XIIIA SMILING FACE
“Doctor Luke, zur,” I said, as we walked that day, “I dreamed o’ you, last night.”
“Pleasantly, I hope?”
I sighed.
“What,” said he, gravely, “did you dream of me?”
’Twas hard to frame a reply. “I been thinkin’, since,” I faltered, floundering in search of a simile, “that you’re like a—like a——”
“Like what?” he demanded.
I did not know. My eye sought everywhere, but found no happy suggestion. Then, through an opening in the hills, I caught sight of the melancholy wreck on the Reef of the Thirty Black Devils.
“I fear t’ tell,” said I.
He stopped. “But I wish to know,” he persisted. “You’ll tell me, Davy, will you not? It means so much.”
“Like a wrecked ship,” said I.
“Good God!” he exclaimed, starting from me.
At once he sent me home; nor would he have mewalk with him that afternoon, because, as he said, my sister would not allow me to bear him company, did she know as much as I had in some strange way divined.
Next day, armed with my sister’s express permission, I overcame his scruples; and off we went to Red Indian Cave. Everywhere, indeed, we went together, while the wrecked folk waited the mail-boat to come—Doctor Luke and I—hand in hand—happy (for the agony of my loss came most in the night, when I lay wakeful and alone in my little bed) as the long, blue days. We roamed the hills, climbed the cliffs, clambered along shore; and once, to my unbounded astonishment and alarm, he stripped to the skin and went head first into the sea from the base of the Good Promise cliffs. Then nothing would content him but that I, too, should strip and plunge in: which I did (though you may think it extraordinary), lest he think me afraid to trust his power to save me. Thus the invigourating air, the yellow sunlight, the smiling sea beyond the rocks, the blue sky overhead, were separate delights in which our friendship ripened: so that at times I wondered what loneliness would overtake me when he had gone. I told him I wished he would not go away on the mail-boat, but would stay and live withus, that, being a doctor, as he had said, he might heal our folk when they fell sick, and no one would die, any more. He laughed at that—but not because of merriment—and gripped my hand tighter, and I began to hope that, perhaps, he would not go away; but he did not tell me whether he would or not.
When the mail-boat was near due, my sister said that I must have the doctor to tea; for it would never do, said she, to accept his kindnesses and show no hospitality in return. In reply to this Doctor Luke said that I must present his compliments to my sister (which I thought a curious way of putting it), and say that he accepted the invitation with great pleasure; and, as though it were a matter of grave moment, he had me repeat the form until I knew it perfectly. That evening my sister wore a long skirt, fashioned in haste from one of my mother’s gowns, and this, with my mother’s keys, which she kept hanging from her girdle, as my mother used to do, made her very sweetly staid. The doctor came speckless, wearing his only shirt, which (as Tom Tot’s wife made known to all the harbour) he had paid one dollar to have washed and ironed in three hours for the occasion, spending the interval (it was averred) in his room. While wewaited for the maids to lay the table, my sister moved in and out, directing them; and the doctor gazed at her in a way so marked that I made sure she had forgotten a hook or a button, and followed her to the kitchen to discover the omission.
“Sure, Bessie, dear,” I began, very gingerly, “I’m fair dreadin’ that you’re—you’re——”
She was humming, in happy unconsciousness of her state; and I was chagrined by the necessity of disclosing it: but resolutely continued, for it must be done.
“Loose,” I concluded.
She gave a little jump—a full inch, it may be—from the floor.
“Davy!” she cried, in mixed horror and distress. “Oh, dear! Whereabouts?”
“Do you turn around,” said I, “an’ I’ll soon find out.”
She whirled like a top. But I could find nothing awry. She was shipshape from head to toe.
“’Tis very queer,” said I. “Sure, I thought you’d missed a button, for the doctor is lookin’ at you all the time.”
“Atme!” she cried.
“Ay, at you.”
She was then convinced with me that there was something amiss, and called the maids to our help,for, as she said, I was only a boy (though a dear one), and ill schooled in such matters. But it turned out that their eyes were no sharper than mine. They pronounced her hooked and buttoned and pinned to the Queen’s taste.
“’Tis queer, then,” I persisted, when the maids had gone, “that he looks at you so hard.”
“Is you sure he does?” she asked, much puzzled, “for,” she added, with a little frown, “I’m not knowin’ why he should.”
“Nor I,” said I.
At table we were very quiet, but none the less happy for that; for it seemed to me that my mother’s gentle spirit hovered near, content with what we did. And after tea my father sat with the doctor on our platform, talking of disease and healing, until, in obedience to my sister’s glance, I took our guest away to the harbour, to see (as I said) the greatest glories of the sunset: for, as I knew, my sister wished to take my father within, and change the current of his thought. Then I rowed the doctor to North Tickle, and let the punt lie in the swell of the open sea, where it was very solemn and quiet. The sky was heavy with drifting masses of cloud, aflare with red and gold and all the sunset colours, from the black line of coast, lying in the west, far into the east, where sea and sky were turning gray. Indeed,it was very still, very solemn, lying in the long, crimson swell of the great deep, while the dusk came creeping over the sea.
“I do not wonder,” the doctor muttered, with a shudder, “that the people who dwell here fear God.”
There was something familiar to me in that feeling; but for the moment I could not make it out.
“Zur?” I said.
His eyes ranged timidly over the sombre waste—the vasty, splendid heavens, the coast, dark and unfeeling, the infinite, sullen sea, which ominously darkened as he looked—and he covered his face with his hands.
“No,” he whispered, looking up, “I do not wonder that you believe in God—and fear Him!”
Then I knew that roundabout he felt the presence of an offended God.
“And fear Him!” he repeated.
I levelled my finger at him. “You been wicked!” I said, knowing that my accusation was true.
“Yes,” he answered, “I have been wicked.”
“Is you goin’ t’ be good?”
“I am going to try to be good—now.”
“You isn’t goin’ away, is you?” I wailed.
“I am going to stay here,” he said, gravely, “and treat the people, who need me, and try, in that way, to be good.”
“I’d die t’ see it!” cried I.
He laughed—and the tension vanished—and we went happily back to harbour. I had no thought that the resolution to which he had come was in any way extraordinary.
I ran to the Rat Hole, that night, to give the great news to Skipper Tommy Lovejoy and the twins. “Ecod!” the old man cried, vastly astounded. “Is he t’ stay, now? Well, well! Then they’s no need goin’ on with the book. Ecod! now think o’ that! An’ ’tis all because your mother died, says you, when he might have saved her! Ah, Davy, the ways o’ God is strange. He manages somehow t’ work a blessin’ with death an’ wreck. ‘I’m awful sorry for they poor children,’ says He, ‘an’ for the owners o’ that there fine ship; but I got t’ have My way,’ says He, ‘or the world would never come t’ much; so down goes the ship,’ says He, ‘an’ up comes that dear mother t’ my bosom. ’Tis no use tellin’ them why,’ says He, ‘for they wouldn’t understand. An’, ecod!’ says He, ‘while I’m about it I’ll just put it in the mind o’ that doctor-man t’ stay right there an’ do a day’s work or two for Me.’ I’m sure He meant it—I’m sure He meant t’ do just that—I’m sure ’twas all done o’ purpose. We thinks He’s hard an’ a bit free an’ careless. Ecod! they’stimes when we thinks He fair bungles His job. He kills us, an’ He cripples us, an’ He starves us, an’ He hurts our hearts; an’ then, Davy, we says He’s a dunderhead at runnin’ a world, which, says we, we could run a sight better, if we was able t’ make one. But the Lard, Davy, does His day’s work in a seamanlike way, usin’ no more crooked backs an’ empty stomachs an’ children’s tears an’ broken hearts than He can help. ’Tis little we knows about whatHe’sup to. An’ ’tis wise, I’m thinkin’, not t’ bother about tryin’ t’ find out. ’Tis better t’ let Him steer His own course an’ ask no questions. I justknowedHe was up t’ something grand. I said so, Davy! ’Tis just like the hymn, lad, about His hidin’ a smilin’ face behind a frownin’ providence. Ah, Davy,He’lltake care o’we!”
All of which, as you know, was quite characteristic of Skipper Tommy Lovejoy.
XIVIn The WATCHES of The NIGHT
At once we established the doctor in our house, that he might be more comfortably disposed; and this was by my sister’s wish, who hoped to be his helper in the sweet labour of healing. And soon a strange thing happened: once in the night—’twas late of a clear, still night—I awoke, of no reason; nor could I fall asleep again, but lay high on the pillow, watching the stars, which peeped in at my window, companionably winking. Then I heard the fall of feet in the house—a restless pacing: which brought me out of bed, in a twinkling, and took me tiptoeing to the doctor’s room, whence the unusual sound. But first I listened at the door; and when I had done that, I dared not enter, because of what I heard, but, crouching in the darkness, must continue to listen ... and listen....
By and by I crept away to my sister’s room, unable longer to bear the awe and sorrow in my heart.
“Bessie!” I called, in a low whisper.
“Ay, Davy?”
“Is you awake?”
“Ay, I’m wakeful.”
I closed the door after me—then went swiftly to her bedside, treading with great caution.
“Listenin’?” I asked.
“T’ the doctor,” she answered, “walkin’ the floor.”
“Is you afraid?” I whispered.
“No.”
“I is.”
She sat up in bed—and drew me closer. “An’ why, dear?” she asked, stroking my cheek.
“Along o’ what I heared in the dark, Bessie—at his door.”
“You’ve not been eavesdroppin’, Davy?” she chided.
“Oh, I wisht I hadn’t!”
“’Twas not well done.”
The moon was up, broadly shining behind the Watchman: my sister’s white little room—kept sweet and dainty in the way she had—was full of soft gray light; and I saw that her eyes were wide and moist.
“He’s wonderful restless, the night,” she mused.
“He’ve a great grief.”
“A grief? Oh, Davy!”
“Ay, a great, great grief! He’ve been talkin’ to hisself, Bessie. But ’tis not words; ’tis mostly only sounds.”
“Naught else?”
“Oh, ay! He’ve said——”
“Hush!” she interrupted. “’Tis not right for me t’ know. I would not have you tell——”
I would not be stopped. “He’ve said, Bessie,” I continued, catching something, it may be, of his agony, “he’ve said, ‘I pay! Oh, God, I pay!’ he’ve said. ‘Merciful Christ, hear me—oh, I pay!’”
She trembled.
“’Tis some great grief,” said I.
“Do you haste to his comfort, Davy,” she whispered, quickly. “’Twould be a kind thing t’ do.”
“Is you sure he’s wantin’ me?”
“Were it me I would.”
When I had got to the doctor’s door again, I hesitated, as before, fearing to go in; and once more I withdrew to my sister’s room.
“I’m not able t’ go in,” I faltered. “’Tis awful, Bessie, t’ hear men goin’ on—like that.”
“Like what?”
“Cryin’.”
A little while longer I sat silent with my sister—until, indeed, the restless footfalls ceased, and the blessed quiet of night fell once again.
“An’, Bessie,” said I, “he said a queer thing.”
She glanced a question.
“He said your name!”
She was much interested—but hopelessly puzzled. For a moment she gazed intently at the stars. Then she sighed.
“He’ve a great grief,” I repeated, sighing, “an’ he’ve been wicked.”
“Oh, no—not wicked!”
“Ay,” I persisted, gently, “wicked; for he’ve told me so with his own tongue.”
“Not wicked!”
“But he’vesaidso,” I insisted, nettled, on the instant, by my sister’s perversity.
“I’m thinkin’ he couldn’t be,” she said.
“Sure, why not?” I demanded.
She looked away for a moment—through the window, into the far, starlit sky, which the light of the moon was fast paling; and I thought my question forgot.
“Why not, sister?”
“I—don’t know—why not!” she whispered.
I kissed my sister good-night, while yet she puzzled over this, and slipped off to my own room, lifting my night-dress, as I tiptoed along, lest I trip and by some clumsy commotion awake my friend to his bitterness. Once back in my bed—once again lying alone in the tranquil night—I found the stars still peeping in at my window, still twinkling companionably,as I had left them. And I thought, as my mother had taught me, of these little watchmen, serene, constant, wise in their great remoteness—and of him who lay in unquiet sleep near by—and, then, understanding nothing of the mystery, nor caring to know, but now secure in the unquestioning faith of childhood, I closed my eyes to sleep: for the stars still shone on, flashing each its little message of serenity to the troubled world.
XVTHE WOLF
In course of time, the mail-boat cleared our harbour of wrecked folk; and within three weeks of that day my father was cast away on Ill Wind Head: being alone on the way to Preaching Cove with the skiff, at the moment, for fish to fill out the bulk of our first shipment to the market at St. John’s, our own catch having disappointed the expectation of us every one. My sister and I were then left to manage my father’s business as best we could: which we must determine to do, come weal or woe, for we knew no other way. My sister said, moreover, that, whether we grew rich or poor, ’twas wise and kind to do our best, lest our father’s folk, who had ever been loyal to his trade, come upon evil times at the hands of traders less careful of their welfare. Large problems of management we did not perceive, but only the simple, immediate labour, to which we turned with naively willing heads and hands, sure that, because of the love abroad in all the world, no evil would befall us.
“’Twill be fortune,” my sister said, in her sweetand hopeful way; “for the big world is good, Davy,” said she, “to such as are bereft.”
“I’m not so sure o’ that.”
“Ay,” she repeated, unshaken, “the world is kind.”
“You is but a girl, Bessie,” said I, “an’ not well acquaint with the way o’ the world. Still an’ all,” I mused, “Skipper Tommy says ’tis kind, an’ he’ve growed wonderful used t’ livin’.”
“We’ll not fear the world.”
“No, no! We’ll not fear it. I’ll be a man, sister, for your sake.”
“An’ I a true woman,” said she, “for yours.”
To Tom Tot we gave the handling of the fish and stores, resolving, also, to stand upon his judgment in the matter of dealing supplies to the thriftless and the unfortunate, whether generously or with a sparing hand, for the men of our harbour were known to him, every one, in strength and conscience and will for toil. As for the shop, said we, we would mind it ourselves, for ’twas but play to do it; and thus, indeed, it turned out: so hearty was the sport it provided that my sister and I would hilariously race for the big key (which hung on a high nail in the dining-room) whenever a customer came. I would not have you think us unfeeling. God knows, we were not that! ’Twas this way with us: each hid the pain,and thus thought to deceive the other into a happier mood. We did well enough in the shop; but we could make neither head nor tail of the books in my father’s safe; and when our bewilderment and heartache came to ears of the doctor he said that he would himself manage the letters and keep the books in the intervals of healing the sick: which, with a medicine chest they had brought ashore from the wreck, he had already begun to practice.
It seemed, then, to my sister and me, that the current of our life once more ran smooth.
And Jagger of Wayfarer’s Tickle—the same who sat at cards with the mail-boat doctor and beat his dog with the butt of a whip—having got news of my father’s death, came presently to our harbour, with that in mind which jumped ill with our plans. We had dispiriting weather: a raw wind bowled in from the northeast, whipping the fog apace; and the sea, as though worried out of patience, broke in a short, white-capped lop, running at cross purposes with the ground swell. ’Twas evil sailing for small craft: so whence came this man’s courage for the passage ’tis past me even now to fathom; for he had no liking to be at sea, but, rather, cursed the need of putting out, without fail, and lay prone below at such unhappy times as the sloop chanced to toss in roughwaters, praying all the time with amazing ferocity. Howbeit, across the bay he came, his lee rail smothered; and when he had landed, he shook his gigantic fist at the sea and burst into a triumphant bellow of blasphemy, most thrilling (as we were told) to hear: whereafter, with a large air (as of prospective ownership), he inspected the flakes and storehouses, heartily condemned them, wished our gaping crew to perdition, and, out of breath at last, moved up the path to our house, his great dog hanging like a shadow at his heels—having come and gone on the wharves, as Tom Tot said, like a gale o’ wind.
My sister and I sat dreaming in the evening light—wherein, of soft shadows and western glory, fine futures may by any one be fashioned.
“’Tis rich,” said I, “thatI’mwantin’ t’ be.”
“Not I,” said she.
“Not you?”
“Not rich,” she answered, “but helpful t’ such as do the work o’ the world.”
“T’ me, Bessie?”
“Ay,” with a smile and half a sigh, “t’ you.”
“An’ only me? I’d not be selfish with you. Is you wishin’ t’ be helpful—only t’ me?”
“No.”
“T’ him?”
“An it please you,” she softly answered.
“An’ we t’ you, Bessie!” I cried, in a rapture, kissing her plump little hand, which lay over my shoulder, convenient to my lips. “Ay, for your loving-kindness, my sister!”
“’Tis t’ you, first of all, Davy,” she protested, quickly, “that I’m wishin’ t’ be helpful; an’ then t’ him, an’ then t’——”
“T’ who?” I demanded, frowning.
“All the world,” said she.
“Very well,” said I, much relieved to find that the interloper was no more to be dreaded. “I’ll not mindthat. ’Tis as you like. You’ll help whomso you please—an’ as many. For I’m t’ be rich. Rich—look you! I’ll have seven schooners t’ sail the northern Labrador, as the doctor says. I’ll never be content with less. Seven I’ll have, my dear, t’ fish from the Straits t’ Chidley. I’ll have the twins t’ be masters o’ two; but I’ll sail the big one—the swift one—the hundred-tonner—ay, lass, I’ll sail she, with me own hands. An’, ecod! Bessie,I’llcrack it on!”
“You’ll not be rash, dear?” said she, anxiously.
“Rash!” laughed I. “I’ll cut off the reef points! Rash? There won’t be a skipper can carry sail with me! I’ll get the fish—an’ I’ll see to it that my masters does. Then I’ll push our trade north an’ south. Ay, I will! Oh, I knows what I’ll do, Bessie, for I been talkin’ with the doctor, an’ we got it split an’dried. Hard work an’ fair dealing, mum; that’s what’s t’ do it. Our father’s way, mum: honest scales on the wharf an’ full weight at the counter. ’Twill be that or bust——”
“Why, Davy,” she exclaimed, her eyes flashing, “you’re talkin’ like a growed man!”
“Ay, ecod!” I boasted, flattered by the inference, “’twill not be many years afore we does more trade in our harbour than they does at the big stores o’ Wayfarer’s Tickle.”
A low growl, coming from the shadows in the hall, brought me to a full stop; and upon the heels of that a fantastic ejaculation:
“Scuttle me!”
So sudden and savage the outburst, so raucous the voice, so charged with angry chagrin—the whole so incongruous with soft dreams and evening light—that ’twas in a shiver of terror my sister and I turned to discover whose presence had disturbed us.
The intruder stood in the door—a stubby, grossly stout man, thin-legged, thick-necked, all body and beard: clad below in tight trousers, falling loose, however, over the boots; swathed above in an absurdly inadequate pea-jacket, short in the sleeves and buttoned tight over a monstrous paunch, which laboured (and that right sturdily) to burst the bonds ofits confinement, but succeeded only in creating a vast confusion of wrinkles. His attitude was that of a man for the moment amazed beyond utterance: his head was thrown back, so that of his face nothing was to be seen but a short, ragged growth of iron-gray beard and a ridge of bushy eyebrow; his hands were plunged deep in his trousers pockets, which the fists distended; his legs, the left deformed (being bent inward at the knee), were spread wide. In the shadows beyond lurked a huge dog—a mighty, sullen beast, which came stepping up, with lowered head, to peer at us from between his master’s legs.
“I’ll be scuttled,” said the man, bringing his head forward with a jerk, “if the little cock wouldn’t cut into the trade o’ Wayfarer’s Tickle!”
Having thus in a measure mastered his amazement (and not waiting to be bidden), he emerged from the obscurity of the doorway, advanced, limping heavily, and sat himself in my father’s chair, from which, his bandy legs comfortably hanging from the table, where he had disposed his feet, he regarded me in a way so sinister—with a glance so fixed and ill-intentioned—that his great, hairy face, malformed and mottled, is clear to me to this day, to its last pimple and wrinkle, its bulbous, flaming nose and bloodshot eyes, as though ’twere yesterday I saw it. And there he sat, puffing angrily, blowing his nose like a whale, scowling,ejaculating, until (as I’ve no doubt) he conceived us to have been reduced to a condition of trepidation wherein he might most easily overmaster us.
“Scuttled!” he repeated, fetching his paunch a resounding thwack. “Bored!”
Thereupon he drew from the depths of his trousers pocket a disreputable clay pipe, filled it, got it alight, noisily puffed it, darting little glances at my sister and me the while, in the way of one outraged—now of reproach, now of righteous indignation, now betraying uttermost disappointment—for all the world as though he had been pained to surprise us in the thick of a conspiracy to wrong him, but, being of a meek and most forgiving disposition, would overlook the offense, though ’twas beyond his power, however willing the spirit, to hide the wound our guilt had dealt him. Whatever the object of this display, it gave me a great itching to retreat behind my sister’s skirts, for fear and shame. And, as it appeared, he was quick to conjecture my feeling: for at once he dropped the fantastic manner and proceeded to a quiet and appallingly lucid statement of his business.
“I’m Jagger o’ Wayfarer’s Tickle,” said he, “an’ I’m come t’ take over this trade.”
“’Tis not for sale,” my sister answered.
“I wants the trade o’ this harbour,” said he, ignoring her, “on my books. An’ I got t’ have it.”
“We’re wantin’ my father’s business,” my sister persisted, but faintly now, “for Davy, when he’s growed.”
“I’m able t’ buy you out,” Jagger pursued, addressing the ceiling, “or run you out. ’Tis cheaper an’ quicker t’ buy you out. Now,” dropping his eyes suddenly to my sister’s, “how much are you askin’ for this here trade?”
“’Tis not for sale.”
“Not for sale?” roared he, jumping up.
“No, zur,” she gasped.
“If I can’t buy it,” he cried, in a rage, driving the threat home with an oath peculiarly unfit for the ears of women, “I’ll break it!”
Which brought tears to my tender sister’s eyes; whereupon, with a good round oath to match his own, I flew at him, in a red passion, and, being at all times agile and now moved to extraordinary effort, managed to inflict some damage on his shins before he was well aware of my intention—and that so painful that he yelped like a hurt cur. But he caught me by the arms, which he jammed against my ribs, lifted me high, cruelly shaking me, and sat me on the edge of the table in a fashion so sudden and violent that my teeth came together with a snap: having done which, he trapped my legs with his paunch, and thus held me in durance impotentand humiliating, so that I felt mean, indeed, to come to such a pass after an attack impetuously undertaken and executed with no little gallantry and effect. And he brought his face close to mine, his eyes flaring and winking with rage, his lips lifted from his yellow, broken teeth; and ’twas in his mind, as I perceived, to beat me as I had never been beaten before.
“Ye crab!” he began. “Ye little——”
“The dog!” my sister screamed.
’Twas timely warning: for the dog was crouched in the hall, his muscles taut for the spring, his king-hairs bristling, his fangs exposed.
“Down!” shrieks Jagger.
The diversion released me. Jagger sprang away; and I saw, in a flash, that his concern was not for me, but for himself, upon whom the dog’s baleful glance was fastened. There was now no ring of mastery in his voice, as there had been on the mail-boat, but the shiver of panic; and this, it may be, the dog detected, for he settled more alertly, pawing the floor with his forefeet, as though seeking firmer foothold from which to leap. As once before, I wished the beast well in the issue; indeed, I hoped ’twould be the throat and a fair grip! But Jagger caught a billet of wood from the box, and, with a hoarse, stifled cry—frightful to hear—drew back tothrow. Then the doctor’s light step sounded in the hall, and in he came, brushing past the dog, which slunk away into the shadows. For a moment he regarded us curiously, and then, his brows falling in a quick frown, he laid his medicine case on my sister’s sewing-machine, with never a word, and went to the window, where he stood idle, gazing out over the darkening prospect of sea and rock and upon great clouds flushed with lurid colour.
There was silence in the room—which none of us who waited found the will to break.
“Jagger”—said the doctor.
The voice was low—almost a drawl—but mightily authoritative: being without trace of feeling, but superior to passion, majestic.
“Ay, sir?”
“Go!”
The doctor still stood with his back to us, still gazed, continuing tranquil, through the broad window to the world without. And Jagger, overmastered by this confident assumption of authority, went away, as he was bidden, casting backward glances, ominous of machinations to come.
What Jagger uttered on my father’s wharf—what on the deck of the sloop while he moored his dog to the windlass for a beating—what he flung backwhile she gathered way—strangely moved Tom Tot, who hearkened, spellbound, until the last words of it (and the last yelp of the dog) were lost in the distance of North Tickle: it impelled the old man (as he has said many a time) to go wash his hands. But ’tis of small moment beside what the doctor said when informed of the occurrences in our house: being this, that he must have a partnership in our firm, because, first, it was in his heart to help my sister and me, who had been kind to him and were now like sheep fallen in with a wolf-pack, and second, because by thus establishing himself on the coast he might avert the suspicion of the folk from such good works as he had in contemplation.
“More than that,” said he, “we will prove fair dealing possible here as elsewhere. It needs but courage and—money.”
“I’m thinkin’,” my sister said, “that Davy has the courage.”
“And I,” said he, “have the money.”
I was very glad to hear it.
XVIA MALADY of The HEART
In the firelight of that evening—when the maids had cleared the cozy room and carried away the lamp and we three sat alone together in my father’s house—was planned our simple partnership in good works and the fish business. ’Tis wonderful what magic is abroad at such times—what dreams, what sure hopes, lie in the flickering blaze, the warm, red glow, the dancing shadows; what fine aspirations unfold in hearts that are brave and hopeful and kind. Presently, we had set a fleet of new schooners afloat, put a score of new traps in the water, proved fair-dealing and prosperity the selfsame thing, visited the sick of five hundred miles, established a hospital—transformed our wretched coast, indeed, into a place no longer ignorant of jollity and thrift and healing. The doctor projected all with lively confidence—his eyes aflash, his lean, white hand eloquent, his tongue amazingly active and persuasive—and with an insight so sagacious and well-informed, a purpose so pure and wise, that he revealed himself (though we did not think of itthen) not only as a man of heart but of conspicuous sense. It did not enter our minds to distrust him: because our folk are not sophisticated in polite overreaching, not given to the vice of suspicion, and because—well, he was what he was.
My sister’s face was aglow—most divinely radiant—with responsive faith and enthusiasm; and as for me——
“Leave me get down,” I gasped, at last, to the doctor, “or I’ll bust with delight, by heaven!”
He laughed, but unclasped his hands and let me slip from his knee; and then I began to strut the floor, my chest puffed out to twice its natural extent.
“By heaven!” I began. “If that Jagger——”
The clock struck ten. “David Roth,” my sister exclaimed, lifting her hands in mock horror, “’tis fair scandalous for a lad o’ your years t’ be up ’t this hour!”
“Off to bed with you, you rascal!” roared the doctor.
“I’ll not go,” I protested.
“Off with you!”
“Not I.”
“Catch un, doctor!” cried my sister.
“An you can, zur!” I taunted.
If he could? Ecod! He snatched at me, quick as a cat; but I dodged his hand, laughed in his faceand put the table between us. With an agility beyond compare—with a flow of spirits like a gale of wind—he vaulted the broad board. The great, grave fellow appeared of a sudden to my startled vision in midair—his arms and legs at sixes and sevens—his coat-tails flapping like a loose sail—his mouth wide open in a demoniacal whoop—and I dropped to the floor but in the bare nick of time to elude him. Uproarious pursuit ensued: it made my sister limp and pain-stricken and powerless with laughter; it brought our two maids from the kitchen and kept them hysterically screaming in the doorway, the lamp at a fearsome angle; it tumbled the furniture about with rollicking disregard, led the doctor a staggering, scrambling, leaping course in the midst of upturned tables and chairs, and, at last, ran the gasping quarry to earth under the sofa. I was taken out by the heels, shouldered, carried aloft and flung sprawling on my bed—while the whole house rang again with peal upon peal of hearty laughter.
“Oh, zur,” I groaned, “I never knowed you was so jolly!”
“Not so?”
“On my word, zur!”
He sighed.
“I fancied you was never but sad.”
“Ah, well,” said he, “the Labrador, Davy, is evidently working a cure.”
“God be thanked for that!” said I, devoutly.
He rumpled my hair and went out. And I bade him send my sister with the candle; and while I lay waiting in the dark a glow of content came upon me—because of this: that whereas I had before felt woefully inadequate to my sister’s protection, however boastfully I had undertaken it, I was now sure that in our new partnership her welfare and peace of heart were to be accomplished. Then she came in and sat with me while I got ready for bed. She had me say my prayers at her knee, as a matter of course, but this night hinted that an additional petition for the doctor’s well-doing and happiness might not be out of place. She chided me, after that, for the temper I had shown against Jagger and for the oath I had flung at his head, as I knew she would—but did not chide me heartily, because, as she said, she was for the moment too gratefully happy to remember my short-comings against me. I thanked her, then, for this indulgence, and told her that she might go to bed, for I was safely and comfortably bestowed, as she could see, and ready for sleep; but she would not go, and there sat, with the candle in her hand, her face flushed and her great blue eyes soulfully glowing, while she continued to chatter inan incoherent and strangely irrelevant fashion: so that, astonished into broad wakefulness by this extraordinary behaviour, I sat bolt upright in bed, determined to discover the cause.
“Bessie Roth,” said I, severely, “what’s come upon you?”
“I’m not knowin’, Davy,” she answered, softly, looking away.
“’Tis somewhat awful, then,” said I, in alarm, “for you’re not lookin’ me in the eye.”
She looked then in her lap—and did not raise her eyes, though I waited: which was very strange.
“You isn’t sick, is you?”
“No-o,” she answered, doubtfully.
“Oh, youmustn’tget sick,” I protested. “’Twouldneverdo. I’d fair die—ifyougot sick!”
“’Tisn’t sickness; ’tis—I’m not knowin’ what.”
“Ah, come,” I pleaded; “what is it, dear?”
“Davy, lad,” she faltered, “I’m just—dreadful—happy.”
“Happy?” cried I, scornfully. “’Tis not happiness! Why, sure, your lip is curlin’ with grief!”
“But Iwashappy.”
“You isn’t happy now, my girl.”
“No,” she sobbed, “I’m wonderful miserable—now.”
I kicked off the covers. “You’ve the fever, that’s what!” I exclaimed, jumping out of bed.
“’Tis not that, Davy.”
“Then—oh, for pity’s sake, Bessie, tell your brother what’s gone wrong along o’ you!”
“I’m thinkin’, Davy,” she whispered, despairingly, “that I’m nothin’ but a sinful woman.”
“A—what! Why, Bessie——”
“Nothin’,” she repeated, positively, “but a sinful, wicked person.”
“Who told you that?” said I, dancing about in a rage.
“My own heart.”
“Your heart!” cried I, blind angry. “’Tis a liar an it says so.”
“What words!” she exclaimed, changed in a twinkling. “An’ to your sister! Do you get back in bed this instant, David Roth, an’ tell her that you’re sorry.”
I was loath to do it, but did, to pacify her; and when she had carried away the candle I chuckled, for I had cured her of her indisposition for that night, at any rate: as I knew, for when she kissed me ’twas plain that she was more concerned for her wayward brother than for herself.
Past midnight I was awakened by the clang of the bell on my father’s wharf. ’Twas an unpleasant sound. Half a gale—no less—could do it. I thenknew that the wind had freshened and veered to the southeast; and I listened to determine how wild the night. Wild enough! The bell clanged frequently, sharply, jangling in the gusts—like an anxious warning. My window was black; there was no light in the sky—no star shining. Rain pattered on the roof. I heard the rush of wind. ’Twas inevitable that I should contrast the quiet of the room, the security of my place, the comfort of my couch and blankets, with a rain-swept, heaving deck and a tumultuous sea. A gusty night, I thought—thick, wet, with the wind rising. The sea would be in a turmoil on the grounds by dawn: there would be no fishing; and I was regretting this—between sleep and waking—when the bell again clanged dolefully. Roused, in a measure, I got ear of men stumbling up the path. I was into my breeches before they had trampled half the length of the platform—well on my way down the dark stair when they knocked on the door—standing scared in the light of their lantern, the door open, before they found time to hail.
I was addressed by a gray old man in ragged oilskins. “We heared tell,” said he, mildly, wiping his dripping beard, “that you got a doctor here.”
I said that we had.
“Well,” he observed, in a dull, slow voice, “we got a sick man over there t’ Wreck Cove.”
“Ay?” said I.
“An’ we was sort o’ wonderin’, wasn’t we, Skipper Tom,” another put in, “how much this doctor would be askin’ t’ go over an’ cure un?”
“Well, ay,” the skipper admitted, taking off his sou’wester to scratch his head, “wedidkind o’ have that idea.”
“’Tis a wild night,” said I: in my heart doubting—and that with shame—that the doctor would venture out upon the open sea in a gale of wind.
“’Tisnotvery civil,” said the skipper frankly. “I’m free t’ say,” in a drawl, “that ’tis—well—rather—dirty.”
“An’ he isn’t got used t’ sailin’ yet. But——”
“No?” in mild wonder. “Isn’t he, now? Well, we got a stout little skiff. Once she gets past the Thirty Devils, she’ll maybe make Wreck Cove, all right—if she’s handled proper. Oh, she’ll maybe make it if——”
“Davy!” my sister called from above. “Do you take the men through t’ the kitchen. I’ll rouse the doctor an’ send the maids down t’ make tea.”
“Well, now, thank you kindly, miss,” Skipper Tom called up to the landing. “That’s wonderful kind.”
It was a familiar story—told while the sleepy maids put the kettle on the fire and the fury of the gale increased. ’Twas the schoonerLucky Fisherman,thirty tons, Tom Lisson master, hailing from Burnt Harbour of the Newfoundland Green Bay, and fishing the Labrador at Wreck Cove, with a tidy catch in the hold and four traps in the water. There had been a fine run o’ fish o’ late; an’ Bill Sparks, the splitter—with a brood of ten children to grow fat or go hungry on the venture—labouring without sleep and by the light of a flaring torch, had stabbed his right hand with a fish bone. The old, old story—now so sadly threadbare to me—of ignorance and uncleanliness! The hand was swollen to a wonderful size and grown wonderful angry—the man gone mad of pain—the crew contemplating forcible amputation with an axe. Wonderful sad the mail-boat doctor wasn’t nowhere near! Wonderful sad if Bill Sparks must lose his hand! Bill Sparks was a wonderful clever hand with the splittin’-knife—able t’ split a wonderful sight o’ fish a minute. Wonderful sad if Bill Sparks’s family was to be throwed on the gov’ment all along o’ Bill losin’ his right hand! Wonderful sad if poor Bill Sparks———
The doctor entered at that moment. “Who is asking for me?” he demanded, sharply.
“Well,” Skipper Tom drawled, rising, “we was thinkin’ we’d sort o’ like t’ see the doctor.”
“I am he,” the doctor snapped. “Yes?” inquiringly.
“We was wonderin’, doctor,” Skipper Tom answered, abashed, “what you’d charge t’ go t’ Wreck Cove an’—an’—well, use the knife on a man’s hand.”
“Charge? Nonsense!”
“We’d like wonderful well,” said the skipper, earnestly, “t’ have you——”
“But—to-night!”
“You see, zur,” said the skipper, gently, “he’ve wonderful pain, an’ he’ve broke everything breakable that we got, an’ we’ve got un locked in the fo’c’s’le, an’——”
“Where’s Wreck Cove?”
“’Tis t’ the s‘uth’ard, zur,” one of the men put in. “Some twelve miles beyond the Thirty Devils.”
The doctor opened the kitchen door and stepped out. There was no doubt about the weather. A dirty gale was blowing. Wind and rain drove in from the black night; and, under all the near and petty noises, sounded the great, deep roar of breakers.
“Hear that?” he asked, excitedly, closing the door against the wind.
“Ay,” the skipper admitted; “as I was tellin’ the young feller, itisn’tsoverycivil.”
“Civil!” cried the doctor.
“No; not so civil that it mightn’t be a bit civiller; but, now——”
“And twelve miles of open sea!”
“No, zur—no; not accordin’ t’ my judgment. Eleven an’ a half, zur, would cover it.”
The doctor laughed.
“An’, as I was sayin’, zur,” the skipper concluded, pointedly, “we just come through it.”
My sister and I exchanged anxious glances: then turned again to the doctor—who continued to stare at the floor.
“Just,” one of the crew repeated, blankly, for the silence was painful, “come through it.”
The doctor looked up. “Of course, you know,” he began, quietly, with a formal smile, “I am not—accustomed to this sort of—professional call. It—rather—takes my breath away. When do we start?”
Skipper Tom took a look at the weather. “Blowin’ up wonderful,” he observed, quietly, smoothing his long hair, which the wind had put awry. “Gets real dirty long about the Thirty Devils in the dark. Don’t it, Will?”
Will said that it did—indeed, it did—no doubt about that,whatever.
“I s’pose,” the skipper drawled, in conclusion, “we’d as lief get underway at dawn.”
“Very good,” said the doctor. “And—you were asking about my fee—were you not? You’ll have to pay, you know—if you can—for I believe in—that sort of thing. Could you manage three dollars?”
“We was ’lowin’,” the skipper answered, “t’ pay about seven when we sold the v‘y’ge in the fall. ’Tis a wonderful bad hand Bill Sparks has got.”
“Let it be seven,” said the doctor, quickly. “The balance may go, you know, to help some poor devil who hasn’t a penny. Send it to me in the fall if——”
The skipper looked up in mild inquiry.
“Well,” said the doctor, with a nervous smile, “if we’re all here, you know.”
“Oh,” said the skipper, with a large wave of the hand, “that’s God’sbusiness.”
They put out at dawn—into a sea as wild as ever I knew an open boat to brave. The doctor bade us a merry good-bye; and he waved his hand, shouting that which the wind swept away, as the boat darted off towards South Tickle. My sister and I went to the heads of Good Promise to watch the little craft on her way. The clouds were low and black—torn by the wind—driving up from the southwest like mad: threatening still heavier weather. We followed the skiff with my father’s glass—saw her beat bravely on, reeling through the seas, smothered in spray—until she was but a black speck on the vast, angry waste, and, at last, vanished altogether in the spume and thickening fog. Then we went back to my father’s house, prayerfully wishing the doctor safe voyage toWreck Cove; and all that day, and all the next, while the gale still blew, my sister was nervous and downcast, often at the window, often on the heads, forever sighing as she went about the work of the house. And when I saw her thus distraught and colourless—no warm light in her eyes—no bloom on her dimpled cheeks—no merry smile lurking about the corners of her sweet mouth—I was fretted beyond description; and I determined this: that when the doctor got back from Wreck Cove I should report her case to him, whether she liked it or not, with every symptom I had observed, and entreat him, by the love and admiration in which I held him, to cure her of her malady, whatever the cost.
On the evening of the third day, when the sea was gone down and the wind was blowing fair and mild from the south, I sat with my sister at the broad window, where was the outlook upon great hills, and upon sombre water, and upon high, glowing sky—she in my mother’s rocker, placidly sewing, as my mother used to do, and I pitifully lost in my father’s armchair, covertly gazing at her, in my father’s way.
“Is you better, this even, sister, dear?” I asked.
“Oh, ay,” she answered, vehemently, as my mother used to do. “Much better.”
“You’re wonderful poorly.”
“’Tis true,” she said, putting the thread between her white little teeth. “But,” the strand now broken, “though you’d not believe it, Davy, dear, I’m feeling—almost—nay, quite—well.”
I doubted it. “’Tis a strange sickness,” I observed, with a sigh.
“Yes, Davy,” she said, her voice falling, her lips pursed, her brows drawn down. “I’m not able t’ make it out, at all. I’m feelin’—so wonderful—queer.”
“Is you, dear?”
“Davy Roth,” she averred, with a wag of the head so earnest that strands of flaxen hair fell over her eyes, and she had to brush them back again, “I never felt so queer in all my life afore!”
“I’m dreadful worried about you, Bessie.”
“Hut! as for that,” said she, brightly, “I’m not thinkin’ I’m goin’ t’die, Davy.”
“Sure, you never can tell about sickness,” I sagely observed.
“Oh, no!” said she. “I isn’t got that—kind o’—sickness.”
“Well,” I insisted, triumphantly, “you’re wonderful shy o’ eatin’ pork.”
She shuddered.
“I wished I knowed what you had,” I exclaimed impatiently.
“I wished you did,” she agreed, frankly, if somewhat faintly. “For, then, Davy, you’d give me a potion t’ cure me.”
She drew back the curtain—for the hundredth time, I vow—and peered towards South Tickle.
“What you lookin’ for?” I asked.
“I was thinkin’, Davy,” she said, still gazing through the window, “that Skipper Zach Tupper might be comin’ in from the Last Chance grounds with a fish for breakfast.”
The Last Chance grounds? ’Twas ignorance beyond belief! “Bessie,” I said, with heat, “is you gone mad? Doesn’t you know that no man in his seven senses would fish the Last Chance grounds in a light southerly wind? Why——”
“Well,” she interrupted, with a pretty pout, “you knows so well as me that Zach Tupper haven’tgothis seven senses.”
“Bessie!”
She peeked towards South Tickle again; and then—what a wonder-worker the divine malady is!—she leaned eagerly forward, her sewing falling unheeded to the floor; and her soft breast rose and fell to a rush of sweet emotion, and her lips parted in delicious wonderment, and the blood came back to her cheeks, and her dimples were no longer pathetic, but eloquent of sweetness and innocence, and her eyesturned moist and brilliant, glowing with the glory of womanhood first recognized, tender and pure. Ah, my sister—lovely in person but lovelier far in heart and mind—adorably innocent—troubled and destined to infinitely deeper distress before the end—brave and true and hopeful through all the chequered course of love! You had not known, dear heart, but then discovered, all in a heavenly flash, what sickness you suffered of.
“Davy!” she whispered.
“Ay, dear?”
“I’m knowin’—now—what ails me.”
I sat gazing at her in love and great awe. “’Tis not a wickedness, Bessie,” I declared.
“No, no!”
“’Tis not that. No, no! I knows ’tis not a sin.”
“’Tis a holy thing,” she said, turning, her eyes wide and solemn.
“A holy thing?”
“Ay—holy!”
I chanced to look out of the window. “Ecod!” I cried. “The Wreck Cove skiff is in with Doctor Luke!”
Unfeeling, like all lads—in love with things seen—I ran out.
The doctor came ashore at the wharf in a state ofwild elation. He made a rush for me, caught me up, called to the crew of the skiff to come to the house for tea—then shouldered me, against my laughing protest, and started up the path.
“I’m back, safe and sound,” cried he. “Davy, I have been to Wreck Cove and back.”
“An’ you’re wonderful happy,” cried I, from the uncertain situation of his shoulder.
“Happy? That’s the word, Davy. I’m happy! And why?”
“Tell me.”
“I’ve done a good deed. I’ve saved a man’s right hand. I’ve done a good deed for once,” he repeated, between his teeth, “by God!”
There was something contagious in all this; and (I say it by way of apology) I was ever the lad to catch at a rousing phrase.
“A good deed!” I exclaimed. “By God, you’ll do——”
He thrashed me soundly on the spot.