Chapter 10

"That's more'n I know. I didn't see it done," said Seth.

"Who drank?"

"I drinked a little, for one; jest enough to know 't wan't water.

"And how many of you are drunk?" demanded Captain Edney.

"I a'n't, for one. But I believe Manly is a little how-come ye-so. I'll say this for him, though: he had nothing to do with tapping the casks, and he didn't seem to know what it was the boys gin him. He was dry; it tasted sweet, and he drinked, nat'rally."

"Who gave him the whiskey?"

"I didn't notice, particularly," said Seth.

His accomplices were summoned, the quartermaster was notified, and the affair was still further investigated. All confessed to having tasted the liquor, but nobody knew who tapped the casks, or who had given the whiskey to Frank, and all had the same plausible excuse for their offence--intolerable thirst. It was impossible, where all were leagued together, and all seemed equally culpable, to single out the ringleaders for punishment, and it was not desirable to punish all. After a while, therefore, the men were dismissed with a reprimand, and the subject postponed indefinitely. That very afternoon forty barrels of water came on board, and the men had no longer a pretext for tapping casks in the hold; and a few days later was the battle, in which they wiped out by their bravery all memory of past transgressions.

And Frank? The muss, as the boys called it, was over before his senses recovered from their infinite bewilderment. He lay stupefied in his bunk, which went whirling round and round with him, sinking down and down and down, into void and bottomless chaos, where solid earth was none--type of the drunkard's moral state, where virtue has lost its foot-hold, and there is no firm ground of self-respect, and conscience is a loosened ledge toppling treacherously, and there is no steady hope to stay his horrible whirling and sinking. Stupefaction became sleep; with sleep inebriation passed; and Frank awoke to misery.

It was evening. The boys were playing cards again by the light of the ship's lantern. The noise and the glimmer reached Frank in his berth, and called him back to time and space and memory. He remembered his watch, his insolent reply to his old friend Sinjin, the scene in the hold of the vessel, the sweet-tasting stuff, and the dizziness, a strange ladder somewhere which he had either climbed or dreamed of climbing; and he thought of his mother and sisters with a pang like the sting of a scorpion. He could bear any thing but that.

He got up, determined not to let vain regrets torment him. He shut out from his mind those pure images of home, the presence of which was maddening to him. Having stepped so deep into guilt, he would not, he could not, turn back. For Frank carried even into his vices that steadiness of resolution which distinguishes such natures from those of the Jack Winch stamp, wavering and fickle alike in good and ill. He possessed that perseverance and purpose which go to form either the best and noblest men, or, turned to evil, the most hardy and efficient villains. Frank was no milksop.

"O, I'm all right," said he, with a reckless laugh, in reply to his comrades' bantering. "Give me a chance there--can't you?"

For he was bent on winning back his watch. It seemed that nothing short of the impossible could turn him aside from that intent. The players made room for him, and he prepared his counters, and took up his cards.

"What do you do, Frank?" was asked impatiently; all were waiting for him.

What ailed the boy? He held his cards, but he was not looking at them. His eyes were not on the board, nor on his companions, nor on any object there. But he was staring with a pallid, intense expression--at something. There were anguish, and alarm, and yearning affection in his look. His hair was disordered, his countenance was white and amazed; his comrades were astonished as they watched him.

"What's the matter, Frank? what's the matter?"

Their importunity brought him to himself.

"Did you see?" he asked in a whisper.

They had seen nothing that he had seen. Then it was all an illusion? a fragment of his drunken dreams? But no drunken dream was ever like that.

"Yes, I'll play," he said, trying to collect himself thinking that he would forget the illusion, and remembering he had his watch to win back.

But his heart failed him. His brain, his hand failed him also. Absolutely, he could not play.

"Boys, I'm not very well. Excuse me--I can't play to-night."

And hesitatingly, like a person who has been stunned, he got up, and left the place. Few felt inclined to jeer him. John Winch begun to say something about "the parson going to pray," but it was frowned down.

Frank went on deck. The evening was mild, the wind was south, the sky was clear and starry; it was like a May night in New England. The schooner was riding at anchor in the sound; other vessels of the fleet lay around her, rocking gently on the tide--dim hulls, with glowing, fiery eyes; and here there was a band playing, and from afar off came the sound of solemn singing, wafted on the wind. And the water was all a weltering waste of waves and molten stars.

But little of all this Frank saw, or heard, or heeded. His soul was rapt from him; he was lost in wonder and grief.

"Can you tell me any thing?" said a voice at his side.

"O, Atwater," said Frank, clutching his hand, "what does it mean? As I was playing, I saw--I saw--every thing else disappeared; cards, counters, the bench we were playing on, and there before me, as plainly as I ever saw any thing in my life----"

"What was it?" asked Atwater, as Frank paused, unable to proceed.

"My sister Hattie." then said Frank, in a whisper of awe, "in her coffin! in her shroud! But she did not seem dead at all. She was white as the purest snow; and she smiled up at me--such a sweet, sad smile--O! O!"

And Frank wrung his hands.

XVIII.

BITTER THINGS.

Atwater could not have said much to comfort him, even if he had had the opportunity. Some young fellows who had heard of Frank's losses at bluff, and of his intoxication, saw him on deck, and came crowding around to have some jokes with him. Atwater retired. And Frank, who had little relish for jokes just then, went below, and got into his berth, where he could be quiet, and think a little.

But thinking alone there with his conscience was torture to him. He turned on his bed and looked, and saw Atwater sitting in his bunk, with a book in his hand, reading by the dim light. The card-playing was going on close by, and jokes and oaths and laughter were heard on all sides; but Atwater heeded no one, and no one heeded him.

Only Frank: he regarded the still, earnest soldier a long time, silently admiring his calmness and strength, so perfectly expressed in his mild, firm, kindly, taciturn face, and wondering what book he had.

"What are you reading, Atwater?" he at length asked.

"My Bible," replied the soldier, giving him a grave, pleasant smile.

Frank felt pained,--almost jealous. I can't tell how it is, but we don't like too well the sight of our companions cheerfully performing those duties which we neglect or hate. Cain slew Abel for that cause.

"I didn't know you read that," said Frank.

"I never have too much. But my wife----" The soldier's voice always sunk with a peculiarly tender thrill whenever he spoke of his bride of an hour, or rather of a minute, whom he had wedded and left in such haste. "She slipped a Bible in my knapsack unbeknown to me. I had a letter from her to-day, in which she asked me if I read it. So I must read it, and say yes, if only to please her. But the truth is," said Atwater, with a brightening eye, "I find good in it I never thought was there before."

Frank had no word to answer him. Conscience-stricken, sick at heart, miserable as he could be, he could only lie there in his berth, and look at the brave soldier, and envy him.

He remembered how, not long ago, when his mother's wishes were more to him than they had been of late, he had desired to read his Testament for her sake, but had not dared to do so openly, fearing the sneers of his comrades. And his mother, in every letter, repeated her injunction, "My son, read your Testament;"--which had become to him as the idle wind. For never now, either by stealth or openly, did he read that book.

Yet here was this plain, honest soldier,--many called him dull,--for whom a word from one he loved was sufficient; he took the book as if that word were law. And the looks, the jests, which Frank had feared, were nothing to him.

Ashamed, remorseful, angry with himself, the boy lay thinking what he should do. A few bitter moments only. Then, opening his knapsack, he took out his Testament, and sitting in his bunk so that the light would shine on the page, opened it and read. His companions saw, and were surprised enough. But nobody jeered. What was the reason, I wonder?

And this was what Frank read. Written on a blank leaf, with a pencil, in his own hand, were these words:--

_"I do now solemnly promise my mother and sisters that, when I am in the army, I will never be guilty of swearing, or gambling, or drinking, or any other mean thing I know they would not approve of. And I do solemnly pledge my word that they shall sooner hear of my death than of my being guilty of any of those things._ Frank Manly."

And beneath those words were written these also, in his mother's hand:--

_"O heavenly Father! I beseech Thee, help my dear son to keep his promises. Give him strength to resist temptation. Save him, I pray Thee, from those who kill the body, but above all from those who kill the soul. If it be Thy gracious will, let him pass safely through whatever evils may beset him, and return to us uncontaminated and unhurt. But if this may not be, then, O, our Saviour! take him, take my precious child, I implore Thee, pure unto Thyself. And help us all so to live, that we shall meet again in joy and peace, if not here, hereafter. Amen._"

Frank did not turn that page, but sat looking at it long. And he saw something besides the words there written. He saw himself once more a boy at home, the evening before his enlistment; pencil in hand, writing that solemn promise; his mother watching near; the bright face of his sister Helen yonder, shadowed by the thought of his going; the little invalid Hattie on the lounge, her sad face smiling very much as he saw it smiling out just now from the flowers in the coffin.

He saw his mother also, pencil in hand, writing that prayer,--her countenance full of anxious love and tears, her gentle lips tremulous with blessings. He saw her come to his bed in the moonlight night, when last he slept there with little Willie at his side, as maybe he will never sleep again. And he heard her counsels and entreaties, as she knelt there beside him; and felt her kisses; and lived over once more the thoughts of that night after she was gone, and when he lay sleepless with the moonlight on his bed.

But here he was now--not away there in the room at home, but here, among soldiers, on shipboard. And the pure, innocent Frank of that night lived no more. And all those promises had been broken, one by one. And he knew not what to do, he was so miserable.

Yet--the sudden thought warmed and thrilled his breast--he might be pure as then, he might be innocent as then, and all the stronger for having known what temptation was, and fallen, and risen again. And he might keep those promises in a higher and nobler sense than he dreamed of when he made them; and his mother's prayer might, after all, be answered.

"Frank," said the voice of Captain Edney. He had come to visit the quarters of his company, and, seeing the boy sitting there so absorbed, his young face charged with thought and grief, had stopped some moments to regard him, without speaking.

Frank started, almost like a guilty person, and gave the military salute rather awkwardly as he got upon his feet. He had been secretly dreading Captain Edney's displeasure, and now he thought he was to be called to an account.

"I have something for you in my room," said the officer, with a look of serious reserve, unlike the cheerful, open, brotherly glance with which he formerly regarded the drummer boy.

Frank accompanied him, wondering what that something was. A reproof for his drunkenness, or for gambling away the watch, he expected more than any thing else; and his heart was heavy by the way.

"Did you know a mail came on board to-day?" said the captain, as they entered his stateroom.

Frank remembered hearing Atwater say he had that day got a letter from his wife. But his mind had been too much agitated by other things to consider the subject then.

"No, sir, I didn't know it."

"How happens that? You are generally one of the most eager to receive letters."

Frank hung his head. What answer could he make? That he was intoxicated in his berth when the mail arrived? A sweat of shame covered him. He was silent.

"Well, well, my boy!"--Captain Edney patted him gently on the shoulder,--"you are forgiven this time. I am sure you did not mean to get drunk."

"O, sir!" began Frank, but stopped there, over whelmed by the captain's kindness.

"I know all about it," said Captain Edney. "Tucket assures me that he and the rest were more to blame than you. But, for the sake of your friends, Frank, take warning by this experience, and never be betrayed into any thing of the kind again. I trust you. And here, my boy, are your letters."

He put half a dozen into Frank's hands. And Frank, as he took them, felt his very heart melt within him with gratitude and contrition. He was not thinking so much of the letters as of Captain Edney and his watch.

"Forgive me; forgive me!" he humbly entreated.

"I do, freely, as I told you," said the captain.

"But--the watch you gave me!"

"Dear boy!"--the captain put his arm kindly about him,--"haven't I always told you I knew nothing about the watch? I did not give it to you, nor do I know what generous friend did."

"It is true, then?" Frank looked up with a half-glad, half-disappointed expression. He was disappointed to know that so good a friend was not the donor of the watch, and yet glad that he had not wronged _him_ by gambling it away. "Then, Captain Edney, I wish you would tell me what to do. I have done the worst and meanest thing. I have lost the watch."

And he went on to relate how he had lost it. Captain Edney heard him with deep concern. He had all along felt a sense of responsibility for the boy Mrs. Manly had intrusted to him, as well as a genuine affection for him; he had therefore double cause to be pained by this unexpected development.

"Frank," said he, "I am glad I did not first hear this story from any body else; and I am glad that the proof of your thorough repentance accompanies the confession. That breaks the pain of it. To-morrow I will see what can be done about the watch. Perhaps we shall get it again. To-night I have only one piece of advice to give. Don't think of winning it back with cards."

"Then how shall I ever get it?" asked Frank, in despair. For he did not wish his mother to know of the circumstances; and to buy the watch back when he was paid off again, would be to withhold money which he felt belonged to her.

Captain Edney could not solve the difficulty; and with that burden upon his mind, Frank returned to his bunk with his letters.

He bent over them with doubt and foreboding. The first he selected was from his mother. As he opened it, his eye caught these words:--

"... He says that you beat some of the worst men in the regiment at their own vices. He says you are generally smoking, except when you take out your pipe to swear. According to his account, you are one of the profanest of the profane. And he tells of your going with others to steal turkeys of a secessionist in Maryland, and how you got out of the scrape by the most downright lying. He gives the story so circumstantially that I cannot think he invented it, but am compelled to believe there is something in it. O, my child, is it possible? Ill as your sister is, to hear these things of you is a greater trial than the thought of parting with her so soon. Have you forgotten your promises to me? Have you forgotten----"

Frank could read no more. He gnashed his teeth together, and held them tight, like a person struggling against some insupportable pain. His sister so ill? That was Hattie. He saw the name written farther back. "He says,"--"according to his account,"--who was it sending home such stories about him? He glanced up the page, until his eye fell upon the name.

"_John Winch_----"

O, but this was too much! To be accused of swearing by _him_! To be charged with stealing by one who went with him to steal, and did not, only because he was a coward! Frank felt an impulse to fall instantly upon that wretched youth, and choke the unmanly life out of him. John was at that moment writing a letter under the lantern, probably filling it with more tales about him;--and couldn't he tell some great ones now!--grinning, too, as he wrote; quite unaware what a tiger was watching him, athirst for his blood.

Yes. Winch had got letters to-day, and, learning what a lively sensation his stories of Frank created, had set to work to furnish the sequel to them; giving interesting particulars up to latest dates.

N. B. He was writing on the head of Frank's drum, which he had borrowed for the purpose. He had written his previous letters on the same. It was a good joke, he thought, to get the boy he was abusing to contribute some needful assistance towards the work; it added a flavor to treachery. But Frank did not so much enjoy the pleasantry. He was wild to be beating the tattoo, not on the said drum, but on the head of the rogue who was writing on the drum, and with his fist for drumsticks.

But he reflected, "I shall only be getting deeper into trouble, if I pitch into him. Besides, he is a good deal bigger than I,"--a powerful argument in favor of forbearance. "I'll wait; but I'll be revenged on him some way."

Little did he know--and as little did Winch surmise--how that revenge was to be accomplished. But it was to be, and soon.

For the present, Frank had other things to think of. He read of Hattie's fading away; of her love for him; and the tender messages she sent,--perhaps the last she would ever send to him. And he remembered his wonderful vision of her that evening. And tears came to cool and soften his heart.

And so we quit him for the night, leaving him alone with his letters, his grief, and his remorse.

XIX.

SETH GETS "RILED."

There is in the life of nearly every young person a turning-point of destiny. It may be some choice which he makes for himself, or which others make for him, whether of occupation, or companion, or rule of life. It may be some deep thought which comes to him in solitary hours,--some seed of wisdom dropped from the lips of teacher, parent, or friend, sinking silently as starlight into the soul, and taking immortal root there, unconsciously, perhaps, even to himself. Now it is the quickening of the spirit at the sight of God's beautiful universe--a rapture of love awakened by a morning in spring, by the blue infinity of the sky, by the eternal loneliness and sublimity of the sea. Or, in some moment of susceptibility, the smiles of dear home faces, the tender trill of a voice, a surge of solemn music, may have power over the young heart to change its entire future. And again, it is some vivid experience of temptation and suffering that shapes the great hereafter. For the Divinity that maketh and loveth us is forever showering hints of beauty and blessedness to win back our wandering affections,--dropping cords of gentlest influences to draw home again all hearts that will come.

Then the spirit of the youth rises up within him, and says,--

"Whereas I was blind, now I am beginning to see. And whereas I was weak, now, with God's help, I will strive for better things. Long enough have I been the companion of folly, and all the days of my life have I been a child. But now I perceive that I am to become a man, and I will henceforth think the thoughts and do the deeds of a man."

Such an experience had come to Frank; and thus, on the new morning, as he beheld it rise out of the sea, his spirit spake unto him.

He answered his mother's letter, confessing that his conduct had afforded only too good a foundation for Jack's stories.

"The trouble, I think, is," said he, "that I wrote my promises first with _a pencil_. They did get a little _rubbed out_ I own. I have since taken _a pen_, and written them all over again, word by word, and letter by letter, _with ink_. So you may depend upon it, dear mother, that not another syllable of my pledge will _get blurred_ or _dimmed_, either on the _leaf of my Testament_; or on the _page of my heart_. Only _believe this_, and then you may believe as much as you please of what J. W. writes."

Not a word to the same _J. W._ did Frank say of the base thing he had done; and as for the revenge he had vowed, the impulse to wreak it in tigerish fashion had passed like a night-fog before the breezy purity of the new life that had dawned.

In a couple of days Frank had mostly recovered his equanimity. The loss of the watch was still a source of anxious grief to him, however; less on his own account, let me say, than for the sake of the unknown giver. Nor had he, as yet, found any opportunity to atone for his rudeness to the old drum-major, who had lately, for some cause, gone over to the other wing of the regiment on board the steamer, so that Frank yearned in vain to go to him and humbly beg forgiveness for his fault.

"What has taken Mr. Sinjin away?" he asked of his friend, the young corporal.

Gray shrugged his shoulders, and looked at Frank as if he had a good mind to tell a secret.

"How should I know? He's such a crotchety old boy. I don't think he could account for his conduct himself. He asked permission to remove his quarters to the steamer, and got it; pretending, I believe, that he could have better accommodations there."

"And _I_ believe," said Frank, "that you know more about it than you will own."

"Well, I have my suspicions. Shall I be candid with you, Frank? and you'll forgive me if I hurt your feelings?"

"Yes," said Frank, anxiously.

"Well, then," said Gray. "I suppose you know Sinjin had taken a great fancy to you."

"I thought at one time he liked me."

"At one time? I'll wager my head he was liking you the most when he appeared to the least--he's such a queer old cove! I've heard he was disappointed in love once, and that some friend of his proved traitor to him; and that's what has made him so shy of showing any thing like affection for any body. Well, he heard of your gambling, and went to talk with you about it, and you said something to him that wounded him so I think he couldn't bear the sight of you afterwards."

The boy's heart was wrung by this revelation. What reason, he demanded to know, had Gray for thinking thus?

"Because I know the man, and because I know something which I think you ought to know." Gray drew Frank confidentially aside. "He may anathematize me for betraying his secret; but I think it is time to do him justice, even against his will. Frank, it was Old Sinjin who gave you the watch."

Frank's heart leaped up, but fell again instantly, convulsed with pain and regret.

"Are you sure, Gray?"

"Sure as this: I was with him when he bought the watch in Annapolis. I helped him to do it up in the wrappers. And it was I that pitched it into the tent at you Thanksgiving-day evening. That is being pretty sure--isn't it?"

"And he knows that I lost it?" said Frank.

"He had just heard so when he went to speak with you about gambling."