When the tug landed Caleb at Keyport this same afternoon, he hurried through his duties and went straight to his cabin. Mrs. Leroy’s sympathetic words were still in his ears. He could hear the very tones of her voice and recall the pleading look in her eyes. He wished he had told her the whole truth then and there, and how he felt toward Betty; and he might have done so had not the other ladies been there, expecting her aboard the yacht. He did not feel hurt or angry; he never was with those who spoke well of his wife. Her words had only deepened the conviction that had lately taken possession of his own mind,—that he alone, of all who knew Betty, had shut his heart against her. Even this woman,—a total stranger,—who had taken her out of the streets and befriended her still pleaded for her. When would his own heart ever be softened? What did he want her to do for him? Crawl back on her hands and knees and lie outside his door until he took her in? And if she never came,—what then?
How long would she be able to endure her present life? He had saved her from Carleton. So far no one except Betty, Carleton, and himself had known of the night attack; not even Captain Joe. It was best not to talk about it; it might injure her. But who else would try to waylay and insult her? Maybe his holding out so long against her would force her into other temptations, and so ruin her. What if it was already too late? Lacey had been seen round Keyport lately,—once at night. He knew he wrote to her; Bert Simmons, the letter-carrier, had shown him other letters with the Stonington postmark. Was Lacey hanging round Keyport because she had sent for him? And if she went back to him after all,—whose fault was it?
At the thought of Lacey the beads of sweat stood on his forehead. Various conflicting emotions took possession of him, bringing the hot blood to his cheek and setting his fingernails deep into the palms of his hands. It was only at rare intervals, when he had run into Stonington aboard the Screamer, or on one of the tugs short of coal or water, that he had seen the man who had ruined his home, and then only at a distance. The young rigger was at work around the cars on the dock. Caleb had never known whether Lacey had seen him. He thought not. The men said the young fellow always moved away when any of the Keyport boats came in. Then his mind reverted to Captain Joe and to the night he pleaded for her, and to the way he said over and over again, “She ain’t nothin’ but a child, Caleb, an’ all of us is liable to go astray.” These words seemed to burn themselves into his brain.
As the twilight came on he went upstairs on tiptoe, treading as lightly as if he knew she was asleep and he feared to waken her. Standing by the bed, he looked about him in an aimless, helpless way, his eyes resting finally on the counterpane, and the pillow he had placed every night for her on her side of the bed. It was yellow and soiled now. In the same half-dazed, dreamy way he stepped to the closet, opened the door cautiously, and laid his hand upon her dresses, which hung where she had left them, smoothing them softly with his rough fingers. He could easily have persuaded himself (had she been dead) that her spirit was near him, whispering to him, leading him about, her hand in his.
As he stood handling the dresses, with their little sleeves and skirts, all the paternal seemed suddenly to come out in him. She was no longer his wife, no longer the keeper of his house, no longer the custodian of his good name. She was his child, his daughter, his own flesh and blood,—one who had gone astray, one who had pleaded for forgiveness, and who was now alone in the world, with every door closed against her but Captain Joe’s.
In the brightness of this new light of pity in him a great weight seemed lifted from his heart. His own sorrow and loneliness seemed trivial and selfish beside hers. He big and strong, fearless to go and come, able to look every man in the face; and she a timid girl, shrinking, frightened, insulted, hiding even from those who loved her. What sort of man was he to shut his door in her face and send her shuddering down the road?
With these new thoughts there came a sudden desire to help, to reach out his arms toward her, to stand up and defend her,—defend her, out in the open, before all the people.
Catching up his hat, he hurried from the house and walked briskly down the road. It was Betty’s hour for coming home. Since her encounter with Carleton there had been few evenings in the week he had not, with one excuse or another, loitered along the road, hiding behind the fish-house until she passed, watching her until she reached the swinging gate. Soon the residents up and down the road began to time his movements. “Here comes Caleb,” they would say; “Betty ain’t far off. Ain’t nothin’ goin’ to touch her as long as Caleb’s round.”
This watchful care had had its effect. Not only had Captain Joe and Aunty Bell taken her part, but Caleb was looking after her too. When this became common talk the little remaining tattle ceased. Better not talk about Betty, the gossips said among themselves; Caleb might hear it.
When the diver reached the top of the hill overlooking Captain Joe’s cottage, his eye fell upon Betty’s slight figure stepping briskly up the hill, her shawl drawn tightly about her shoulders, her hat low down on her face. She had passed the willows and was halfway to the swinging gate. Caleb quickened his pace and walked straight toward her.
She saw him coming, and stopped in sudden fright. For an instant she wavered, undecided whether she would turn and run, or brave it out and pass him. If she could only get inside the garden before he reached her! As she neared the gate she heard his footsteps on the road, and could see from under the rim of her hat the rough shoes and coarse trousers cement-stained up as far as his knees. Only once since she had gone off with Lacey had she been so close to him.
Gathering all her strength she sprang forward, her hand on the swinging gate.
“I’ll hold it back, child,” came a low, sweet voice, and an arm was stretched out before her. “It shan’t slam to and hurt ye.”
He was so close she could have touched him. She saw, even in her agony, the gray, fluffy beard and the wrinkled, weather-stained throat with the unbuttoned collar of the flannel shirt. She saw, too, the big brown hand, as it rested on the gate.
She did not see his eyes. She dared not look so high.
As she entered the kitchen door she gave a hurried glance behind. He was following her slowly, as if in deep thought; his hands behind his back, his eyes on the ground.
Aunty Bell was bending over the stove when Betty dashed in.
“It’s Caleb! He’s coming in! Oh, aunty, don’t let him see me—please—please!”
The little woman turned quickly, startled at the sudden interruption.
“He don’t want ye, child.” The girl’s appearance alarmed her. She is not often this way, she thought.
“He does—he does. He spoke to me—Oh, where shall I go?” she moaned, wringing her hands, her whole body trembling like one with an ague.
“Go nowhere,” answered Aunty Bell in decided tones. “Stay where ye be. I’ll go see him. ’T ain’t nothin’, child, only somethin’ for the cap’n.” She had long since given up all hope of Caleb’s softening.
As she spoke the diver’s slow and measured step could be heard sounding along the plank walk.
Aunty Bell let down her apron and stepped to the door. Betty crept behind the panels, watching him through the crack, stifling her breath lest she should miss his first word. Oh, the music of his voice at the gate! Not his words, but the way he spoke,—the gentleness, the pity, the compassion of it all! As this thought surged through her mind she grew calmer; a sudden impulse to rush out and throw herself at his feet took possession of her. He surely could not repel her when his voice carried such tenderness to her heart. A great sob rose in her throat. The measured, slow step came closer.
At this instant she heard the outer gate swing to a second time with a resounding bang, and Captain Joe’s voice calling, “Git yer dress, Caleb, quick as God’ll let ye! Train through the Medford draw an’ two men drownded. I’ve been lookin’ fur ye everywhere.”
“Who says so?” answered Caleb calmly without moving.
“Mr. Sanford ’s sent the yacht. His nigger’s outside now. Hurry, I tell ye; we ain’t got a minute.”
Betty waited, her heart throbbing. Caleb paused for an instant and looked earnestly and hesitatingly toward the house. Then he turned quickly and followed Captain Joe.
Aunty Bell waited until she saw both men cross the road on their way to the dock. Then she went in to find Betty.
She was still crouched behind the door, her limbs trembling beneath her. On her face was the dazed look of one who had missed, without knowing why, some great crisis.
“Don’t cry, child,” said the little woman, patting her cheek. “It’s all right. I knowed he didn’t come for ye.”
“But, Aunty Bell, Aunty Bell,” she sobbed, as she threw her arms about her neck, “I wanted him so.”
The purple twilight had already settled over Medford harbor when the yacht with Captain Joe and Caleb on board glided beneath the wrecked trestle with its toppling cars, and made fast to one of the outlying spiles of the draw. As the yacht’s stern swung in toward the sunken caboose which coffined the bodies of the drowned men, a small boat put off from the shore and Sanford sprang aboard. He had succeeded in persuading the section boss in charge of the wrecking gang to delay wrecking operations until Caleb could get the bodies, insisting that it was inhuman to disturb the wreck until they were recovered. As the yacht was expected every moment and the services of the diver would be free, the argument carried weight.
“Everything is ready, sir,” said Captain Joe, as Sanford walked aft to meet him. “We’ve ’iled up the cylinders, an’ the pump can git to work in a minute. I’ll tend Caleb; I know how he likes his air. Come, Caleb, git inter yer dress; this tide’s on the turn.”
The three men walked along the yacht’s deck to where the captain had been oiling the air-pump. It had been lifted clear of its wooden case and stood near the rail, its polished brasses glistening in the light of a ship’s lantern slung to the ratlines. Sprawled over a deck settee lay the rubber diving-dress,—body, arms, and legs in one piece, like a suit of seamless underwear,—and beside it the copper helmet, a trunkless head with a single staring eye. The air-hose and life-line, together with the back-plate and breast-plate of lead and the iron-shod shoes, lay on the deck.
Caleb placed his folded coat on a camp-stool, drew off his shoes, tucked his trousers into his stocking legs, and began twisting himself into his rubber dress, Sanford helping him with the arms and neckpiece. Captain Joe, meanwhile, overhauled the plates and loosened the fastenings of the weighted shoes.
With the screwing on of Caleb’s helmet and the tightening of his face-plate, the crowd increased. The news of the coming diver had preceded the arrival of the yacht, and the trestle and shores were lined with people.
When Caleb, completely equipped, stepped on the top round of the ladder fastened to the yacht’s side, the crowd climbed hurriedly over the wrecked cars to the stringers of the trestle to get a better view of the huge man-fish with its distorted head and single eye, and its long antennæ of hose and life-line. Such a sight would be uncanny even when the blazing sun burnished the diver’s polished helmet and the one eye of the face-plate glared ominously; but at night, under the wide sky, with only a single swinging lamp to illumine the gloomy shadows, the man-fish became a thing of dread,—a ghoulish spectre who prowled over foul and loathsome things, and who rose from the slime of deep bottoms only to breathe and sink again.
Caleb slowly descended the yacht’s ladder, one iron-shod foot at a time, until the water reached his armpits. Then he swung himself clear, and the black, oily ooze closed over him.
Captain Joe leaned over the yacht’s rail, the life-line wound about his wrist, his sensitive hand alert for the slightest nibble of the man-fish. These nibbles are the unspoken words of the diver below to his “tender” above. His life often depends on these being instantly understood and answered.
For the diver is more than amphibious; he is twice-bodied,—one man under water, one man above, with two heads and four hands. The connecting links between these two bodies—these Siamese twins—are the life-line and signal-cord through which they speak to each other, and the air-hose carrying their life-breath.
As Caleb dropped out of sight the crew crowded to the yacht’s rail, straining their eyes in the gloom. In the steady light of the lantern they could see the cord tighten and slacken as the diver felt his way among the wreckage, or sank to the bottom. They could follow, too, the circle of air bubbles floating on the water above where he worked. No one spoke; no one moved. An almost deathly stillness prevailed. The only sounds were the wheezing of the air-pump turned by the sailor, and the swish of the life-line cutting through the water as the diver talked to his tender. With these were mingled the unheeded sounds of the night and of the sea,—the soft purring of the tall grasses moving gently to and fro in the night-wind, and the murmuring of the sluggish water stirred by the rising tide and gurgling along the yacht’s side on its way to the stern.
“Has he found them yet, Captain Joe?” Sanford asked, after some moments, under his breath.
“Not yet, sir. He’s been through one car, an’ is now crawlin’ through t’other. He says they’re badly broke up. Run that air-hose overboard, sir; let it all go; he wants it all. Thank ye. He says the men are in their bunks at t’other end, if anywheres; that’s it, sir.”
There came a quick double jerk, answered by one long pull.
“More air, sir,—more air!” Captain Joe cried in a quick, rising voice. “So-o, that’ll do.”
The crew looked on in astonishment. The talk of the man-fish was like the telephone talk of a denizen from another world.
A quarter of an hour passed. Not a single tremor had been felt along the life-line, nor had Captain Joe moved from his position on the rail. His eye was still on the circle of bubbles that rose and were lost in the current. Sanford grew uneasy.
“What’s he doing now, captain?” he asked in an anxious voice.
“Don’t know, sir; ain’t heard from him in some time.”
“Ask him.”
“No, sir; better let him alone. He might be crawlin’ through somewheres; might tangle him up if I moved the line. He’s got to feel his way, sir. It’s black as mud down there. If the men warn’t in the caboose he wouldn’t never find ’em at night.”
A quick, sharp jerk from under the surface now swished through the water, followed by a series of strong, rapid pulls,—seesaw pulls, as if some great fish were struggling with the line.
“He’s got one of ’em, sir,” said the captain, with sudden animation. “Says that’s all. He’s been through two cars an’ felt along every inch o’ the way. If there’s another, he’s got washed out o’ the door.”
As he spoke the air-hose slackened and the life-line began to sag.
Captain Joe turned quickly to Sanford. “Pull in that hose, Mr. Sanford,” hauling in the slack of the life-line himself. “He’s a-comin’ up; he’ll bring him with him.”
These varied movements on the yacht stirred the overhanging crowd into action. They hoped the diver was coming up; they hoped, too, he would bring the dead man. His appearing with his awful burden would be less terrible than not knowing what the man-fish was doing. The crew of the yacht crowded still closer to the rail; this fishing at night for the dead had a fascination they could not resist. Some of them even mounted the ratlines, and others ran aft to see the diver rise from the deep sea.
In a moment more the black water heaved in widening circles, and Caleb’s head and shoulders were thrust up within an oar’s length of the yacht. The light of the lantern fell upon his wet helmet and extended arm.
The hand clutched a man’s boot.
Attached to the boot were a pair of blue overalls and a jacket. The head of the drowned man hung down in the water. The face was hidden.
Captain Joe leaned forward, lowered the lantern that Caleb might see the ladder, reeled in the life-line hand over hand, and dragged the diver and his burden to the foot of the ladder. Sanford seized a boat-hook, and, reaching down, held the foot close to the yacht’s side; then a sailor threw a noose of marline twine around the boot. The body was now safe from the treacherous tide.
Caleb raised himself slowly until his helmet was just above the level of the deck. Captain Joe removed the lead plates from his breast and back, and unscrewed his glass face-plate, letting out his big beard and letting in the cool night-air.
“Any more down there?” he cried, his mouth close to Caleb’s face as he spoke.
Caleb shook his head inside the copper helmet. “No; don’t think so. Guess ye thought I was a-goin’ to stay all night, didn’t ye? I had ter crawl through two cars ’fore I got him; when I found him he was under a tool-chest. One o’ them lower cars, I see, has got its end stove out.”
“Jes’ ’s I told ye, Mr. Sanford,” said Captain Joe in a positive tone; “t’other body went out with the tide.”
The yacht, with the rescued dead man laid on the deck and covered with a sheet, steamed across the narrow channel, reversed her screw, and touched the fender spiles of her wharf as gently as one would tap an egg. Sanford, who, now that the body was found, had gone ahead in the small boat in search of the section boss, was waiting on the wharf for the arrival of the yacht.
“There’s more trouble, Captain Joe,” he called. “There’s a man here that the scow saved from the wreck. Mr. Smearly thought he would pull through, but the doctor who’s with him says he can’t live an hour. His spine is injured. Major Slocomb and Mr. Smearly are now in Stonington in search of a surgeon. The section boss tells me his name is Williams, and that he works in the machine shops. Better look at him and see if you know him.”
Captain Joe and Caleb walked toward the scow. She was moored close to the grassy slope of the shore. On her deck stood half a dozen men,—one a diver sent by the manager of the road, and who had arrived with his dress and equipment too late to be of service.
The injured man lay in the centre. Beside him, seated on one of Mrs. Leroy’s piazza chairs, was the village doctor; his hand was on the patient’s pulse. One of Mrs. Leroy’s maids knelt at the wounded man’s feet, wringing out cloths that had been dipped in buckets of boiling water brought by the men servants. Mrs. Leroy and Helen and one or two guests sat a short distance away on the lawn. Over by the stables swinging lights could be seen glimmering here and there, as if men were hurrying. There were lights, too, on the dock and on the scow’s deck; one hung back of the sufferer’s head, where it could not shine on his eyes.
The wounded man, who had been stripped of his wet clothes, lay on a clean mattress. Over him was thrown a soft white blanket. His head was propped up on a pillow taken from one of Mrs. Leroy’s beds. She had begged to have him moved to the house, but the doctor would not consent until the surgeon arrived. So he kept him out in the warm night-air, under the stars.
Dying and dead men were no new sight to Captain Joe and Caleb. The captain had sat by too many wounded men knocked breathless by falling derricks, and seen their life-blood ooze away, and Caleb had dragged too many sailors from sunken cabins. This accident was not serious; only three killed and one wounded out of twenty. In the morning their home people would come and take them away,—in cloth-covered boxes, or in plain pine. That was all.
With these thoughts in his mind, and in obedience to Sanford’s request, Captain Joe walked toward the sufferer, nodded to the Medford doctor sitting beside him, picked up the lantern which hung behind the man’s head, and turned the light full on the pale face. Caleb stood at one side talking with the captain of the scow.
“He ain’t no dago,” said Captain Joe, as he turned to the doctor. “Looks to me like one o’ them young fellers what’s”—He stopped abruptly. Something about the injured man attracted him.
He dropped on one knee beside the bed, pushed back the matted hair from the man’s forehead, and examined the skin carefully.
For some moments he remained silent, scanning every line in the face. Then he rose to his feet, folded his arms across his chest, his eyes still fastened on the sufferer, and said slowly and thoughtfully to himself,—
“Well, I’m damned!”
The doctor bent his head in expectation, eager to hear the captain’s next words, but the captain was too absorbed to notice the gesture. For some minutes he continued looking at the dying man.
“Come here, Caleb!” he called, beckoning to the diver. “Hold the lantern close. Who’s that?” His voice sank almost to a whisper. “Look in his face.”
“I don’t know, cap’n; I never see him afore.”
At the sound of the voices the head on the pillow turned, and the man half opened his eyes, and groaned heavily. He was evidently in great pain,—too great for the opiates wholly to deaden.
“Look agin, Caleb; see that scar on his cheek; that’s where the Screamer hit ’im. That’s Bill Lacey.”
Caleb caught up the lantern as Captain Joe had done, and turned the light full on the dying man’s face. Slowly and carefully he examined every feature,—the broad forehead, deep-sunk eyes, short, curly hair about the temples, and the mustache and close-trimmed beard, which had been worn as a disguise, no doubt, along with his new name of Williams. In the same searching way his eye passed over the broad shoulders and slender, supple body outlined under the clinging blanket, and so on down to the small, well-shaped feet that the kneeling maid was warming.
“It’s him,” he said quietly, stepping back to the mast, and folding his arms behind his back, while his eyes were fixed on the drawn face.
During this exhaustive search Captain Joe followed every expression that swept over the diver’s face. How would the death of this man affect Betty?
With an absorbed air, the captain picked up an empty nail-keg, and crossing the deck sat down beside the mattress, his hands on his knees, watching the sufferer. As he looked at the twitching muscles of the face and the fading color, the bitterness cherished for months against this man faded away. He saw only the punishment that had come, its swiftness and its sureness. Then another face came before him,—a smaller one, with large and pleading eyes.
“Ain’t no chance for him, I s’pose?” he said to the doctor in a low tone.
The only answer was an ominous shake of the head and a significant rubbing of the edge of the doctor’s hand across the waist-line of the captain’s back. Captain Joe nodded his head; he knew,—the spine was broken.
The passing of a spirit is a sacred and momentous thing, an impressive spectacle even to rough men who have seen it so often.
One by one the watchers on the scow withdrew. Captain Joe and the doctor remained beside the bed; Caleb stood a few feet away, leaning against the mast, the full glow of the lantern shedding a warm light over his big frame and throwing his face into shadow. What wild, turbulent thoughts surged through his brain no one knew but himself. Beads of sweat had trickled down his face, and he loosened his collar to breathe the better.
Presently the captain sank on his knee again beside the mattress. His face had the firm, determined expression of one whose mind has been made up on some line of action that has engrossed his thoughts. He put his mouth close to the sufferer’s ear.
“It’s me, Billy,—Cap’n Joe. Do ye know me?”
The eyes opened slowly and fastened themselves for an instant upon the captain’s face. A dull gleam of recognition stirred in their glassy depths; then the lids closed wearily. The glimpse of Lacey’s mind was but momentary, yet to the captain it was unmistakable. The brain was still alert.
He leaned back and beckoned to Caleb.
“Come over ’ere,” he said in a low whisper, “an’ git down close to 'im. He ain’t got long ter live. Don’t think o’ what he done to you; git that out o’ yer head; think o’ where he’s a-goin’. Don’t let him go with that on yer mind; it ain’t decent, an’ it’ll haunt ye. Git down close to ’im, an’ tell 'im ye ain’t got nothin’ agin 'im; do it for me, Caleb. Ye won’t never regret it.”
The diver knelt in a passive, listless way, as one kneels in a church to the sound of an altar bell. The flame of the lantern fell on his face and shaggy beard, lighting up the earnest, thoughtful eyes and tightly pressed lips.
“Pull yerself together, Billy, jes’ once fur me,” said Captain Joe in a half-coaxing voice. “It’s Caleb bendin’ over ye; he wants to tell ye somethin’.”
The sunken, shriveled lids parted quickly, and the eyes rested for a moment on the diver’s face. The lips moved, as if the man were about to speak. But no words came.
Over the cheeks and nose there passed a convulsive twitching,—the neck stiffened, the head straightened back upon the pillow.
Then the jaw fell.
“He’s dead,” said the doctor, laying his hand over the man’s heart.
Captain Joe drew the blanket over the dead face, rose from his knees, and, with his arm in Caleb’s, left the scow and walked slowly toward the yacht. The doctor gathered up his remedies, gave some directions to the watchman, and joined Mrs. Leroy and the ladies on the lawn.
Only the watchman on the scow was left, and the silent stars,—stern, unflinching, pitiless, like the eyes of many judges.
“The diver knelt in a passive, listless way”
“The diver knelt in a passive, listless way”
“The diver knelt in a passive, listless way”
Caleb and Captain Joe sat on the yacht’s deck on their way back to Keyport. The air-pump had been lifted into its case, and the dress and equipment had been made ready to be put ashore at the paraphernalia dock.
The moon had risen, flooding the yacht with white light and striping the deck with the clear-cut, black shadows of the stanchions. On the starboard bow burned Keyport Light, and beyond flashed Little Gull, a tiny star on the far-off horizon.
Caleb leaned back on a settee, his eyes fixed on the glistening sea. He had not spoken a word since his eyes rested on Lacey’s face.
“Caleb,” said Captain Joe, laying his hand on the diver’s knee, “mebbe ye don’t feel right to me fur sayin’ what I did, but I didn’t want ye to let 'im go an’ not tell 'im ye hadn’t no hatred in yer heart toward ’im. It’d come back to plague ye, and ye’ve had sufferin’ enough already ’long o’ him. He won’t worry you nor her no more. He’s lived a mean, stinkin’ life, an’ he’s died ’s I allus knowed he would,—with nobody’s hand ter help ’im. Caleb,”—he paused for an instant and looked into the diver’s face,—“you ’n me ’s knowed each other by an’ large a many a year; ye know what I want ye to do; ye know what hurts me an’ has ever sence the child come back. He’s out o’ yer hands now. God’s punished him. Be good to yerself an’ to her, an’ forgive her. Take Betty back.”
The old man turned and slipped his hand over Captain Joe’s,—a hard, horny hand, with a heart-throb in every finger-tip.
“Cap’n Joe, I know how ye feel. There ain’t nothin’ between us; but yer wrong abouthim. As I stood over him to-night I fit it all out with myself. If he’d ’a’ lived long ’nough I’d ’a’ told him, jes’ ’s ye wanted me to. But yer ain’t never had this thing right; I ain’t a-blamin’ her.”
“Then take ’er home, an’ quit this foolish life ye’re leadin’, an’ her heart a-breakin’ every day for love o’ ye. Ain’t ye lonely ’nough without her? God knows she is without you.”
Caleb slowly withdrew his hand from Captain Joe’s and put his arms behind his head, making a rest of his interlocked fingers.
“When ye say she’s a-breakin’ her heart for me, Cap’n Joe, ye don’t know it all.” His eyes looked up at the sky as he spoke. “'T ain’t that I ain’t willin’ to take ’er back. I allus wanted to help her, an’ I allus wanted to take care of her,—not to have her take care o’ me. I made up my mind this mornin’, when I see how folks was a-treatin’ 'er, to ask ’er to come home. If I’d treat ’er right, they’d treat ’er right; I know it. But I warn’t the man for her, an’ she don’t love me now no more’n she did. That’s what hurts me an’ makes me afraid. Now I’ll tell ye why I know she don’t love me; tell ye something ye don’t know at all,”—he turned his head as he spoke, and looked the captain full in the eyes, his voice shaking,—“an’ when I tell ye I want to say I ain’t a-blamin’ her.” The words that followed came like the slow ticking of a clock. “He’s—been—a-writin’—to ’er—ever since—she left ’im. Bert Simmons—showed me the letters.”
“You found that out, did ye?” said Captain Joe, a sudden angry tremor in his voice. “Ye’re right; he has! Been a-writin’ to her ever sence she left him,—sometimes once a month, sometimes once a week, an’ lately about every day.”
Caleb raised his head. This last was news to him.
“And that ain’t all. Every one o’ them letters she’s brought to me, jes’ ’s fast as she got ’em, an’ I locked ’em in my sea-chest along o’ the money ye gin her every week, an’ the money and letters are there now. An’ there’s more to it yet.There ain’t nary seal broke on any one of Lacey’s.Whoever’s been a-lyin’ to ye, Caleb, ain’t told ye one half o’ what he ought to know.”
Captain Joe swung back his garden gate and walked quickly up the plank walk, his big, burly body swaying as he moved. The house was dark, except for a light in the kitchen window, and another in Betty’s room. He saw Aunty Bell in a chair by the table, but he hurried by, on his way upstairs, without a word. Caleb followed with slow and measured step. When he reached the porch, Aunty Bell had left her seat and was standing on the mat.
“Why, Caleb, be ye comin’ in too?” she said. “I’ll git supper for both o’ ye. Guess ye’re tuckered out.”
“I don’t want no supper,” he answered gravely, without looking at her. “I’ll go into the settin’-room an’ wait, if ye’ll let me.”
She opened the door silently for him, wondering if he was in one of his moods. The only light in the room came from the street-lamp, stenciling the vines on the drawn shades.
“I’ll fetch a light for ye, Caleb,” she said quietly, and turned toward the kitchen. In the hall she paused, her knees shaking, a prayer in her heart. Captain Joe and Betty were coming down the stairs, Betty’s face hidden on his shoulder, her trembling fingers clinging to his coat.
“Ain’t nothin’ to skeer ye, child”
“Ain’t nothin’ to skeer ye, child”
“Ain’t nothin’ to skeer ye, child”
“Ain’t nothin’ to skeer ye, child,” the captain said, patting the girl’s cheek as he stopped at the threshold. “It’s all right. He’s in there waitin’,” and he closed the door upon them.
Then he walked straight toward Aunty Bell, two big tears rolling down his cheeks, and, laying his hand upon her shoulder, said, “Caleb’s got his lights trimmed, an’ Betty’s found harbor. The little gal’s home.”
In another room, some miles away, before a window that looked upon the sea, sat a woman, with cheeks tight pressed between her hands. The low-lying drowsy moon shed a white light on her thoughtful face and silvered the fluff of loosened hair that fell about her shoulders. She had sat there for hours—long after the house was silent. Outside the world was still: only the lapping of little wave-tongues along the shore was heard; the croaking of frogs in the marsh, and the cry of the night-hawk circling as he flew.
On the desk beside her lay an open letter with a Paris postmark. It had come by the late mail.
Once in a while her eyes would rest on the shimmer of silver framing the Ledge. Then some remembrance of the day would rush over her: the anxious waiting for the verdict; Sanford’s upraised hand as he entered the cabin; the gaunt outline of the wrecked trestle and the ghostly lantern that burned above the head of the dying man. From out the turmoil of these contending memories one face shone clear and strong, with fixed and questioning eyes.
In that one look she had read his inmost depth. She had caught the sudden uplifting of the lids, the wondering glance at her joyous words of praise, and the shadow that followed.
“It is best so,” she whispered to herself at last. “It is the only way. I did not mean to hurt him,—only to help. Help him—and me.”
With a tired, listless air, she rose from her seat, folded the letter slowly, and locked it in her desk.
THE END.
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