; but Judith and I, being young and engaged with the passion of our years, had no consciousness of the signs and wonders of the weather. The weather concerns the old, the satisfied and disillusioned of life, the folk from whom the romance of being has departed. What care had we for the weather? 'Twas dusk, and we were alone at the turn of the road--a broad, rocky twist in the path, not without the softness of grass, where lovers had kissed in parting since fishing was begun from Twist Tickle and Whisper Cove. By the falling shades and a screen of young leaves we were hid from the prying eyes of Whisper Cove. 'Twas from me, then, that the maid withdrew into a deeper shadow, as though, indeed, 'twas not fit that we should be together. I was hurt: but fancied, being stupid and self-centred, that 'twas a pang of isolation to which I must grow used.

"Why, Judy," says I, "don't, for pity's sake, do that! Why, maid," I protested, "I don't care. I'm glad--I'm just _glad_!"

"Glad!" she faltered, staring.

"To be sure I'm glad," I cried.

She came close to me.

"I don't care," says I.

"You do not care!" she muttered, looking away. "You do not care!" she repeated, in a voice that was the faintest, most drear echo of my own.

"Not I!" I answered, stoutly. "Not a whit!"

She began to cry.

"Look up!" I besought her. "I do not care," I declared again, seeking in this way to ease her pity of me. "I do _not_ care!"

'Twas a strange thing that happened then: first she kissed the cuff of my coat, in the extravagant way of a maid, and then all at once clapped her hands over her eyes, as though to conceal some guilt from a righteous person. I perceived this: I felt the shame she wished to hide, and for a moment wondered what that shame might be, but forgot, since the eyes were mine neither to have read nor to admire, but John Cather's. And what righteousness had I? None at all that she should stand ashamed before me. But there she stood, with her blue eyes hid--a maid in shame. I put my finger under her chin and tried to raise her face, but could not; nor could I with any gentleness withdraw her hands. She was crying: I wondered why. I stooped to peer between her fingers, but could see only tears and the hot color of her flushes. I could not fathom why she cried, except in excess of happiness or in adorable pity of me. The wind rose, I recall, as I puzzled; 'twas blowing through the gloaming in a soothing breeze from the west, as though to put the fears of us to sleep. A gentle gust, descending to our sheltered place, rustled the leaves and played with the maid's tawny hair; and upon this she looked up--and stepped into the open path, where, while her tears dried and her drooping helplessness vanished, she looked about the sky, and felt of the wind, to discover its direction and promise of strength. 'Twas a thing of tragical significance, as it seems to me now, looking back from the quiet mood in which I dwell; but then, having concern only to mitigate the maid's hysteria, following upon the stress of emotion I conceived she had undergone, this anxious survey of the weather had no meaning. I watched her: I lingered upon her beauty, softened, perfected, enhanced in spiritual quality by the brush of the dusk; and I could no longer wish John Cather joy, but knew that I must persist in the knightly endeavor.

"The wind's from the west," says she. "A free wind."

"For Topmast Harbor," says I; "but a mean breeze for folk bound elsewhere."

"A free wind for Topmast Harbor," she repeated.

"No matter," says I.

"'Tis a great thing," she replied, "for them that are bound to Topmast Harbor."

'Twas reproachfully spoken.

"You'll be going home now, maid," I entreated. "You'll leave me walk with you, will you not?"

She looked down in a troubled muse.

"You'll leave me follow, then," says I, "to see that you've no fear of the dark. 'Twill be dark soon, Judith, and I'm not wanting you to be afraid."

"Come!" cries she. "I _will_ walk with you--home!"

She took my hand, and entwined her long fingers with mine, in the intimate, confiding way she was used to doing when we were a lad and a maid on the dark roads. Many a time, when we were lad and maid, had Judith walked forward, and I backward, to provide against surprise by the shapes of night; and many a dark time had she clutched my hand, nearing the lights of Twist Tickle, to make sure that no harm would befall her. And now, in this childish way, she held me; and she walked with me twenty paces on the path to Twist Tickle, whereupon she stopped, and led me back to that same nook of the road, and doggedly released me, and put an opposing hand on my breast.

"Do you bide here," says she; "and when I call, do you go home."

"An you wish it," I answered.

'Twas not more than twenty paces she walked towards the impoverished cottages of Whisper Cove: then turned, and came again to me. I wondered why she stood in this agony of indecision: but could not tell, nor can be blamed for the mystification, relentlessly as I blame myself.

"Dannie," she moaned, looking up, "I can go nowhere!"

"You may go home, maid," says I. "'Tis a queer thing if you may not go home."

"'Tis an unkind thing."

"Come!" I pleaded. "'Twill so very soon be dark on the road; and I'm not wantin' you t' wander in the dark."

"I cannot," says she. "I just cannot!"

"Judith," I chided, "you may. 'Tis an unseemly thing in you to say."

"But I cannot bear it, Dannie!"

"I would cry shame upon you, Judith," I scolded, "were _I_ not so careful of your feelings."

She seemed now to command herself with a resolution of which tender maids like Judith should not be capable: 'tis too lusty and harsh a thing. I stood in awe of it. "Dannie," says she, "do you go home. I'll follow an I can. And if I do not come afore long, do you tell un to think that I spend the night with the wife of Moses Shoos. You may kiss me, Dannie, lad," says she, "an you cares t' do it."

I did care: but dared not.

"I'm wishin' for it," says she.

"But," I protested, "is you sure 'tis right?"

"'Tis quite right," she answered. "God understands."

"I'd be glad," says I.

"You may kiss me, then."

I kissed her. 'Tis a thing I regret: 'twas a kiss so lacking in earnest protraction--so without warmth and vigor. 'Twas the merest brushing of her cheek. I wish I had kissed her, like a man, in the fulness of desire I felt; but I was bound, in the last light of that day, to John Cather, in knightly honor.

"'Twas very nice," says she. "I wisht you'd do it again."

I did.

"Thank you, Dannie," she whispered.

"Judith!" I cried. "Judith! For shame, to thank me!"

"And now," says she, "you'll be off on the road. You'll make haste, will you not? And you'll think, will you not, that I spend the night with Mrs. Shoos? You'll not fret, Dannie: I'd grieve to think that you fretted. I'd not have you, for all the world, trouble about me. Not you," she repeated, her voice falling. "Not you, Dannie--dear. You'll be off, now," she urged, "for 'tis long past time for tea. And you'll tell un all, will you not, that I talked o' spendin' the night with Mrs. Moses Shoos at Whisper Cove?"

"An you wish it, Judith."

"Good-night!"

I pressed away....

* * * * *

When I came to our house on the neck of land by the Lost Soul, I turned at the threshold to survey the weather. I might have saved myself the pains and puzzle of that regard. The print of sea and sky was foreign: I could make nothing of it. 'Twas a quiet sea, breaking, in crooning lullaby, upon the rocks below my bedroom window. It portended no disturbance: I might sleep, thinks I, with the soft whispering to lull me, being willing for the magic shoes of sleep to take me far away from this agony as never man was before. The wind was blowing from the west: but not in gusts--a sailing breeze for the timid. I was glad that there was no venomous intention in the wind: 'twas a mild and dependable wind, grateful to such as fared easterly in the night. I wished that all men might fare that way, in the favoring breeze, but knew well enough that the purposes of men are contrary, the one to the other, making fair winds of foul, and foul of fair, so that there was no telling, of any event, whatever the apparent nature of it, whether sinister or benign, the preponderance of woe or happiness issuing from it. Over all a tender sky, spread with soft stretches of cloud, and set, in its uttermost depths, with stars. 'Twas dark enough now for the stars to shine, making the most of the moon's absence, which soon would rise. Star upon star: a multitude of serenely companionable lights, so twinkling and knowing, so slyly sure of the ultimate resolution of all the doubts and pains and perplexities of the sons of men! But still there was abroad an oppression: a forewarning, in untimely heat and strain, of disastrous weather. 'Twas that I felt when I turned from the contemplation of the stars to go within, that I might without improper delay inform our maid-servant of Judith's intention.

Then I joined my uncle....

XXIV

JOHN CATHER'S FATE

'Twas with a start that I realized the lateness of the hour. Time for liquor! 'Twas hard to believe. My uncle sat with his bottle and glass and little brown jug. The glass was empty and innocent of dregs; the stopper was still tight in the bottle, the jug brimming with clear water from our spring. He had himself fetched them from the pantry, it seemed, and was now awaiting, with genial patience, the arrival of company to give an air of conviviality to the evening's indulgence. I caught him in a smiling muse, his eye on the tip of his wooden leg; he was sailed, it seemed, to a clime of feeling far off from the stress out of which I had come. There was no question: I was not interrogated upon the lapse of the crew, as he called John Cather and Judy and me, from the politeness of attendance at dinner, which, indeed, he seemed to have forgotten in a train of agreeable recollections. He was in a humor as serene and cheerfully voluble as ever I met with in my life; and when he had bade me join him at the table to pour his first dram, he fell to on the narrative of some adventure, humorously occurring, off the Funks, long, long ago, in the days of his boyhood. I did not attend, nor did I pour the dram: being for the time deeply occupied with reflections upon the square, black bottle on the table before me--the cure of moods my uncle had ever maintained it would work.

I got up resolved.

"Where you goin', Dannie?" says my uncle, his voice all at once vacant of cheerfulness.

"To the pantry, sir," I answered.

"Ah!" says he. "Is it ginger-ale, Dannie?"

"No, sir."

"That's good," says he, blankly; "that's very good. For Judy," he added, "is fell into the habit o' tipplin' by day, an' the ginger-ale is all runned out."

I persevered on my way to the pantry.

"Dannie!" he called.

I turned.

"Is you quite sure, lad," he asked, with an anxious rubbing of his stubble of gray beard, "that 'tisn't ginger-ale?"

"I'm wanting a glass, sir," I replied, testily. "I see but one on the table."

"Ah!" he ejaculated. "A glass!"

I returned with the glass.

"Dannie," says my uncle, feigning a relief he dared not entertain, "you was wantin' a drop o' water, wasn't you?" He pushed the little brown jug towards me. "I _'lowed_ 'twas water," says he, hopefully, "when you up an' spoke about gettin' a glass from the pantry." He urged the jug in my direction. "Ay," he repeated, not hopefully now at all, but in a whisper more like despair, "I jus' _'lowed_ 'twas a drop o' water."

The jug remained in its place.

"Dannie," he entreated, with a thick forefinger still urging the jug on its course, "you is thirsty, I _knows_ you is!"

I would not touch the jug.

"You been havin' any trouble, shipmate?" he gently asked.

"Yes, sir," I groaned. "Trouble, God knows!"

"Along o' Judy?"

'Twas along o' Judy.

"A drop o' water," says he, setting the glass almost within my hand, "will do you good."

'Twas so anxiously spoken that my courage failed me. I splashed water into the glass and swallowed it.

"That's good," says he; "that's very good."

I pushed the glass away with contempt for its virtue of comfort; and I laughed, I think, in a disagreeable way, so that the old man, unused to manifestations as harsh and irreligious as this, started in dismay.

"Good," he echoed, staring, unconvinced and without hope; "that's very good."

And now, a miserable determination returning, I fixed my eyes again on the square, black bottle of rum. 'Twas a thing that fairly fascinated my attention. The cure of despair was legendary, the palatable quality a thing of mere surmise: I had never experienced either; but in my childhood I had watched my uncle's fearsome moods vanish, as he downed his drams, one by one, giving way to a grateful geniality, which sent my own bogies scurrying off, and I had fancied, from the smack of his lips, and from the eager lifting of the glasses at the Anchor and Chain, the St. John's tap-room we frequented, that a drop o' rum was a thing to delight the dry tongue and gullet of every son of man. My uncle sat under the lamp: I remember his countenance, aside from the monstrous scars and disfigurements which the sea had dealt him--its anxious regard of me, its intense concern, its gathering purpose, the last of which I did not read at that moment, but now recall and understand. 'Twas quiet and orderly in the room: the geometrical gentlemen were there riding the geometrically tempestuous sea in a frame beyond my uncle's gargoylish head, and the tidied rocking-chair, which I was used to addressing as a belted knight o' the realm, austerely abode in a shadow. I was in some saving way, as often happens in our lives, conscious of these familiar things, to which we return and cling in the accidents befalling us and in the emergencies of feeling we must all survive. The room was as our maid-servant had left it, bright and warm and orderly: there was as yet no disarrangement by the conviviality we were used to. 'Tis not at all my wish to trouble you with the despair I suffered that night, with Judith gone from me: I would not utter it--'twas too deep and unusual and tragical to disturb a world with. But still I stared at that square, black bottle of rum, believing, as faith may be, in the surcease it contained.

I watched that bottle.

"Dannie," says my uncle, with a wish, no doubt, for a diversion, "is the moon up?"

I walked to the window. "'Tis up," I reported; "but 'tis hid by clouds, an' the wind's rising."

"The wind rising?" says he. "'Twill do us no harm."

Of course, my uncle did not know which of us was at sea.

"The wind," he repeated, "will do no harm."

I sat down again: and presently got my glass before me, and reached for the square, black bottle of rum. I could stand it no longer: I could really stand it no longer--the pain of this denial of my love was too much for any man to bear.

"I'll have a drop," says I, "for comfort."

My uncle's hand anticipated me.

"Ah!" says he. "For comfort, is it?"

Unhappily, he had the bottle in his hand. 'Twas quite beyond my reach--done with any courtesy. I must wait for him to set it down again. The jug was close enough, the glass, too; but the bottle was in watchful custody. My uncle shook the bottle, and held it to the lamp; he gauged its contents: 'twas still stout--he sighed. And now he set it on the table, with his great, three-fingered hand about the neck of it, so that all hope of possession departed from me: 'twas a clutch too close and meaning to leave me room for hope. I heard the wind, rising to a blow, but had no fret on that account: there was none of us at sea, thank God! we were all ashore, with no care for what the wind might do. I observed that my uncle was wrought up to a pitch of concern to which he was not used. He had gone pale, who was used, in exaltation of feeling, to go crimson and blue in the scars of him; but he had now gone quite white and coldly sweaty, in a ghastly way, with the black bottle held up before him, his wide little eyes upon it. I had never before known him to be in fact afraid; but he was now afraid, and I was persuaded of it, by his pallor, by his trembling hand, by the white and stare of his eyes, by the drooping lines of his poor, disfigured face. He turned from the bottle to look at me; but I could not withstand the poignancy of his regard: I looked away--feeling some shame, for which I could not account to myself. And then he sighed, and clapped the black bottle on the table, with a thump that startled me; and he looked towards me with a resolution undaunted and determined. I shall never forget, indeed, the expression he wore: 'twas one of perfect knightliness--as high and pure and courageous as men might wear, even in those ancient times when honorable endeavor (by the tales of John Cather) was a reward sufficient to itself.

I shall never forget: I could not forget.

"Dannie," says he, listlessly, "'tis wonderful warm in here. Cast up the window, lad."

'Twas not warm. There was no fire; and the weather had changed, and the wind came in at the open door, running in cold draughts about the house. 'Twas warm with the light of the lamp, to be sure; 'twas cosey and grateful in the room: but the entering swirl of wind was cold, and the emotional situation was such in bleakness and mystery as to make me shiver.

I opened the window.

"That's good," he sighed. "How's the tide?"

"'Tis the ebb, sir."

"Could ye manage t' see Digger Rock?" he inquired.

The moon, breaking out, disclosed it: 'twas a rock near by, submerged save at low-tide--I could see it.

"Very good," says he. "Could ye hit it?"

"I've nothing to shy, sir."

"But an you had?" he insisted.

My tutor entered the hall. I heard him go past the door. 'Twas in a quick, agitated step, not pausing to regard us, but continuing up the stair to his own room. I wondered why that was.

"Eh, Dannie?" says my uncle.

"I might, sir," I answered.

"Then," says he, "try it with this bottle!"

I cast the bottle.

"That's good," says he. "Ye're a wonderful shot, Dannie. I heared un go t' smash. That's good; that's _very_ good!"

* * * * *

We sat, my uncle and I, for an hour after that, I fancy, without managing an exchange: I would address him, but he would not hear, being sunk most despondently in his great chair by the empty, black grate, with his eyes fixed in woe-begone musing upon the toes of his ailing timber; and he would from time to time insinuate an irrelevant word concerning the fishing, and, with complaint, the bewildering rise and fall of the price of fish, but the venture upon conversation was too far removed from the feeling of the moment to engage a reply. Presently, however, I commanded myself sufficiently to observe him with an understanding detached from my own bitterness; and I perceived that he sat hopeless and in fear, as in the days when I was seven, with his head fallen upon his breast and his eyes grown tragical, afraid, but now in raw kind and infinite measure, of the coming of night upon the world he sailed by day. I heard nothing from my tutor--no creak of the floor, no step, no periodical creaking of his rocking-chair. He had not, then, thinks I, cast off his clothes; he had not gone to reading for holy orders, as was, at intervals, his custom--he had thrown himself on his bed. But I neither cared nor wondered: I caught sight of my uncle's face again--half amazed, wholly despondent, but yet with a little glint of incredulous delight playing, in brief flashes, upon it--and I could think of nothing else, not even of Judith, in her agony of mysterious shame upon the Whisper Cove road, nor of her disquieting absence from the house, nor of the rising wind, nor of the drear world I must courageously face when I should awake from that night's sleep.

I considered my uncle.

"Do ye go t' bed, Dannie," says he, looking up at last. "Ye've trouble enough."

I rose, but did not wish to leave him comfortless in the rising wind. I had rather sit with him, since he needed me now, it seemed, more than ever before.

"Ye'll not trouble about me, lad?"

I would not be troubled.

"That's good," says he. "No need o' your troublin' about _me_. Ol' Nick Top's able t' take care o' _his_self! That's very good."

I started away for bed, but turned at the door, as was my custom, to wish my uncle good-night. I said nothing, for he was in an indubitable way not to be disturbed--having forgotten me and the affection I sought at all times to give him. He was fallen dejectedly in his chair, repeating, "_For behold the Lord will come with fire, and with his chariots like a whirlwind, to render his anger with fury, and his rebuke with the flames of fire._" I paused at the door to watch him, and I saw that his maimed hand wandered over the table until it found his glass, and that he caught and raised the glass, and that he set it down again, and that he pushed the empty thing away.

I saw all that....

* * * * *

And I went to bed; but I did not go to sleep. In the first place, I could not, and, for better reason, my tutor got astir the moment my door was closed. I heard his cautious descent to the dining-room. The man had been waiting to get me out of the way; but I heard him go down, and that right easily, in the fall of his stockinged feet, and in the click of his door-latch, and in the creak of the stair. I cast my clothes off in haste, but lay wide awake in my bed--as who would not?--listening to the ominous murmur of voices from below. My tutor, it seemed, was placid and determined; my uncle was outraged. I heard the old man's voice rise in a rage, fall to a subdued complaint, patter along in beseeching. It seemed 'twas all to no purpose; my tutor was obdurate, and my uncle yielded to his demands, however unwillingly. There was the mutter of agreement, there was the click of my uncle's strong-box, there was the clink of gold coin. I listened for the pop of a new cork; but I did not hear it: I heard the jug of spring water exchange hands--no more than that. 'Twas very queer. But I was not concerned with it, after all. Let my uncle and John Cather deal with each other as they would, in any way engaging the clink of gold from my uncle's strong-box; 'twas for me, unconcerned, to look out of my window, to discover the weather. And this I did; and I found the weather threatening--very dark, with the moon hid by clouds, and blowing up in a way promising a strength of wind not to be disregarded by folk who would put to sea.

The end of this was that John Cather and my uncle came above. My tutor went straightway to his room, with steps that hastened past my door; but my uncle paused, pushed the door cautiously ajar, thrust in his head.

"Is you asleep, Dannie?" says he.

"No, sir. I'm wonderful wide awake."

"Ah, well!" he whispered, in such a way that I perceived his triumphant glee, though I could not see his face for the darkness of my room; "you might as well turn over an' go t' sleep."

"An' why, sir?" I asked.

"Like a babe, Dannie," says he, addressing me with fondness, as though I were a little child again--"jus' like a babe."

He walked to my window and looked out to sea.

"Dirty weather the morrow, sir," I ventured.

"The lights o' the mail-boat!" he exclaimed. "She've left Fortune Harbor. Ecod, b'y!"

He withdrew at once and in haste, and I heard him stump off to my tutor's quarters, where, for a long time after that, there occurred many and mysterious noises. I could not understand, but presently made the puzzle out: John Cather was packing up. 'Twas beyond doubt; the thump and creak, the reckless pulling of drawers, steps taken in careless hurry and confusion, the agitation of the pressing need of haste, all betrayed the business in hand. John Cather was packing up: he was rejected of Judith--he was going away! It hurt me sorely to think that the man would thus in impulsive haste depart, after these years of intimate companionship, with a regard so small for my wishes in the matter. Go to sleep like a babe? I could not go to sleep at all; I could but lie awake in trouble. John Cather was packing up; he was going away! My uncle helped him with his trunks down the stairs and to the stage-head, where, no doubt, my uncle's punt was waiting to board the belated mail-boat--the mean little trunk John Cather had come with, and the great leather one I had bought him in London. I was glad, at any rate, that my gifts--the books and clothes and what-not I had bought him abroad--were not to be left to haunt me. But that John Cather should not say good-bye! I could not forgive him that. I waited and waited, lying awake in the dark, for him to come. And come he did, when the trunks were carried away and the whistle of the mail-boat had awakened our harbor. He pushed my door open without knocking, knowing well enough that I was wide awake. 'Twas then dark in my room; he could not see me.

"Where are your matches?" says he.

I told him, but did not like the manner of his speech. 'Twas in a way to rouse the antagonism of any man, being most harsh and hateful.

"I can't find them," he complained.

"You'll find them well enough, John Cather," I chided, "an you looks with patience."

He had no patience, it seemed, but continued to fumble about, and at last, with his back turned to me, got my lamp lighted. For a moment he stood staring at the wall, as though he lacked the resolution to turn. And when he wheeled I knew that I looked upon the countenance of a man who had been broken on the wheel; and I was very much afraid. John Cather was splashed and streaked with the mud of the hills. 'Twas not this evidence of passionate wandering that alarmed me; 'twas his pallor and white lips, his agonized brows, the gloomy depth to which his bloodshot eyes had withdrawn.

"Now," says he, "I want to look at you."

I did not want to be looked at.

"Sit up!" he commanded.

I sat up in bed.

"Put the blanket down," says he. "I have come, I say, to look at you."

I uncovered to my middle.

"And _this_," says he, "is the body of you, is it?"

The lamp was moved close to my face. John Cather laughed, and began, in a way I may not set down, to comment upon me. 'Twas not agreeable. I tried to stop him. 'Twas unkind to me and 'twas most injurious to himself. He did us vile injustice. I stopped my ears against his raving, but could not shut it out. "And this is the body of you! This is the body of you!" Here was not the John Cather who had come to us clear-eyed and buoyant and kindly out of the great world; here was an evil John Cather--the John Cather of a new birth at Twist Tickle. 'Twas the man our land and hearts had made him; he had here among us come to his tragedy and was cast away. I knew that the change had been worked by love--and I wondered that love could accomplish the wreck of a soul. I tried to stop his ghastly laughter, to quiet his delirium of brutality; and presently he was still, but of exhaustion, not of shame. Again he brought the lamp close to my face, and read it, line upon line, until it seemed he could bear no longer to peruse it. What he saw there I do not know--what to give him hope or still to increase the depth of his hopelessness. He betrayed no feeling; but the memory of his pale despair continues with me to this day, and will to the end of my years. Love has never appeared to me in perfect beauty and gentleness since that night; it can wear an ugly guise, achieve a sinister purpose, I know.

John Cather set the lamp on the table, moving in a preoccupation from which I had been cast out.

"John Cather!" I called.

My uncle shouted from below.

"John!" I urged.

"Parson," my uncle roared, "ye'll lose your passage!"

Cather blew out the light.

"John," I pleaded, "you'll not go without saying good-bye?"

He stopped on the threshold; but I did not hear him turn. I called him again; he wheeled, came stumbling quickly to my bed, caught my hand.

"Forgive me, Dannie!" he groaned. "My heart is broken!"

He ran away: I never saw him again....

* * * * *

And now, indeed, was the world gone all awry! What had in the morning of that day been a prospect of joy was vanished in a drear mist of broken hopes. Here was John Cather departed in sore agony, for which was no cure that ever I heard of or could conceive. Here was John Cather gone with the wreck of a soul. A cynical, purposeless, brooding life he must live to his last day: there was no healing in all the world for his despair. Here with us--to whom, in the years of our intercourse, he gave nothing but gladness--his ruin had been wrought. 'Twas not by wish of us; but there was small comfort in the reflection, since John Cather must suffer the same. Here was John Cather gone; and here, presently, was my uncle, pacing the floor below. Up and down, up and down: I thought the pat of his wooden leg would go on forever--would forever, by night and day, express the restlessness of thirst. And here was Judy, abroad, in trouble I could not now divine--'twas a thing most strange and disturbing that she should stand in distress before me. I had accounted for it, but could not now explain--not with John Cather gone. I was mystified, not agitated by alarms. I would meet the maid on the Whisper Cove road in the morning, thinks I, and resolve the puzzle. I would discover more than that. I would discover whether or not I had blundered. But this new hope, springing confidently though it did, could not thrive in the wretchedness of John Cather's departure. I was not happy.

My uncle roughly awoke me at dawn.

"Sir?" I asked.

"Judy," says he, "haves disappeared."

He held me until he perceived that I had commanded myself....

XXV

TO SEA

Judith had vanished! Our maid-servant, astir in the child's behalf before dawn, in her anxious way, was returned breathless from Whisper Cove with the report. There was no Judith with the wife of Moses Shoos: nor had there been that night. 'Twas still but gray abroad--a drear dawn: promising a belated, sullen day. We awoke the harbor to search the hills, the ledges of the cliffs, the surf-washed shore. 'Twas my uncle hither, the maid-servant thither, myself beyond. Clamorous knocking, sudden lights in the cottages, lights pale in the murky daylight, and a subdued gathering of our kind men-folk: I remember it all--the winged haste, the fright of them that were aroused, the shadows and the stumbling of the farther roads, the sickly, sleepy lights in the windows, the troubled dawn. We dispersed: day broadened, broke gray and glum upon Twin Islands--but discovered no lost maid to us.

'Twas whispered about, soon, that the women had spoken evil of Judith in our harbor; and pursuing this ill-omened rumor, in a rage I could not command, I came at last upon the shameful truth: the women had spoken scandal of the maid, the which she had learned from Aunt Esther All, the Whisper Cove gossip. The misfortune of gentle Parson Stump, poor man! who had in the ear of Eli Flack's wife uttered a sweetly jocular word concerning Judith and the honorable intention of John Cather, who walked with her alone on the roads, about his love-making. But, unhappily, the parson being absent-minded, 'twas into the dame's deaf ear he spoke, and his humor became, in transmission, by pure misfortune, an evil charge.

There was then no help for it, old wives being what they are: authorized by the gentle parson, depending upon the report of a dame of character, the tittle-tattle spread and settled like a mist, defiling Judith to the remotest coves of Twin Islands. And Judith was vanished! I knew then, in the gray noon of that day, why the child had cried in that leafy nook of the Whisper Cove road that she could go nowhere.

I cursed myself.

"Stop, Dannie!" cries my uncle. "She's still on the hills--somewheres there, waitin' t' be sought out an' comforted an' fetched home."

I thought otherwise.

"She've lied down there," says he, "t' cry an' wait for me an' you."

I watched him pace the garden-path.

"An' I'm not able, the day, for sheer want o' rum," he muttered, "t' walk the hills."

I looked away to the sombre hills, where she might lie waiting for him and me; but my glance ran far beyond, to the low, gray sky and to a patch of darkening sea. And I cursed myself again--my stupidity and ease of passion and the mean conceit of myself by which I had been misled to the falsely meek conclusion of yesterday--I cursed myself, indeed, with a live wish for punishment, in that I had not succored the maid when she had so frankly plead for my strength. John Cather? what right had I to think that she had loved him? On the hills? nay, she was not there; she was not on the hills, waiting for my uncle and me--she was gone elsewhere, conserving her independence and self-respect, in the womanly way she had. My uncle fancied she was a clinging child: I knew her for a proud and impulsively wilful woman. With this gossip abroad to flout her, she would never wait on the hills for my uncle and me: 'twas the ultimate pain she could not bear in the presence of such as loved and trusted her; 'twas the event she had feared, remembering her mother, all her life long, dwelling in sensitive dread, as I knew. She would flee the shame of this accusation, without fear or lingering, unable to call upon the faith of us. 'Twas gathering in my mind that she had fled north, as the maids of our land would do, in the spring, with the Labrador fleet bound down for the fishing. 'Twas a reasonable purpose to possess her aimless feet. She would ship on a Labradorman: she might, for the wishing--she would go cook on a north-bound craft from Topmast Harbor, as many a maid of our coast was doing. And by Heaven! thinks I, she had.

Her mother's punt was gone from Whisper Cove.

"She've lied down there on the hills," my uncle protested, "t' cry an' wait. Ye're not searchin', Dannie, as ye ought. She've _jus'_ lied down, I tell ye," he whimpered, "t' wait."

'Twas not so, I thought.

"She've her mother's shame come upon her," says he, "an' she've hid."

I wished it might be so.

"Jus' lied down an' hid," he repeated.

"No, no!" says I. "She'd never weakly hide her head from this."

He eyed me.

"Not Judith!" I expostulated.

"She'd never bear her mother's shame, Dannie," says he. "She'd run away an' hide. She--she--_told_ me so."

I observed my uncle: he was gone with the need of rum--exhausted and unnerved: his face all pallid and splotched. 'Twas a ghastly thing to watch him stump the gravelled walk of our garden in the gray light of that day.

"Uncle Nicholas, sir," says I, for the moment forgetting the woe of Judith's hapless state in this new alarm, "do you come within an' have a dram."

"Ye're not knowin' _how_ t' search," he complained. "Ye're but a pack o' dunderheads!"

"Come, sir!" I pleaded.

"Is ye been t' Skeleton Droch?" he demanded. "She've a habit o' readin' there. No!" he growled, in a temper; "you isn't had the _sense_ t' go t' Skeleton Droch."

"A dram, sir," I ventured, "t' comfort you."

"An' ye bide here, ye dunderhead!" he accused.

I put my hand on his shoulder: he flung it off. I took his arm: he wrenched himself free in an indignant passion.

"Ye're needin' it, sir," says I.

"For God's sake, child!" he cried; "do you go find the maid an' leave me be. God knows I've trouble enough without ye!"

The maid was not at Skeleton Droch: neither on the hills, nor in the hiding-places of the valleys, nor lying broken on the ledges of the cliffs, nor swinging in the sea beneath--nor was she anywhere on the land of Twin Islands or in the waters that restlessly washed the boundary of gray rock. 'Twas near evening now, and a dreary, angrily windy time. Our men gathered from shore and inland barren--and there was no Judith, nor cold, wet body of Judith, anywhere to be found. 'Twas unthinkingly whispered, then, that the maid had fled with John Cather on the mail-boat: this on Tom Tulk's Head, in its beginning, and swiftly passed from tongue to tongue. Being overwrought when I caught the surmise--'twas lusty young Jack Bluff that uttered it before me--I persuaded the youth of his error, which, upon rising, he admitted, as did they all of that group, upon my request, forgiving me, too, I think, the cruel abruptness of my argument, being men of feeling, every one. The maid was not gone with John Cather, she was not on the hills of Twin Islands; she was then fled to Topmast Harbor for self-support, that larger settlement, whence many Labradormen put out at this season for the northerly fishing. And while, sheltered from the rising wind, the kind men-folk of our harbor talked with my uncle and me on Eli Flack's stage, there came into the tickle from Topmast Harbor, in quest of water, a punt and a man, being bound, I think, for Jimmie Tick's Cove. 'Twas by him reported that a maid of gentle breeding had come alone in a punt to Topmast in the night. And her hair? says I. She had hair, and a wonderful sight of it, says he. And big, blue eyes? says I. She _had_ eyes, says he; an' she had a nose, so far as he could tell, which had clapped eyes on the maid, an' she had teeth an' feet, himself being able to vouch for the feet, which clipped it over the Topmast roads quite lively, soon after dawn, in search of a schooner bound down the Labrador.

I knew then into what service the _Shining Light_ should be commissioned.

"Ay, lad," says my uncle.

"And will you ship, sir?"

"Why, Lord love us, shipmate!" he roared, indignantly, to the amazement of our folk; "is ye thinkin' I'm past my labor?"

I nodded towards Whisper Cove.

"The man," he agreed.

It came about thus that I sought out Moses Shoos, wishing for him upon this high adventure because of his chivalry. Nay, but in Twist Tickle, whatever the strength and courage and kindliness of our folk, there was no man so to be desired in a crucial emergency. The fool of the place was beyond purchase, beyond beseeching: kept apart by his folly from every unworthy motive to action. He was a man of pure leading, following a voice, a vision: I would have him upon this sacred adventure in search of the maid I loved. 'Twas no mean errand, no service to be paid for; 'twas a high calling--a ringing summons, it seemed to me, to perilous undertakings, rewarded by opportunity for peril in service of a fond, righteous cause. Nay, but I would have this unspoiled fool: I would have for companion the man who put his faith in visions, could I but win him. I believed in visions--in the deep, limpid, mysterious springs of conduct. I believed in visions--in the unreasoning progress, an advance in the way of life not calculated, but made in unselfish faith, with eyes lifted up from the vulgar, swarming, assailing advantages of existence. My uncle and the fool and I! there was no peril upon the sea to daunt us: we would find and fetch, to her own place, in perfect honor, the maid I loved. And of all this I thought, whatever the worth of it, as I ran upon the Whisper Cove road, in the evening of that gray, blustering day.

Moses was within.

"Here you is," he drawled. "I 'lowed you'd come. How's the weather?"

"'Twill blow big guns, Moses," I answered; "and I'll not deceive you."

"Well, well!" he sighed.

And would he go with us?

"I been waitin' for you, Dannie," says he. "I been sittin' here in the kitchen--waitin'."

'Twas a hopeful word.

"If mother was here," he continued, "she'd have 'lowed I'd better wait. 'You wait for Dannie,' mother would have 'lowed, 'until he comes.' An' so I _been_ waitin'."

Well, there I was.

"That was on'y mother," he added; "an', o' course, I'm married now."

Walrus Liz of the Labrador came in. I rose--and was pleasantly greeted. She sat, then, and effaced herself.

"Mrs. Moses Shoos," says Moses, with a fond look upon that woman of ill-favor and infinite tenderness, "haves jus' _got_ t' be consulted."

I was grown hopeless--remembering Tumm's story of the babies.

"In a case like this," Moses confided, "mother always 'lowed a man _ought_ to."

"But your wife?" I demanded.

"Oh, my goodness, Dannie!" cries he. "For shame!"

"Tell me quickly, Moses."

"Mrs. Moses Shoos," he answered, with gravest dignity, "_always_ 'lows, agreein' with me--that _mother_ knowed!"

'Twas in this way that Moses Shoos shipped on the _Shining Light_....

* * * * *

Shortly now, by an arrangement long made and persistently continued, we had the _Shining Light_ ready for sea--provisioned, her water-casks full. I ran through the house upon a last survey; and I found my uncle at the pantry door, his bag on his back, peering into the dark interior of the little room, in a way most melancholy and desirous, upon the long row of bottles of rum. He sighed, closed the door with scowling impatience, and stumped off to board the ship: I was not heroic, but subtracted one from that long row, and stowed it away in a bag I carried. We dropped the anchor of the _Shining Light_, and beat out, through the tickle, to the wide, menacing sea, with the night coming down and a gale of wind blowing lustily up from the gray northeast. 'Twas thus not in flight the _Shining Light_ continued her cruise, 'twas in pursuit of the maid I loved: a thing infinitely more anxious and momentous--a thing that meant more than life or death to me, with the maid gone as cook on a Labrador craft. 'Twas sunset time; but there was no sunset--no fire in the western sky: no glow or effulgent glory or lurid threat. The whole world was gone a dreary gray, with the blackness of night descending: a darkening zenith, a gray horizon lined with cold, black cloud, a coast without tender mercy for the ships of men, a black sea roughening in a rage to the northeast blasts. 'Twas all hopeless and pitiless: an unfeeling sea, but troubled, it seemed to me, by depths of woe and purpose and difficulty we cannot understand. We were bound for Topmast Harbor, on a wind favorable enough for courageous hearts; and my uncle had the wheel, and the fool of Twist Tickle and I kept the deck to serve him. He did not call upon us to shorten sail, in answer to the old schooner's complaint; and I was glad that he did not, as was the fool also....

* * * * *

'Twas night when we put into Topmast Harbor; but my uncle and the fool and I awoke the place without regard for its way-harbor importance or number of houses. There was no maid there, said they; there had been a maid, come at dawn, but she was fortunately shipped, as she wished to be. What maid was that? They did not know. Was she a slender, tawny-haired, blue-eyed, most beauteous maid? They did but sleepily stare. I found a man, awakened from sound slumber, who remembered: ay, there was a maid of that description, who had shipped for cook on the _Likely Lass_. And whence the _Likely Lass_? Bonavist' Bay, says he, put in for rest: a seventy-tonner, put out on the favoring wind. And was there another woman aboard? Ecod! he did not know: 'twas a craft likely enough for any maid, other woman aboard or not. And so we set out again, in the night, dodging the rocks of that tickle, by my uncle's recollection, and presently found ourselves bound north, in search of the _Likely Lass_, towards a sea that was bitter with cold and dark and wind, aboard a schooner that was far past the labor of dealing with gusts and great waves.

And in the night it came on to blow very hard from the east, with a freezing sleet, which yet grew colder, until snow mixed with it, and at last came in stifling clouds. It blew harder: we drove on, submerged in racing froth to the hatches, sheathed in ice, riding on a beam, but my uncle, at the wheel, standing a-drip, in cloth of ice, as long ago he had stood, in the first of the cruise of the _Shining Light_, would have no sail off the craft, but humored her northward in chase of the _Likely Lass_. 'Twas a reeling, plunging, smothered progress through the breaking sea, in a ghostly mist of snow swirling in the timid yellow of our lights, shrouding us as if for death in the rush and seethe of that place. There was a rain of freezing spray upon us--a whipping rain of spray: it broke from the bows and swept past, stinging as it went. 'Twas as though the very night--the passion of it--congealed upon us. There was no reducing sail--not now, in this cold rage of weather. We were frozen stiff and white: 'twas on the course, with a clever, indulgent hand to lift us through, or 'twas founder in the crested waves that reached for us.

"Dannie!" my uncle shouted.

I sprang aft: but in the roar of wind and swish and thud of sea could not hear him.

"Put your ear close," he roared.

I heard that; and I put my anxious ear close.

"I'm gettin' kind o' cold," says he. "Is ye got a fire in the cabin?"

I had not.

"Get one," says he.

I got a fire alight in the cabin. 'Twas a red, roaring fire. I called my uncle from the cabin door. The old man gave the wheel to the fool and came below in a humor the most genial: he was grinning, indeed, under the crust of ice upon his beard; and he was rubbing his stiff hands in delight. He was fair happy to be abroad in the wind and sea with the _Shining Light_ underfoot.

"Ye got it warm in here," says he.

"I got more than that, sir," says I. "I got a thing to please you."

Whereupon I fetched the bottle of rum from my bag.

"Rum!" cries he. "Well, well!"

I opened the bottle of rum.

"Afore ye pours," he began, "I 'low I'd best--God's sake! What's that?"

'Twas a great sea breaking over us.

"Moses!" my uncle hailed.

The schooner was on her course: the fool had clung to the wheel.

"Ice in that sea, Dannie," says my uncle. "An' ye got a bottle o' rum! Well, well! Wonderful sight o' ice t' the nor'ard. Ye'll find, I bet ye, that the fishin' fleet is cotched fast somewheres long about the straits. An' a bottle o' rum for a cold night! Well, well! I bet ye, Dannie," says he, "that the _Likely Lass_ is gripped by this time. An' ye got a bottle o' rum!" cries he, in a beaming fidget. "Rum's a wonderful thing on a cold night, lad. Nothin' like it. I've tried it. Was a time," he confided, "when I was sort o' give t' usin' of it."

I made to pour him a dram.

"Leave me hold that there bottle," says he. "I wants t' smell of it."

'Twas an eager sniff.

"_'Tis_ rum," says he, simply.

I raised the bottle above the glass.

"Come t' think of it, Dannie," says he, with a wistful little smile, "that there bottle o' rum will do more good where you had it than where I'd put it."

I corked the bottle and returned it to my bag.

"That's good," he sighed; "that's very good!"

I made him a cup o' tea....

When I got the wheel, with Moses Shoos forward and my uncle gone asleep below, 'twas near dawn. We were under reasonable sail, running blindly through the night: there were no heroics of carrying-on--my uncle was not the man to bear them. But we were frozen stiff--every block and rope of us. And 'twas then blowing up with angrier intention; and 'twas dark and very cold, I recall--and the air was thick with the dust of snow, so that 'twas hard to breathe. Congealing drops of spray came like bullets: I recall that they hurt me. I recall, too, that I was presently frozen to the deck, and that my mitts were stuck to the wheel--that I became fixed and heavy. The old craft had lost her buoyant will: she labored through the shadowy, ghostly crested seas, in a fashion the most weary and hopeless. I fancied I knew why: I fancied, indeed, that she had come close to her last harbor. And of this I soon made sure: I felt of her, just before the break of day, discovering, but with no selfish perturbation, that she was exhausted. I felt of her tired plunges, of the stagger of her, of her failing strength and will; and I perceived--by way of the wheel in my understanding hands--that she would be glad to abandon this unequal struggle of the eternal youth of the sea against her age and mortality. And the day broke; and with the gray light came the fool of Twist Tickle over the deck. 'Twas a sinister dawn: no land in sight--but a waste of raging sea to view--and the ship laden forward with a shameful burden of ice.

Moses spoke: I did not hear him in the wind, because, I fancy, of the ice in my ear.

"Don't hear ye!" I shouted.

"She've begun t' leak!" he screamed.

I knew that she had.

"No use callin' the skipper," says he. "All froze up. Leave un sleep."

I nodded.

"Goin' down," says he. "Knowed she would."

My uncle came on deck: he was smiling--most placid, indeed.

"Well, well!" he shouted. "Day, eh?"

"Leakin'," says Moses.

"Well, well!"

"Goin' down," Moses screamed.

"Knowed she would," my uncle roared. "Can't last long in this. What's that?"

'Twas floe ice.

"Still water," says he. "Leave me have that there wheel, Dannie. Go t' sleep!"

I would stand by him.

"Go t' sleep!" he commanded. "I'll wake ye afore she goes."

I went to sleep: but the fool, I recall, beat me at it; he was in a moment snoring....

* * * * *

When I awoke 'twas broad day--'twas, indeed, late morning. The _Shining Light_ was still. My uncle and the fool sat softly chatting over the cabin table, with breakfast and steaming tea between. I heard the roar of the wind, observed beyond the framing door the world aswirl and white; but I felt no laboring heave, caught no thud and swish of water. The gale, at any rate, had not abated: 'twas blowing higher and colder. My uncle gently laughed, when I was not yet all awake, and the fool laughed, too; and they ate their pork and brewis and sipped their tea with relish, as if abiding in security and ease. I would fall asleep again: but got the smell of breakfast in my nose, and must get up; and having gone on deck I found in the narrow, white-walled circle of the storm a little world of ice and writhing space. The _Shining Light_ was gripped: her foremast was snapped, her sails hanging stiff and frozen; she was listed, bedraggled, incrusted with ice--drifted high with snow. 'Twas the end of the craft: I knew it. And I went below to my uncle and the fool, sad at heart because of this death, but wishing very much, indeed, for my breakfast. 'Twas very warm and peaceful in the cabin, with pork and brewis on the table, my uncle chuckling, the fire most cheerfully thriving. I could hear the wind--the rage of it--but felt no stress of weather.

"Stove in, Dannie," says my uncle. "She'll sink when the ice goes abroad."

I asked for my fork.

"Fill up," my uncle cautioned. "Ye'll need it afore we're through."

'Twas to this I made haste.

"More pork than brewis, lad," he advised. "Pork takes more grindin'."

I attacked the pork.

"I got your bag ready," says he.

Then I had no cause to trouble....

* * * * *

'Twas deep night, the gale still blowing high with snow, when the wind changed. It ran to the north--shifted swiftly to the west. The ice-pack stirred: we felt the schooner shiver, heard the tumult of warning noises, as that gigantic, lethargic mass was aroused to unwilling motion by the lash of the west wind. The hull of the _Shining Light_ collapsed. 'Twas time to be off. I awoke the fool--who had still soundly slept. The fool would douse the cabin fire, in a seemly way, and put out the lights; but my uncle forbade him, having rather, said he, watch the old craft go down with a warm glow issuing from her. Presently she was gone, all the warmth and comfort and hope of the world expiring in her descent: there was no more a _Shining Light_; and we three folk were cast away on a broad pan of ice, in the midst of night and driving snow. Of the wood they had torn from the schooner against this time, the fool builded a fire, beside which we cowered from the wind; and soon, the snow failing and the night falling clear and starlit, points of flickering light appeared on the ice beyond us. There were three, I recall, diminishing in the distance; and I knew, then, what I should do in search of Judith when the day came. Three schooners cast away beyond us; one might be the _Likely Lass_: I would search for Judith, thinks I, when day came. 'Twas very long in coming, and 'twas most bitter cold and discouraging in its arrival: a thin, gray light, with no hopeful hue of dawn in the east--frosty, gray light, spreading reluctantly over the white field of the world to a black horizon. I wished, I recall, while I waited for broader day, that some warm color might appear to hearten us, some tint, however pale and transient, to recall the kindlier mood of earth to us; and there came, in answer to my wishing, a flush of rose in the east, which waxed and endured, spreading its message, but failed, like a lamp extinguished, leaving the world all sombre and inimical, as it had been.

I must now be off alone upon my search: my wooden-legged uncle could not travel the ice--nor must the fool abandon him.

"I 'lowed ye would, lad," says he, "like any other gentleman."

I bade them both good-bye.

"Three schooners cast away t' the nor'ard," says he. "I'm hopin' ye'll find the _Likely Lass_. Good-bye, Dannie. I 'low I've fetched ye up very well. Good-bye, Dannie."

I was moved away now: but halted, like a dog between two masters.

"Good-bye!" he shouted. "God bless ye, Dannie--God bless ye!"

I turned away.

"God bless ye!" came faintly after me.

That night I found Judith with the crew of the _Likely Lass_, sound asleep, her head lying, dear child! on the comfortable breast of the skipper's wife. And she was very glad, she said, that I had come....

XXVI

THE DEVIL'S TEETH

'Twill not, by any one, be hard to recall that the great gale of that year, blowing unseasonably with snow, exhausted itself in three days, leaving the early birds of the Labrador fleet, whose northward flitting had been untimely, wrecked and dispersed upon the sea. In the reaction of still, blue weather we were picked up by the steamer _Fortune_, a sealing-craft commissioned by the government for rescue when surmise of the disaster grew large; but we got no word of my uncle and the fool of Twist Tickle until the fore-and-after _Every Time_ put into St. John's with her flag flying half-mast in the warm sunshine. 'Twas said that she had the bodies of men aboard: and 'twas a grewsome truth--and the corpses of women, too, and of children. She brought more than the dead to port: she brought the fool, and the living flesh and spirit of my uncle--the old man's body ill-served by the cold, indeed, but his soul, at sight of me, springing into a blaze as warm and strong and cheerful as ever I had known. 'Twas all he needed, says he, t' work a cure: the sight of a damned little grinnin' Chesterfieldian young gentleman! Whatever the actual effect of this genteel spectacle, my uncle was presently on his feet again, though continuing much broken in vigor; and when he was got somewhat stronger we set out for Twist Tickle, to which we came, three days later, returning in honor to our own place.

The folk were glad that we were all come back to them....

* * * * *

I loved Judith: I loved the maid with what exalted wish soul and body of me understood--conceiving her perfect in every grace and spiritual adornment: a maid lifted like a star above the hearts of the world. I considered my life, and counted it unworthy, as all lives must be before her: I considered my love, but found no spot upon it. I loved the maid: and was now grown to be a man, able, in years and strength and skill of mind and hand, to cherish her; and I would speak to her of this passion and dear hope, but must not, because of the mystery concerning me. There came, then, an evening when I sought my uncle out to question him; 'twas a hushed and compassionate hour, I recall, the sunset waxing glorious above the remotest sea, and the night creeping with gentle feet upon the world, to spread its soft blanket of shadows.

I remembered the gray stranger's warning.

"Here I is, lad," cries my uncle, with an effort at heartiness, which, indeed, had departed from him, and would not come again. "Here I is--havin' a little dram o' rum with Nature!"

'Twas a draught of salt air he meant.

"Dannie," says he, in overwhelming uneasiness, his voice become hoarse and tremulous, "ye got a thing on your mind!"

I found him very old and ill and hopeless; 'twas with a shock that the thing came home to me: the man was past all labor of the hands, got beyond all ships and winds and fishing--confronting, now, with an anxious heart, God knows! a future of dependence, for life and love, upon the lad he had nourished to the man that was I. I remembered, again, the warning of that gray personage who had said that my contempt would gather at this hour; and I thought, as then I had in boyish faith most truly believed, that I should never treat my uncle with unkindness. 'Twas very still and glowing and beneficent upon the sea; 'twas not an hour, thinks I, whatever the prophecy concerning it, for any pain to come upon us. My uncle was fallen back in a great chair, on a patch of greensward overlooking the sea, to which he had turned his face; and 'twas a kindly prospect that lay before his aged eyes--a sweep of softest ocean, walled with gentle, drifting cloud, wherein were the fool's great Gates, wide open to the glory beyond.

"I'm wishing, sir," said I, "to wed Judith."

"'Tis a good hope," he answered.

I saw his hand wander over the low table beside him: I knew what it sought--and that by his will and for my sake it must forever seek without satisfaction.

"Sir," I implored, "I've no heart to ask her!"

He did not answer.

"And you know why, sir," I accused him. "You know why!"

"Dannie," says he, "ye've wished for this hour."

"And I am ready, sir."

He drew then from his pocket a small Bible, much stained and wrinkled by water, which he put on the table between us. "Dannie, lad," says he, "do ye now go t' your own little room, where ye was used t' lyin', long ago, when ye was a little lad." He lifted himself in the chair, turned upon me--his eyes frankly wet. "Do ye go there," says he, "an' kneel, like ye used t' do in the days when ye was but a little child, an' do ye say, once again, for my sake, Dannie, the twenty-third psa'm."

I rose upon this holy errand.

"'_The Lord is my shepherd,_'" my uncle repeated, looking away to the fool's great Gates, "'_I shall not want._'"

That he should not.

"'_He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters._'"

And so it should be.

"Dannie," my uncle burst out, flashing upon me with a twinkle, as when I was a lad, "I 'low I've fetched ye up very well: for say what ye will, 'twas a wonderful little anchor I give ye t' hold to!"

* * * * *

I went then to the little bed where as a child I lay waiting for sleep to come bearing fairy dreams. 'Twas still and dusky in the room: the window, looking out upon the wide, untroubled waters, was a square of glory; and the sea whispered melodiously below, as it had done long, long ago, when my uncle fended my childish heart from all the fears of night and day. I looked out upon the waste of sea and sky and rock, where the sombre wonder of the dusk was working, clouds in embers, cliffs and water turning to shadows; and I was comforted by this returning beauty. I repeated the twenty-third psalm, according to my teaching, reverently kneeling, as I was bid; and my heart responded, as it has never failed to do. I remembered: I remembered the windless dusks and fresh winds and black gales through which as a child I had here serenely gone to sleep because my uncle sat awake and watchful below. I remembered his concern and diffident caresses in the night when I had called to him to come: I remembered all that he had borne and done to provide the happiness and welfare he sought in loving patience to give the child he had. Once again, as when I was a child, the sea and sunset took my soul as a harp to stir with harmonious chords of faith; and I was not disquieted any more--nor in any way troubled concerning the disclosure of that black mystery in which I had thrived to this age of understanding. And 'twas in this mood--this grateful recollection of the multitudinous kindnesses of other years--that I got up from my knees to return to my uncle.

"Dannie," says he, having been waiting, it seemed, to tell me this, first of all, "ye'll remember--will ye not?--for your guidance an' comfort, that 'tis not a tie o' blood betwixt you an' ol' Nick Top. He's no kin t' shame ye: he's on'y a chance acquaintance."

The tale began at the waning of the evening glory....

* * * * *

"Your father an' me, lad," said my uncle, "was shipmates aboard the _Will-o'-the-Wisp_ when she was cast away in a nor'east gale on the Devil's Teeth, near twenty year ago: him bein' the master an' me but a hand aboard. How old is you now, Dannie? Nineteen? Well, well! You was but six months come from above, lad, when that big wind blowed your father's soul t' hell; an' your poor mother was but six months laid away. We was bound up from the Labrador that night, with a cargo o' dry fish, picked up 'long shore in haste, t' fill out a foreign bark at Twillingate. 'Twas late in the fall o' the year, snow in the wind, the sea heapin' up in mountains, an' the night as black as a wolf's throat. Your father was crowdin' on, Dannie, in the way he had, bein' a wonderful driver, an' I 'lowed he was fetchin' too close t' the Harborless Shore for safety; but I wouldn't tell un so, lad, for I didn't know un so well as I knows you, bein' on'y a hand aboard, ye see, with a word or two t' le'ward of what ye might call a speakin' acquaintance with the skipper. I 'lowed he'd strike the Rattler; but he cleared the Rattler, by good luck, an' fetched up at dawn on the Devil's Teeth, a mean, low reef o' them parts, where the poor _Will-o'-the-Wisp_ broke her back an' went on in splinters with the sea an' wind. 'Twas over soon, Dannie; 'twas all over soon, by kindness o' Providence: the ol' craft went t' pieces an' was swep' on t' le'ward by the big black waves."

In the pause my uncle's hand again searched the low table for the glass that was not there.

"I'm not wantin' t' tell ye," he muttered.

I would not beg him to stop.

"Me an' your father, Dannie," he continued, presently, dwelling upon the quiet sunset, now flaring with the last of its fire, "somehow cotched a grip o' the rock. 'Twas a mean reef t' be cast away on, with no dry part upon it: 'twas near flush with the sea, an' flat an' broad an' jagged, slimy with sea-weed; an' 'twas washed over by the big seas, an' swam in the low roll o' the black ones. I 'low, Dannie, that I was never afore cotched in such a swirl an' noise o' waters. 'Twas wonderful--the thunder an' spume an' whiteness o' them big waves in the dawn! An' 'twas wonderful--the power o' them--the wolfish way they'd clutch an' worry an' drag! 'Twas a mean, hard thing t' keep a grip on that smoothed rock; but I got my fingers in a crack o' the reef, an' managed t' hold on, bein' stout an' able, an' sort of savage for life--in them old days. Afore long, your poor father crep' close, lad, an' got his fingers in the same crack. 'Twas all done for you, Dannie, an' ye'll be sure t' bear it in mind--will ye not?--when ye thinks o' the man hereafter. I seed the big seas rub un on the reef, an' cut his head, an' break his ribs, as he come crawlin' towards me. 'Twas a long, long time afore he reached the place. Ye'll not forget it--will ye lad?--ye'll surely not forget it when ye thinks o' the man that was your father."

I looked at the sward, soft and green with summer, and roundabout upon the compassionate shadows of evening.

"'Nick,' says your father," my uncle continued, "'does ye hear them men?'

"They was all gone down, poor souls! I knowed.

"'Nine men o' the crew,' says he, 'drownin' there t' le'ward.'

"'Twas o' Mary Luff's son I thought, that poor lad! for I'd fetched un on the v'y'ge.

"'I hear un callin',' says he.

"'Twas but a fancy: they was no voices o' them drowned men t' le'ward.

"'Nick,' says he, 'I didn't mean t' wreck her here. I was 'lowin' t' strike the Long Cliff, where they's a chance for a man's life. Does ye hear me, Nick?' says he. 'I didn't mean t' do it _here_!'

"'Skipper,' says I, 'was ye meanin' t' wreck that there ship?'

"'Not here,' says he.

"'Was ye meanin' t' _do_ it?' says I."

My uncle paused.

"Go on, sir," said I.

"Dannie," said he, "they come, then, three big seas, as seas will; an' I 'low"--he touched the crescent scar--"I got this here about that time."

'Twas quite enough for me.

"'Skipper,' says I," my uncle continued, "'what did ye go an' do it for?'

"'I got a young one t' St. John's,' says he.

"''Tis no excuse,' says I.

"'Ay,' says he, 'but I was 'lowin' t' make a gentleman of un. He's the on'y one I got,' says he, 'an' his mother's dead.'

"''Twas no way t' go about it,' says I.

"'Ye've no lad o' your own,' says he, 'an' ye don't know. They was a pot o' money in this, Top,' says he. 'I was 'lowin' t' make a gentleman o' my young one an I lived through; but I got t' go--I got t' go t' hell an' leave un. They's ice in these big seas,' says he, 'an I've broke my left arm, an' can't stand it much longer. But you'll live it out, Top; you'll live it out--I knows ye will. The wind's gone t' the nor'west, an' the sea's goin' down; an' they'll be a fleet o' Labrador craft up the morrow t' pick you up. An' I was 'lowin', Top,' says he, 'that you'd take my kid an' fetch un up as his mother would have un grow. They isn't no one else t' do it,' says he, 'an' I was 'lowin' you might try. I've broke my left arm,' says he, 'an' got my fingers froze, or I'd live t' do it myself. They's a pot o' money in this, Top,' says he. 'You tell the owner o' this here ship,' says he, 'an' he'll pay--he've got t' pay!'

"I had no wish for the task, Dannie--not bein' much on nursin' in them days.

"'I got t' go t' hell for this, Top,' says your father, 'an' I 'lowed ye'd ease the passage.'

"'Skipper, sir,' says I, 'is ye not got a scrap o' writin'?'

"He fetched out this here little Bible.

"'Top,' says he, 'I 'lowed I'd have a writin' t' make sure, the owner o' this here ship bein' on'y a fish speculator; an' I got it in this Bible.'

"'Then,' says I, 'I'll take that young one, Tom Callaway, if I weathers this here mess.'

"'Ay,' says he, 'but I'm not wishin' t' go t' hell for _that_.'

"'Twas come broad day now.

"'An I'm but able, Tom Callaway,' says I, 'I'll make a gentleman of un t' ease your pains.'

"'Would ye swear it?' says he.

"I put my hand on the Book; an' I knowed, Dannie, when I made ready t' take that oath, out there on the Devil's Teeth, that I'd give my soul t' hell for the wickedness I must do. I done it with my eyes wide open t' the burden o' evil I must take up; an' 'twas sort o' hard t' do, for I was by times a Christian man, Dannie, in them ol' days, much sot on church an' prayer an' the like o' that. But I seed that your poor father was bent on makin' a gentleman out o' you t' please your dead mother's wishes, an' I 'lowed, havin' no young un o' my own, that I _didn't_ know much about the rights of it; an' I knowed he'd suffer forever the pains o' hell for what he done, whatever come of it, an' I 'lowed 'twould be a pity t' have the murder o' seven poor men go t' waste for want o' one brave soul t' face the devil. 'Nick,' thinks I, while your father, poor, doomed man! watched me--I can see here in the dusk the blood an' water on his white face--'Nick,' thinks I, 'an you was one o' them seven poor, murdered men, ye'd want the price o' your life paid t' that wee young one. From heaven or hell, Nick, accordin' t' which place ye harbored in,' thinks I, 'ye'd want t' watch that little life grow, an' ye'd like t' say t' yourself, when things went ill with ye,' thinks I, 'that the little feller ye died for was thrivin', anyhow, out there on earth.' An' I 'lowed, for your wee sake, Dannie, an' for the sake o' the seven poor, murdered men, whose wishes I read in the dead eyes that looked into mine, an' for the sake o' your poor, fond father, bound soon for hell, that I'd never let the comfort o' my mean soul stand in the way o' fetchin' good t' your little life out o' all this woe an' wickedness. I 'lowed, Dannie, then an' there, on the Devil's Teeth, that could I but manage to endure, I'd stand by your little body an' soul t' the end, whatever become o' me."

'Twas but a tale my uncle told: 'twas not an extenuation--not a plea.

"'Tide's risin', Nick,' says your father. 'I can't stand it much longer with my broken arm an' froze fingers. Nick,' says he, 'will ye swear?'

"I was afraid, Dannie, t' swear it.

"'Won't ye?' says he. 'He've his mother's eyes--an' he'll be a wonderful good lad t' you.'

"I couldn't, Dannie.

"'For God's sake, Nick!' says he, 'swear it, an' ease my way t' hell.'

"'I swear!' says I.

"'Then,' says he, 'you turn the screws on the owner o' that there ship. The writin' is all you needs. You make a gentleman o' my lad, God bless un! accordin' t' the wishes of his mother. Give un the best they is in Newf'un'land. Nothin' too good in all the world for Dannie. You bear in mind, Nick,' says he, 'that I'm roastin' in hell,' says he, '_payin_' for his education!'"

My uncle's hand approached the low table, but was in impatience withdrawn; and the old man looked away--northward: to the place, far distant, where the sea still washed the Devil's Teeth.

"I've bore it in mind," he muttered.

Ay! and much more than that: the wreck of his own great soul upon my need had clouded twenty years of life with blackest terror of the unending pains of perdition.

"'Tis a lovely evening, Dannie," he sighed. "'Tis so still an' kind an' beautiful. I've often 'lowed, in weather like this, with the sea at peace an' a red sky givin' promise o' mercy for yet one day," said he, "that I'd like t' live forever--jus' live t' fish an' be an' hope."

"I wisht ye might!" I cried.

"An' t' watch ye grow, Dannie," said he, turning suddenly upon me, his voice fallen low and tremulous with affectionate feeling and pride. "Life," says he, so earnestly that I was made meek by the confession, "held nothin' at all for me but the Christian hope o' heaven until ye came; an' then, when I got ye, 'twas filled full o' mortal, unselfish, better aims. I've loved ye well, lad, in my own delight," says he. "I've loved ye in a wishful way," he repeated, "quite well."

I was humble in this presence....

* * * * *

"Your father," my uncle resumed, "couldn't stand the big seas. I cotched un by the jacket, an' held un with me, so long as I was able, though he 'lowed I might as well let un go t' hell, without drawin' out the fear o' gettin there. 'On'y a minute or two, Nick,' says he. 'Ye might as well let me get there. I'm cold, froze up, an' they's more ice comin' with this sea,' says he; 'they was a field o' small ice up along about the Sissors,' says he, 'an' I 'low it haves come down with the nor'east wind. The sea,' says he, 'will be full of it afore long. Ye better let me go,' says he. ''Tisn't by any means pleasant here, an' the on'y thing I wants, now that ye've took the oath,' says he, 'is t' get warm. Ye better let me go. I got t' go, anyhow,' says he, 'an' a hour or two don't make no difference.' An' so, with the babe that was you in mind, an' with my life t' save for your sake, I let un go t' le'ward, where the seven murdered men had gone down drowned. 'Twas awful lonesome without un, when the tide got high an' the seas was mean with chunks o' ice. Afore that," my uncle intensely declared, "I was admired o' water-side widows, on account o' looks; but," says he, touching his various disfigurements, "I was broke open here, an' I was broke open there, by bein' rubbed on the rocks an' clubbed by the ice at high-tide. When I was picked up by Tumm, o' the _Quick as Wink_ (bein' bound up in fish), I 'lowed I might as well leave the cook, which is now dead, have his way with the butcher-knife an' sail-needle; an' so I come t' St. John's as ye sees me now, not a wonderful sight for looks, with my leg an' fingers gone, but ready, God knows! t' stand by the young un I was livin' t' take an' rear. Ye had been, all through it, Dannie," he added, simply, "the thing that made me hold on; for when your father was gone t' le'ward, an' I begun t' think o' ye, a wee babe t' St. John's, I got t' love ye, lad, as I've loved ye ever since.

"'Tis a lovely evening," he added; "'tis a wonderful civil and beautiful time, with all them clouds, like coals o' fire, in the west."

'Twas that: an evening without guile or menace--an hour most compassionate.

"The owner o' the _Will-o'-the-Wisp_," says my uncle, "wasn't no Honorable in them days; he was but a St. John's fish speculator with a taste for low politics. But he've become a Honorable since, on the fortune he've builded from that wreck, an' he's like t' end a knight o' the realm, if he've money enough t' carry on an' marry the widow he's after. 'Twas not hard t' deal with un--leastways, 'twas not hard when I loaded with rum, which I was used t' doin', Dannie, as ye know, afore I laid 'longside of un in the wee water-side place he'd fetch the money to. No, no! 'Twas not easy: I'd not have ye think it--'twas hard, 'twas bitter hard, Dannie, t' be engaged in that dirty business. I'd not have ye black your soul with it; an' I was 'lowin, Dannie, afore the parson left us, t' teach un how t' manage the Honorable, t' tell un about the liquor an' the bluster, t' show un how t' scare the Honorable on the Water Street pavement, t' teach un t' threaten an' swear the coward's money from his pocket, for I wasn't wantin' _you_, Dannie, t' know the trial an' wickedness o' the foul deed, bein' in love with ye too much t' have ye spoiled by sin. I 'low I had that there young black-an'-white parson near corrupted: I 'low I had un worked up t' yieldin' t' temptation, lad, when he up an' left us, along o' Judy. An' there's the black-an'-white parson, gone God knows where! an' here's ol' Nick Top, sittin' on the grass at evenin', laid by the heels all along o' two days o' wind on the ice!"

"And so you brought me up?" says I.

"Ay, Dannie," he answered, uneasily; "by blackmail o' the Honorable. I got t' go t' hell for it, but I've no regrets on that account," says he, in a muse, "for I've loved ye well, lad; an' as I sit here now, lookin' back, I knows that God was kind t' give me you t' work an' sin for. I'll go t' hell--ay, I'll go t' hell! Ye must never think, lad, when I gets down there, that I'm sorry for what I done. I'll not be sorry--not even in hell--for I'll think o' the years when you was a wee little lad, an' I'll be content t' remember. An' do you go away, now, lad," he added, "an' think it over. Ye'll not judge me now; ye'll come back, afore long, an' then judge me."

I moved to go.

"Dannie!" he called.

I turned.

"I've gone an' tol' Judy," says he, "lest she learn t' love ye for what ye was not."

'Twas no matter to me....

* * * * *

This, then, was the heart of my mystery! I had been fed and adorned and taught and reared in luxury by the murder of seven men and the merciless blackmail of an ambitious villain. What had fed me, warmed me, clothed me had been the product of this horrible rascality. And my father was the murderer, whom I had dreamed a hero, and my foster-father was the persecutor, whom I had loved for his kindly virtue. And paid for!--all paid for in my father's crime and damnation. This--all this--to make a gentleman of the ill-born, club-footed young whelp of a fishing skipper! I laughed as I walked away from this old Nick Top: laughed to recall my progress through these nineteen years--the proud, self-righteous stalking of my way.

'Twas a pretty figure I had cut, thinks I, with my rings and London clothes, in the presence of the Honorable, with whom I had dealt in pride and anger! 'Twas a pretty figure I had cut, all my life--the whelp of a ruined, prostituted skipper: the issue of a murderous barratry! What protection had the defenceless child that had been I against these machinations? What protest the boy, growing in guarded ignorance? What appeal the man in love, confronted by his origin and shameful fostering? Enraged by this, what I thought of my uncle's misguided object and care I may not here set down, because of the bitterness and injustice of the reflections; nay, but I dare not recall the mood and wicked resentment of that time.

And presently I came to the shore of the sea, where I sat down on the rock, staring out upon the waters. 'Twas grown dark then, of a still, religious night, with the black sea lapping the rocks, infinitely continuing in restlessness, and a multitude of stars serenely twinkling in the uttermost depths of the great sky. 'Twas of this I thought, I recall, but cannot tell why: that the sea was forever young, unchanging in all the passions of youth, from the beginning of time to the end of it; that the mountains were lifted high, of old, passionless, inscrutable, of unfeeling snow and rock, dwelling above the wish of the world; that the sweep of prairie, knowing no resentment, was fruitful to the weakest touch; that the forests fell without complaint; that the desert, hopeless, aged, contemptuous of the aspirations of this day, was of immutable bitterness, seeking some love long lost to it nor ever to be found again; but that the sea was as it had been when God poured it forth--young and lusty and passionate--the only thing in all the fleeting world immune from age and death and desuetude.

'Twas strange enough; but I knew, thank God! when the rocking, crooning sea took my heart as a harp in its hands, that all the sins and errors of earth were of creative intention and most beautiful, as are all the works of the God of us all. Nay, but, thinks I, the sins of life are more lovely than the righteous accomplishments. Removed by the starlit sky, wherein He dwells--removed because of its tender distance and beauty and placidity, because of its compassion and returning gift of faith, removed by the vast, feeling territory of sensate waters, whereupon He walks, because they express, eternally, His wrath and loving kindness--carried far away, in the quiet night, I looked back, and I understood, as never before--nor can I ever hope to know again--that God, being artist as we cannot be, had with the life of the world woven threads of sin and error to make it a pattern of supernal beauty, that His purpose might be fulfilled, His eyes delighted.

And 'twas with the healing of night and starry sky and the soft lullaby of the sea upon my spirit--'twas with this wide, clear vision of life, the gift of understanding, as concerned its exigencies--that I arose and went to my uncle....

* * * * *

I met Judith on the way: the maid was hid, waiting for me, in the deep shadow of the lilacs and the perfume of them, which I shall never forget, that bordered the gravelled path of our garden.

"You've come at last," says she. "He've been waiting for you--out there in the dark."

"Judith!" says I.

She came confidingly close to me.

"I've a word to say to you, maid," says I.

"An' you're a true man?" she demanded.

"'Tis a word," says I, "that's between a man an' a maid. 'Tis nothing more."

She held me off. "An' you're true," she demanded, "to them that have loved you?"

"As may or may not appear," I answered.

"Ah, Dannie," she whispered, "I cannot doubt you!"

I remember the scent of the lilacs--I remember the dusk--the starlit sky.

"I have a word," I repeated, "to say to you."

"An' what's that?" says she.

"'Tis that I wish a kiss," says I.

She put up her dear red lips.

"Ay," says I, "but 'tis a case of no God between us. You know what I am and have been. I ask a kiss."

Her lips still invited me.

"I love you, Judith," says I, "and always have."

Her lips came closer.

"I would be your husband," I declared.

"Kiss me, Dannie," she whispered.

"And there is no God," says I, "between us?"

"There is no God," she answered, "against us."

I kissed her.

"You'll do it again, will you not?" says she.

"I'll kiss your sweet tears," says I. "I'll kiss un away."

"Then kiss my tears."

I kissed them away.

"That's good," says she; "that's very good. An' now?"

"I'll speak with my uncle," says I, "as you knowed I would."

I sought my uncle.

"Sir," says I, "where's the writing?"

"'Tis in your father's Bible," he answered.

I got it from the Book and touched a flaring match to it. "'Tis the end of _that_, sir," says I. "You an' me, sir," says I, "will be shipmates to the end of the voyage."

He rose.

"You're not able, sir," says I.

"I is!" he declared.

'Twas with difficulty he got to his feet, but he managed it; and then he turned to me, though I could see him ill enough in the dark.

"Dannie, lad," says he, "I 'low I've fetched ye up very well. Ye is," says he, "a--"

"Hush!" says I; "don't say it."

"I will!" says he.

"Don't!" I pleaded.

"You _is_," he declared, "a gentleman!"

The night and the abominable revelations of it were ended for my uncle and me in this way....

* * * * *

And so it came about that the Honorable was troubled no more by our demands, whatever the political necessities that might assail him, whatever the sins of other days, the black youth of him, that might fairly beset and harass him. He was left in peace, to follow his career, restored to the possessions my uncle had wrested from him, in so far as we were able to make restitution. There was no more of it: we met him afterwards, in genial intercourse, but made no call upon his moneybags, as you may well believe. My uncle and I made a new partnership: that of Top & Callaway, of which you may have heard, for the honesty of our trade and the worth of the schooners we build. He is used to taking my hand, upon the little finger of which I still wear the seal-ring he was doubtful of in the days when Tom Bull inspected it. "A D for Dannie," says he, "an' a C for Callaway, an' betwixt the two," says he, "lyin' snug as you like, is a T for Top! An' that's the way I lies," says he, "ol' Top betwixt the Dannie an' the Callaway. An' as for the business in trade an' schooners that there little ol' damned Chesterfieldian young Dannie haves builded from a paddle-punt, with Judy t' help un," says he, "why don't ye be askin' me!" And the business I have builded is good, and the wife I have is good, and the children are good. I have no more to wish for than my uncle and wife and children. 'Tis a delight, when the day's work is done, to sit at table, as we used to do when I was a child, with the geometrical gentleman framed in their tempestuous sea beyond, and to watch my uncle, overcome by Judith's persuasion, in his old age, sip his dram o' hot rum. The fire glows, and the maid approves, and my uncle, with his ailing timber comfortably bestowed, beams largely upon us.

"Jus' a nip," says he. "Jus' a wee nip o' the best Jamaica afore I goes t' bed."

I pour the dram.

"For the stomach's sake, Dannie," says he, with a gravity that twinkles against his will, "accordin' t' the Apostle."

And we are glad that he has that wee nip o' rum t' comfort him....

* * * * *

'Twas blowing high to-day. Tumm, of the _Quick as Wink_, beat into harbor for shelter. 'Twas good to know that the genial fellow had come into Twist Tickle. I boarded him. 'Twas very dark and blustering and dismally cold at that time. The schooner was bound down to the French shore and the ports of the Labrador. I had watched the clouds gather and join and forewarn us of wind. 'Twas an evil time for craft to be abroad, and I was glad that Tumm was in harbor. "Ecod!" says he, "I been up t' see the fool. They've seven," says he. "Ecod! think o' that! I 'low Walrus Liz o' Whoopin' Harbor got all she wanted. Seven!" cries he. "Seven kids! Enough t' stock a harbor! An' they's talk o' one o' them," says he, "bein' trained for a parson." I think the man was proud of his instrumentality. "I've jus' come from the place," says he, "an' he've seven, all spick an' span," says he, "all shined an' polished like a cabin door-knob!" I had often thought of it, and now dwelt upon it when I left him. I remembered the beginnings of our lives, and I knew that out of the hopelessness some beauty had been wrought, in the way of the God of us all: which is the moral of my tale.

"Think o' that!" cries Tumm, of the _Quick as Wink_.

I did think of it.

"Think o' that!" he repeated.

I had left Tumm below. I was alone. The night was still black and windy; but of a sudden, as I looked up, the clouds parted, and from the deck of the _Quick as Wink_ I saw, blind of vision as I was, that high over the open sea, hung in the depth and mystery of space, there was a star....

THE END

End of Project Gutenberg's The Cruise of the Shining Light, by Norman Duncan