It was late in August when Mary received the letter from Crawford in which he told of his determination to wait no longer but to tell his father of his love for her. Edwin Smith was much better. By way of proof, his son inclosed a photograph which he had taken of his father sitting beneath a tree on the lawn of their home. The picture showed Mr. Smith without his beard, which had been shaved off during his illness. Either this or the illness itself had changed him a great deal. He looked thinner and, which was odd under the circumstances, younger. Mary, looking at this photograph, felt more than ever the impossible conviction that somewhere or other at some time in her life she must have met Mr. Edwin Smith.
So, in my next letter [wrote Crawford], I shall have news to tell. And I am sure it will be good news. “Ask your father first,” you said. Of course you remember that, and I have remembered it every moment since. Now I am going to ask him. After that you will give me your answer, won't you? And it can't be anything but yes, because I won't let it be.
What Mary's feelings were when she received this letter, whether or not she slept as soundly that night and other nights immediately following, whether or not the sight of Isaiah returning from the post-office at mail times caused her breath to come a little quicker and her nerves to thrill—these are questions the answers to which must be guessed. Suffice it to say that she manifested no marked symptoms of impatience and anxiety during that week and when at last Isaiah handed her another letter postmarked Carson City the trembling of the hand which received it was so slight as to be unnoticed by Mr. Chase.
She put aside the letter until that night when she was alone in her room. Then she opened it and read what Crawford had written. His father had not only refused consent to his son's contemplated marriage but had manifested such extraordinary agitation and such savage and unreasonable obstinacy that Crawford was almost inclined to believe his parent's recent illness had affected his mind.
That is the only explanation I can think of [he wrote]. It seems as if he must be insane. And yet he seemed rational enough at the beginning of our first interview and during most of the second. Even when I had broken the news that there was a girl in whom I felt an especial interest he did not show any sign of the outbreak that came afterward. It wasn't until I began to tell how I first met you there at South Harniss, who you were, and about Captain Gould and Mr. Hamilton, that I noticed he was acting queerly. I was head over heels in my story, trying to make plain how desperate my case was and doing my best to make him appreciate how tremendously lucky his son was to have even a glimmer of a chance to get a girl like you for a wife, when I heard him make an odd noise in his throat. I looked up—I don't know where I had been looking before—certainly not at him—and there he was, leaning back in his chair, his face as white as his collar, and waving a hand at me. I thought he was choking, or was desperately ill or something, and I sprang toward him, but he waved me back. “Stop! Wait!” he said, or stammered, or choked; it was more like a croak than a human voice. “Don't come here! Let me be! What are you trying to tell me? Who—who is this girl?” I asked him what was the matter—his manner and his look frightened me—but he wouldn't answer, kept ordering me to tell him again who you were. So I did tell him that you were the daughter of the Reverend Charles Lathrop and Augusta Lathrop, and of your mother's second marriage to Captain Marcellus Hall. “But he died when she was seven years old,” I went on, “and since that time she has been living with her guardians, the two fine old fellows who adopted her, Captain Shadrach Gould and Zoeth Hamilton. They live at South Harniss on Cape Cod.” I had gotten no further than this when he interrupted me. “She—she has been living with Zoeth Hamilton?” he cried. “With Zoeth Hamilton! Oh, my God! Did—did Zoeth Hamilton send you to me?” Yes, that is exactly what he said: “Did Zoeth Hamilton send you to me?” I stared at him. “Why, no, Dad,” I said, as soon as I could say anything. “Of course he didn't. I have met Mr. Hamilton but once in my life. What IS the matter? Sit down again. Don't you think I had better call the doctor?” I thought surely his brain was going. But no, he wouldn't answer or listen. Instead he looked at me with the wildest, craziest expression and said: “Did Zoeth Hamilton tell you?” “He told me nothing, Dad,” I said, as gently as I could. “Of course he didn't. I am almost a stranger to him. Besides, what in the world was there to tell? I came to you because I had something to tell. I mean to marry Mary Lathrop, if she will have me—” I got no further than that. “No!” he fairly screamed. “No! No! No! Oh, my God, no!” And then the doctor came running in, we got Dad to bed, and it was all over for that day, except that I naturally was tremendously upset and conscience-stricken. I could see that the doctor thought I was to blame, that I had confessed something or other—something criminal, I imagine he surmised—to Dad and that it had knocked the poor old chap over. And I couldn't explain, because what I had told him was not for outsiders to hear.
Well, after a terribly anxious night and a worrisome forenoon the doctor told me that father was himself again and wanted to see me at once. “I've said all I can against it,” said the doctor. “I don't know what sort of rumpus you two had yesterday, but it came dangerously near being the finish for him. And it must not be repeated; I'm making that as emphatic as I can.” I assured him that so far as I was concerned there would not be a scene, and then went in to Dad's room. He looked white enough and sick enough but he was rational and his mind was keen and clear. He got me to tell the whole story about you all over again and he asked a lot of questions; in fact, he cross-examined me pretty thoroughly. When I had finished his tone was calm, but I noticed that his hand was shaking and he seemed to be holding himself in. “And so you think you want to marry this down-east country girl, do you?” he said. “I certainly do,” said I. He laughed, a forced laugh—didn't sound like his at all—and he said: “Well, my boy, you'll get over it. It's a whole lot better to get over it now than to do so by and by when it's too late. It's a good thing I called you home when I did. You stay here and keep on with your studies and I'll keep on getting into shape again. By next summer, when we go on our fishing trip, you'll have forgotten all about your Down-Easter.” Well, THAT was a staggerer, coming from him. It didn't sound like him at all, and again I had that feeling that his mind was going. You see, Mary, I never asked Dad for anything I didn't get—never. Now, I wasn't asking, I was just telling him what I had made up my mind to have, and he treated me this way. I answered him calmly and quietly, telling him I was serious and what you meant to me. He wouldn't listen at first; then when he did, he wouldn't agree. Pleaded with me—he was lonesome, I was his only son, he needed me, he couldn't share me with anyone else, and so on. There is no use going into all the details. We didn't get any nearer an agreement, we did get nearer and nearer to bad temper on my part and shouts and hysterics on his. So I left him, Mary. That was last night. I knew Dad was inclined to be stubborn, and I knew he had strong prejudices, but I never imagined he could behave like this to me. And I am sure he would not if he were himself. So I shall say no more to him on the subject for a day or two. Then, when he is better, as I am hoping he may be soon, he and I will have another talk. But understand, Mary dear, my mind was made up before I spoke to him at all. What he says or what he does will make no difference, so far as you and I are concerned. I know you are a believer in duty; well, so am I. I would stick by Dad through thick and thin. If I knew he was right in asking me to do or not to do a thing, even if I knew he had been wrong in asking other things, I would stick by him and try to do as he asked. But not this. I love Dad, God knows I do, but I love you, Mary, and as I have vowed to myself every day since I last saw you, I am going to marry you if you will only have me. As for Dad—well, we'll hope within a day or two I may have better news to write.
Mary read and reread the long letter. Then she leaned back in her chair and with the letter in her lap sat there—thinking. She had been right in her forebodings; it was as she had expected, had foreseen: Edwin Smith, man of affairs, wealthy, arbitrary, eccentric, accustomed to having his own way and his prejudices, however absurd, respected—a man with an only son for whom, doubtless, plans definite and ambitious had been made, could not be expected calmly to permit the upsetting of those plans by his boy's marriage to a poor “Down-Easter.” So much she had foreseen from the first, and she had never shared Crawford's absolute confidence in his parent's acquiescence. She had been prepared, therefore, to read that Mr. Smith had refused his consent.
But to be prepared for a probability and to face a certainty are quite different. It was the certainty she was facing now. Unless Mr. Smith changed his mind, and the chances were ten to one against that, he and his son would quarrel. Crawford had inherited a portion of his father's stubbornness; he was determined, she knew. He loved her and he meant what he said—if she would have him he would marry her in spite of his father. It made her proud and happy to know that. But she, too, was resolute and had meant what she said. She would not be the cause of a separation between father and son. And, besides, marriage had become for her a matter of the distant future; for the present her task was set there at South Harniss.
What should she do? It was hard for Crawford, poor fellow. Yes, but it was hard for her, too. No one but she knew how hard. He would write her again telling her that his decision was unchanged, begging her to say she loved him, pleading with her to wait for him. And she would wait—Oh, how gladly, how joyfully she could wait—for him!—if she knew she was doing right in permitting him to wait for her. If she was sure that in permitting him to give up his father's love and his home and money and all that money could buy she was justified. There is a love which asks and a love which gives without asking return; the latter is the greater love and it was hers. She had written Crawford that perhaps she was not sure of her feeling toward him. That was not true. She was sure; but because she was fearful that his knowledge might be the means of entailing a great sacrifice on his part, she would not tell him.
What should she do? She considered, as the little Mary-'Gusta used to consider her small problems in that very room. And the result of her considerations was rather unsatisfactory. There was nothing she could do now, nothing but wait until she heard again from Crawford. Then she would write.
She brushed her eyes with her handkerchief and read the letter again. There were parts of it which she could not understand. She was almost inclined to adopt Crawford's suggestion that his father's mind might have been affected by his illness. Why had he received so passively the news that his son had fallen in love and yet become so violent when told the object of that love? He did not know her, Mary Lathrop; there could be no personal quality in his objection. And what could he have meant by asking if Zoeth Hamilton had sent Crawford to him? That was absolutely absurd. Zoeth, and Shadrach, too, had talked with Mary of Crawford's people in the West, but merely casually, as of complete strangers, which, of course, they were. It was all strange, but explainable if one considered that Mr. Smith was weak and ill and, perhaps, flighty. She must not think any more about it now—that is, she must try not to think. She must not give way, and above all she must not permit her uncles to suspect that she was troubled. She must try hard to put it from her mind until Crawford's next letter came.
But that letter did not come. The week passed, then another, but there was no word from Crawford. Mary's anxiety grew. Each day as Isaiah brought the mail she expected him to give her an envelope addressed in the familiar handwriting, but he did not. She was growing nervous—almost fearful. And then came a happening the shock of which drove everything else from her mind for the time and substituted for that fear another.
It was a Tuesday and one o'clock. Mary and Captain Shadrach, having had an early dinner, had returned to the store. Zoeth, upon their arrival, went down to the house for his own meal. Business, which had been very good indeed, was rather slack just then and Shadrach and Mary were talking together. Suddenly they heard the sound of rapid footsteps in the lane outside.
“Who's hoofin' it up to the main road at that rate?” demanded the Captain, lounging lazily toward the window. “Has the town pump got on fire or is somebody goin' for the doctor?”
He leaned forward to look. His laziness vanished.
“Eh! Jumpin' Judas!” he cried, springing to the door. “It's Isaiah, and runnin' as if the Old Boy was after him! Here! You! Isaiah! What's the matter?”
Isaiah pounded up the platform steps and staggered against the doorpost. His face flamed so red that, as Shadrach said afterward, it was “a wonder the perspiration didn't bile.”
“I—I—I—” he stammered. “I—Oh, dear me! What shall I do? He—he—he's there on the floor and—and—Oh, my godfreys! I'm all out of wind! What SHALL I do?”
“Talk!” roared the Captain. “Talk! Use what wind you've got for that! What's happened? Sing out!”
“He's—he's all alone there!” panted Mr. Chase. “He won't speak, scurcely—only moans. I don't know's he ain't dead!”
“Who's dead? Who? Who? Who?” The irate Shadrach seized his steward by the collar and shook him, not too gently. “Who's dead?” he bellowed. “Somebody will be next door to dead right here in a minute if you don't speak up instead of snortin' like a puffin' pig. What's happened?”
Isaiah swallowed, gasped and waved a desperate hand. “Let go of me!” he protested. “Zoeth—he—he's down in a heap on the kitchen floor. He's had a—a stroke or somethin'.”
“God A'mighty!” cried Shadrach, and bolted out of the door. Mary followed him and a moment later, Mr. Chase followed her. The store was left to take care of itself.
They found poor Zoeth not exactly in a heap on the floor of the kitchen, but partially propped against one of the kitchen chairs. He was not unconscious but could speak only with difficulty. They carried him to the bedroom and Isaiah was sent on another gallop after the doctor. When the latter came he gave his patient a thorough examination and emerged from the sickroom looking grave.
“You must get a nurse,” he said. “This is likely to last a long while. It is a slight paralytic stroke, I should say, though what brought it on I haven't the least idea. Has Mr. Hamilton had any sudden shock or fright or anything of that sort?”
He had not, so far as anyone knew. Isaiah, being questioned, told of Zoeth's coming in for dinner and of his—Isaiah's—handing him the morning's mail.
“I fetched it myself down from the post-office,” said Isaiah. “There was a couple of Hamilton and Company letters and the Wellmouth Register and one of them circulum advertisements about So-and-So's horse liniment, and, and—yes, seems to me there was a letter for Zoeth himself. He took 'em all and sot down in the kitchen to look 'em over. I went into the dinin'-room. Next thing I knew I heard him say, 'O God!' just like that.”
“Avast heavin', Isaiah!” put in Captain Shadrach. “You're way off your course. Zoeth never said that. That's the way I talk, but he don't.”
“He done it this time,” persisted Isaiah. “I turned and looked through the doorway at him and he was standin' in the middle of the kitchen floor. Seems to me he had a piece of white paper in his hand—seem's if he did. And then, afore I could say a word, he kind of groaned and sunk down in—in a pile, as you might say, right on the floor. And I couldn't get him up, nor get him to speak to me, nor nothin'. Yet he must have come to enough to move after I left and to crawl acrost and lean against that chair.”
The horse liniment circular and the Wellmouth Register were there on the kitchen table just where Mr. Hamilton had laid them. There, also, were the two letters addressed to Hamilton and Company. Of the letter which Isaiah seemed to remember as addressed to Zoeth personally, there was no sign.
“Are you sure there was such a letter, Isaiah?” asked Mary.
Mr. Chase was not sure; that is to say, he was not sure more than a minute at a time. The minute following he was inclined to think he might have been mistaken, perhaps it was yesterday or the day before or even last week that his employer received such a letter.
Captain Shadrach lost patience.
“Sure 'twan't last Thanksgivin'?” he demanded. “Are you sure about anything? Are you sure how old you are?”
“No, by godfreys, I ain't!” roared Isaiah in desperation. “I'm so upsot ever since I looked into that kitchen and see the poor soul down on the floor there that—that all I'm sure of is that I ain't sure of nothin.'”
“Well, I don't know's I blame you much, Isaiah,” grunted the Captain. “Anyway, it doesn't make much difference about that letter, so fur as I see, whether there was one or not. What did you want to know for, Mary?”
Mary hesitated. “Why,” she answered, “I—perhaps it is foolish, but the doctor said something about a shock being responsible for this dreadful thing and I didn't know—I thought perhaps there might have been something in that letter which shocked or alarmed Uncle Zoeth. Of course it isn't probable that there was.”
Shadrach shook his head.
“I guess not,” he said. “I can't think of any letter he'd get of that kind. There's nobody to write it. He ain't got any relations nigher than third cousin, Zoeth ain't. Anyhow, we mustn't stop to guess riddles now. I'll hunt up the letter by and by, if there was one and I happen to think of it. Now I've got to hunt up a nurse.”
The nurse was found, a Mrs. Deborah Atkins, of Ostable, and she arrived that night, bag and baggage, and took charge of the patient. Deborah was not ornamental, being elderly and, as Captain Shadrach said, built for tonnage more than speed; but she was sensible and capable. Also, her fee was not excessive, although that was by no means the principal reason for her selection.
“Never mind what it costs,” said Mary. “Get the best you can. It's for Uncle Zoeth, remember.”
Shadrach's voice shook a little as he answered.
“I ain't likely to forget,” he said. “Zoeth and I've cruised together for a good many years and if one of us has to go under I'd rather 'twas me. I haven't got much money but what I've got is his, and after that so long as I can get trusted. But there,” with an attempt at optimism, “don't you fret, Mary-'Gusta. Nobody's goin' under yet. We'll have Zoeth up on deck doin' the fishers' hornpipe in a couple of weeks.”
But it was soon plain to everyone, the Captain included, that many times two weeks must elapse before Mr. Hamilton would be able to appear on deck again, to say nothing of dancing hornpipes. For days he lay in partial coma, rallying occasionally and speaking at rare intervals but evidently never fully aware of where he was and what had happened.
“He will recover, I think,” said the doctor, “but it will be a slow job.”
Mary did not again refer to the letter regarding which Isaiah's memory was so befogged. In fact, she forgot it entirely. So also did Captain Shad. For both the worry of Zoeth's illness and the care of the store were sufficient to drive trifles from their minds.
And for Mary there was another trouble, one which she must keep to herself. Three weeks had elapsed since Crawford's letter, that telling of his two fateful interviews with his father, and still no word had come from him. Mary could not understand his silence. In vain she called her philosophy to her rescue, striving to think that after all it was best if she never heard from him again, best that a love affair which could never end happily were ended at once, best that he should come to see the question as his father saw it—best for him, that is, for his future would then be one of ease and happiness. All this she thought—and then found herself wondering why he had not written, imagining all sorts of direful happenings and feeling herself responsible.
One evening, about a week after Mr. Hamilton's sudden seizure, Mary was in her room alone. She had again reread Crawford's latest letter and was sitting there trying to imagine the scene as he had described it. She was trying to picture Edwin Smith, the man who—as his son had so often told her—indulged that son's every whim, was kindness and parental love personified, and yet had raved and stormed like a madman because the boy wished to marry her, Mary Lathrop.
She rose, opened the drawer of her bureau, and took out the photograph of Mr. Smith, the one which showed him without his beard, the one taken since his illness. Crawford had written that this photograph, too, had been taken on the sly.
“Dad's prejudice against photos is as keen as ever,” he wrote. “He would slaughter me on the spot if he knew I had snapped him.”
The face in the picture was not that of the savage, unrelenting parent of the old plays, who used to disinherit his sons and drive his daughters out into blinding snowstorms because they dared thwart his imperial will. Edwin Smith was distinctly a handsome man, gray-haired, of course, and strong-featured, but with a kind rather than a stern expression. As Mary had said when she first saw his likeness, he looked as if he might have had experiences. In this photograph he looked very grave, almost sad, but possibly that was because of his recent sickness.
She was looking at the picture when Isaiah's voice was heard outside the door.
“Hi, Mary-'Gusta,” whispered Mr. Chase. “Ain't turned in yet, have you? Can I speak with you a minute?”
“Certainly, Isaiah,” said Mary. “Come in!”
Isaiah entered. “'Twan't nothin' special,” he said. “I was just goin' to tell you that Debby T. cal'lates Zoeth is a little mite easier tonight. She just said so and I thought you'd like to know.”
By “Debby T.” Isaiah meant Mrs. Atkins. Mary understood.
“Thank you, Isaiah,” she said. “I am ever so glad to hear it. Thank you for telling me.”
“That's all right, Mary-'Gusta. Hello! who's tintype's that?”
He had caught sight of the photograph upon the arm of Mary's chair. He picked it up and looked at it. She heard him gasp. Turning, she saw him staring at the photograph with an expression of absolute amazement—amazement and alarm.
“Why, Isaiah!” she cried. “What is the matter?”
Isaiah, not taking his eyes from the picture, extended it in one hand and pointed to it excitedly with the other.
“For godfreys mighty sakes!” he demanded. “Where did you get that?”
“Get what? The photograph?”
“Yes! Yes, yes! Where'd you get it? Where'd it come from?”
“It was sent to me. What of it? What is the matter?”
Isaiah answered neither question. He seemed to have heard only the first sentence.
“SENT to you!” he repeated. “Mary-'Gusta Lathrop, have you been tryin' to find out—Look here! who sent you Ed Farmer's picture?”
Mary stared at him. “WHOSE picture?” she said. “What are you talking about, Isaiah?”
Isaiah thrust the photograph still closer to the end of her nose. Also he continued to point at it.
“Who sent you Ed Farmer's picture?” he repeated. “Where—where'd you get it? You tell me, now.”
Mary looked him over from head to foot.
“I don't know whether to send for Uncle Shad or the doctor,” she said, slowly. “If you don't stop hopping up and down and waving your arms as if they worked by strings I shall probably send for both. Isaiah Chase, behave yourself! What is the matter with you?”
Isaiah, during his years as sea cook, had learned to obey orders. Mary's tone had its effect upon him. He dropped one hand, but he still held the photograph in the other. And he stared at it as if it possessed some sort of horrible charm which frightened and fascinated at the same time. Mary had never seen him so excited.
“Ed Farmer!” he exclaimed. “Oh, I swan to man! I don't see how—Say, it IS him, ain't it, Mary-'Gusta? But of course 'tis! I can see 'tis with my own eyes. My godfreys mighty!”
Mary shook her head. “If I didn't know you were a blue ribboner, Isaiah,” she said, “I should be suspicious. That photograph was sent me from the West. It is a picture of a gentleman named Edwin Smith, someone I have never seen and I'm perfectly sure you never have. Why in the world it should make you behave as if you needed a strait-jacket I can't see. Does Mr. Smith resemble someone you know?”
Isaiah's mouth fell open and remained so as he gazed first at the photograph and then at her.
“Ed—Edwin Smith,” he repeated. “Edwin Smith! I—I don't know no Edwin Smith. Look here, now; honest, Mary-'Gusta, AIN'T that a picture of Ed Farmer?”
Mary laughed. “Of course it isn't,” she said. “Who is Ed Farmer, pray?”
Isaiah did not answer. He was holding the photograph near the end of his own nose now and examining it with eager scrutiny, muttering comments as he did so.
“If it ain't him it's a better picture than if 'twas,” was one of his amazing observations. “Don't seem as if two folks could look so much alike and not be. And yet—and yet I can see—I can see now—this feller's hair's pretty nigh white and Ed's was dark brown. But then if this feller was Ed he'd be—he'd be—let's see—he'd be all of thirty-five years older than he was thirty-five years ago and that would account—”
Mary burst out laughing.
“Do be still, Isaiah!” she broke in. “You are perfectly idiotic. That man's name is Smith, I tell you.”
Mr. Chase heaved a sigh. “You're sartin 'tis?” he asked.
“Of course I am.”
“Well, then I cal'late it must be. But if Ed Farmer had lived all these years and had had his tintype took he wouldn't get one to favor him more than that does, I bet you. My, it give me a start, comin' onto me so unexpected!”
“But who is Ed Farmer?” asked Mary. The name had meant nothing to her so far. And yet, even as she spoke she remembered. Her expression changed.
“Do you mean—” she cried, eagerly. “Why, Isaiah, do you mean the man in that old photograph I found in the garret ever and ever so long ago? The one you told me was a—a blackguard?”
Isaiah, still staring at Mr. Smith's likeness, answered emphatically.
“That's the one,” he said. “That's the one I meant. My, this feller does look like him, or the way I cal'late he would look if he lived as long as this!”
“Is he dead, then?”
“I don't know. We don't any of us know around here. I ain't laid eyes on him since the day afore it happened. I remember just as well as if 'twas yesterday. He come out of the office onto the wharf where I was workin' and he says to me, 'Isaiah,' he says, knockin' on the head of a barrel with his hand—the right hand 'twas, the one that had the bent finger; he got it smashed under a hogshead of salt one time and it never came straight again—'Isaiah,' says he, 'it's a nice day, ain't it.' And I answered up prompt—I liked him fust-rate; everybody liked him them days—'Yes, sir,' I says, 'this is a good enough day to go see your best girl in.' I never meant nothin' by it, you understand, just a sayin' 'twas, but it seemed to give him a kind of start. He looked at me hard. 'Did anyone tell you where I was goin'?' says he, sharp. 'Why, no,' says I. 'Why should they?' He didn't answer, just kept on starin' at me. Then he laughed and walked away. I didn't know where he was goin' then, but I know now, darn him! And the next day he went—for good.”
He stopped speaking. Mary waited a moment and then asked, quietly: “Went where, Isaiah? Where did he go?”
Isaiah, who was standing, the photograph still in his hand, started, turned and looked at her.
“What's that?” he asked.
“I say, where did this Mr. Farmer go?”
“Eh? Oh, I don't know. He went away, that's all. Don't ask me any more questions. I've been talkin' too much, anyhow, I cal'late. Cap'n Shad would skin me alive if he knew I'd said as much as I have. Say, Mary-'Gusta, don't you say nothin' to either him or Zoeth, will you? You see—it's—it's a kind of little secret we have amongst us and—and nobody else is in on it. 'Twas this plaguey tintype got me to talkin'. No wonder neither! I never see such a look on two folks. I—there, there! Good night, Mary-'Gusta, good night.”
He tossed the photograph on the bureau and hurried out of the room. Mary called after him, but he would neither stop nor answer.
After he had gone Mary took up the photograph, seated herself once more in the chair, and studied the picture for a long time. Then she rose and, lamp in hand, left the room, tiptoed along the hall past the door of Captain Shadrach's room, and up the narrow stairs to the attic, her old playground.
Her playthings were there still, arranged in her customary orderly fashion along the walls. Rose and Rosette and Minnehaha and the other dolls were seated in their chairs or the doll carriage or with their backs against Shadrach's old sea chest. She had never put them away out of sight. Somehow it seemed more like home to her, the knowledge that though she would never play with them again, they were there waiting for her in their old places. While she was away at school they had been covered from the dust by a cloth, but now the cloth had been taken away and she herself dusted them every other morning before going up to the store. As Shadrach said, no one but Mary-'Gusta would ever have thought of doing such a thing. She did, because she WAS Mary-'Gusta.
However, the dolls did not interest her now. She tiptoed across the garret floor, taking great care to avoid the boards which creaked most, and lifted the lid of the old trunk which she had first opened on that Saturday afternoon nearly ten years before. She found the pocket on the under side of the lid, opened it and inserted her hand. Yes, the photograph of Hall and Company was still there, she could feel the edge of it with her fingers.
She took it out, and closed the pocket and then the trunk, and tiptoed down the stairs and to her room again. She closed the door, locked it—something she had never done in her life before—and placing the photograph she had taken from the trunk beside that sent her by Crawford, sat down to compare them.
And as she looked at the two photographs her wonder at Isaiah's odd behavior ceased. It was not strange that when he saw Mr. Edwin Smith's likeness he was astonished; it was not remarkable that he could scarcely be convinced the photograph was not that of the mysterious Ed Farmer. For here in the old, yellow photograph of the firm of “Hall and Company, Wholesale Fish Dealers,” was Edgar S. Farmer, and here in the photograph sent her by Crawford was Edwin Smith. And save that Edgar S. Farmer was a young man and Edwin Smith a man in the middle sixties, they were almost identical in appearance. Each time she had seen Mr. Smith's photograph she had felt certain she must have met the original. Here was the reason—this man in the other photograph. The only difference was the difference of age. Edwin Smith had a nose like Edgar Farmer's, and a chin like his and eyes like his. And Isaiah had just said that Edgar Farmer had a crooked finger on his right hand caused by an accident with a hogshead of salt. Mary remembered well something Crawford had told her, that his father had a finger on the right hand which had been hurt in a mine years before he, Crawford, was born.
It could not be, of course—it could not be—and yet—Oh, WHAT did it mean?
In his own room at the end of the second-story hall, over the kitchen, Mr. Chase was sitting reading the local paper before retiring. It was a habit he had, one of which Captain Shadrach pretended to approve highly. “Best thing in the world, Isaiah,” declared the Captain. “Sleep's what everybody needs and I can't think of any surer way of gettin' to sleep than readin' the South Harniss news in that paper.”
Whether or not this unkind joke was deserved is not material; at all events Isaiah was reading the paper when he was very much startled by a knock at the door.
“Who—who is it?” he stammered.
“It is Mary,” whispered a voice outside the door. “I want to speak with you, Isaiah. You're not in bed, are you?”
Isaiah reluctantly relinquished the paper. “No, no,” he replied, “I ain't in bed. What's the matter? Zoeth ain't no worse, is he?”
“Let me in and I'll tell you.”
“Come on in. You don't need no lettin'.”
Mary entered. She was very grave and very earnest.
“What in the nation,” began Isaiah, “are you prowlin' around this hour of the night for?”
“Hush! Isaiah, you must tell me everything now. There's no use to say you won't—you MUST. Who was Edgar Farmer and what wrong did he do my uncles?”
Isaiah said nothing; he did not attempt to answer. Instead he gaped at her with such an expression of guilty surprise, fright, and apprehension that at any other time she would have laughed. Just now, however, she was far from laughing.
“Come! come!” she said, impatiently. “I mean it. I want you to tell me all about this Edgar Farmer.”
“Now—now, Mary-'Gusta, I told you—”
“You told me a very little. Now I want to know the rest. Everyone else in this family knows it and it is time I did. I'm not a child any more. Tell me the whole story, Isaiah.”
“I shan't neither. Oh, by godfreys, this is what I get by sayin' more'n I ought to! And yet how could I help it when I see that tintype? It's just my luck! Nobody else but me would have had the dratted luck to have that picture stuck into their face and eyes unexpected. And 'twas just so when you found that other one years ago up attic. I had to be the one you sprung it on! I had to be! But I shan't tell you nothin'!”
“Yes, you will. You must tell me everything.”
“Well, I shan't.”
“Very well. Then I shall go straight to Uncle Shad.”
“To who? To CAP'N SHAD! Oh, my godfreys mighty! You go to him and see what he'll say! Just go! Why, he'd shut up tighter'n a clam at low water and he'd give you fits besides. Go to Cap'n Shad and ask about Ed Farmer! My soul! You try it! Aw, don't be foolish, Mary-'Gusta.”
“I'm not going to be foolish, Isaiah. If I go to Uncle Shad I shall tell him that it was through you I learned there was such a person as the Farmer man and that there was a secret connected with him, that it was a disagreeable secret, that—”
“Hush! Land sakes alive! Mary-'Gusta, DON'T talk so! Why, if you told Cap'n Shad he'd—I don't know what he wouldn't do to me. If he knew I told you about Ed Farmer he'd—I swan to man I believe he'd pretty nigh kill me!”
“Well, you'll soon know what he will do, for unless you tell me the whole story, I shall certainly go to him.”
“Aw, Mary-'Gusta—”
“I surely shall. And if he won't tell me I shall go to someone outside the family—to Judge Baxter, perhaps. He would tell me, I'm sure, if I asked. No, Isaiah, you tell me. And if you do tell me all freely and frankly, keeping nothing back, I'll say nothing to Uncle Shad or Uncle Zoeth. They shall never know who told.”
Mr. Chase wrung his hands. Ever since he had been cook at the white house by the shore he had had this duty laid upon him, the duty of keeping his lips closed upon the name of Edgar Farmer and the story connected with that name. When Captain Shadrach first engaged him for his present situation the Captain had ordered him never to speak the name or mention the happenings of that time. And after little Mary Lathrop became a regular and most important member of the family, the command was repeated. “She mustn't ever know if we can help it, Isaiah,” said Shadrach, solemnly. “You know Zoeth and how he feels. For his sake, if nothin' else, we mustn't any of us drop a hint so that she will know. She'll find out, I presume likely, when she gets older; there'll be some kind soul around town that'll tell her, consarn 'em; but WE shan't tell her; and if YOU tell her, Isaiah Chase, I'll—I declare to man I'll heave you overboard!”
And now after all these years of ignorance during which the expected had not happened and no one of the village gossips had revealed the secret to her—now, here she was, demanding that he, Isaiah Chase, reveal it, and threatening to go straight to Captain Gould and tell who had put her upon the scent. No wonder the cook and steward wrung his hands in despair; the heaving overboard was imminent.
Mary, earnest and determined as she was to learn the truth, the truth which she was beginning to believe might mean so much to her, nevertheless could not help pitying him.
“Come, come, Isaiah,” she said, “don't look so tragic. There isn't anything so dreadful about it. Have you promised—have you given your word not to tell? Because if you have I shan't ask you to break it. I shall go to Judge Baxter instead—or to Uncle Shad. But of course I shall be obliged to tell how I came to know—the little I do know.”
Mr. Chase did not like the prospect of her going to the Captain, that was plain. For the first time his obstinacy seemed to waver.
“I—I don't know's I ever give my word,” he admitted. “I never promised nothin', as I recollect. Cap'n Shad he give me orders—”
“Yes, yes, of course he did. Well, now I'M giving you orders. And I promise you, Isaiah, if it ever becomes necessary I'll stand between you and Uncle Shad. Now tell me.”
Isaiah sat down upon the bed and wiped his forehead.
“Oh, Lordy!” he moaned. “I wisht my mouth had been sewed up afore ever I said a word about any of it. . . . But—but . . . Well,” desperately, “what is it you want to know?”
“I want to know everything. Begin at the beginning and tell me who Mr. Farmer was.”
Mr. Chase marked a pattern on the floor with his slippered foot. Then he began:
“He come from up Cape Ann way in the beginnin',” he said. “The rest of the firm was Cape Codders, but he wan't. However, he'd been a-fishin' and he knew fish and after the firm was fust started and needed an extry bookkeeper he applied and got the job. There was three of 'em in Hall and Company at fust, all young men they was, too; your stepfather, Cap'n Marcellus Hall, he was the head one; and Mr. Zoeth, he was next and Cap'n Shad next. 'Twan't until three or four year afterwards that Ed Farmer was took in partner. He was so smart and done so well they give him a share and took him in.
“Everybody liked him, too. He was younger even than the rest, and fine lookin' and he had a—a kind of way with him that just made you like him. The way the business was handled was somethin' like this: Cap'n Marcellus, your stepfather, Mary-'Gusta, he and Cap'n Shad done the outside managin', bossin' the men—we had a lot of 'em on the wharf them days, too, and there was always schooners unloadin' and carts loadin' up and fellers headin' up barrels—Oh, Hall and Company's store and docks was the busiest place on the South Shore. You ask anybody that remembers and they'll tell you so.
“Well, Cap'n Marcellus and Cap'n Shad was sort of outside bosses, same as I said, and Zoeth he was sort of general business boss, 'tendin' to the buyin' supplies and payin' for 'em and gettin' money and the like of that, and Ed—Edgar Farmer, I mean—he was inside office boss, lookin' out for the books and the collections and the bank account and so on. Marcellus and Zoeth and Cap'n Shad was old chums and had been for years; they was as much to each other as brothers and always had been; but it wan't so very long afore they thought as much of Farmer as they did of themselves. He was that kind—you couldn't help takin' a notion to him.
“When I get to talkin' about Hall and Company I could talk for a month of Sundays. Them was great days—yes, sir, great days for South Harniss and the fish business. Why I've seen, of a Saturday mornin' in the mackerel season, as many as forty men ashore right here in town with money in their pockets and their hats on onesided, lookin' for fun or trouble just as happened along. And Cap'n Marcellus and his partners was looked up to and respected; not much more'n boys they wan't, but they was big-bugs, I tell you, and they wore beaver hats to church on Sunday, every man jack of 'em. Fur's that goes, I wore one, too, and you might not think it, but 'twas becomin' to me if I do say it. Yes, sir-ee! 'Twas a kind of curl-up brim one, that hat was, and—”
“Never mind the hat now, Isaiah,” interrupted Mary. “Tell me about Mr. Farmer.”
Isaiah looked offended. “I am tellin' you, ain't I?” he demanded. “Ain't I tellin' you fast as I can?”
“Perhaps you are. We won't argue about it. Go on.”
“Well—well, where was I? You've put me clear off my course.”
“You were just going to tell me what Mr. Farmer did.”
“What he did! What didn't he do, you'd better say! The blackguard! He smashed the firm flat, that's what he done! And he run off with Marcellus's sister.”
“Marcellus's sister! My stepfather's sister! I didn't know he ever had a sister. Are you sure he had?”
“Am I sure! What kind of talk's that? Course I'm sure! She was younger than Marcellus and pretty—say, she WAS pretty! Yes, the outside of her figurehead was mighty hard to beat, everybody said so; but the inside was kind of—well, kind of rattly, as you might say. She'd laugh and talk and go on and Ed Farmer he'd hang over the desk there in the office and look at her. Just look—and look—and look. How many times I've seen 'em that way! It got so that folks begun to talk a little mite. Marcellus didn't, of course; he idolized that girl, worshiped her like a vain thing, so's to speak. And Cap'n Shad, course he wouldn't talk because he's always down on tattle-tales and liars, but I've always thought he was a little mite suspicious and troubled. As for poor Zoeth—well, it's always his kind that are the last to suspect. And Zoeth was as innocent then as he is now. And as good, too.
“And then one day it come out, come down on us like the mainmast goin' by the board. No, come to think of it, it didn't come all to once that way. Part of it did, but the rest didn't. The rest kind of leaked out along slow, gettin' a little mite worse every day. I can see it just as plain as if 'twas yesterday—Marcellus and Shadrach in the office goin' over the books and addin' up on pieces of paper, and it gettin' worse and worse all the time. And the whole town a-talkin'! And poor Zoeth lyin' in his bedroom there to home, out of his mind and ravin' distracted and beggin' and pleadin' with his partners not to chase 'em, to let 'em go free for her sake. And the doctor a-comin'! And—”
Mary began to feel that she, too, was in danger of raving distraction. Between her anxiety to hear the story and her forebodings and growing suspicions she was becoming more and more nervous as Isaiah rambled on.
“Wait! Wait, please, Isaiah!” she begged. “I don't understand. What had happened?”
Isaiah regarded her with surprise and impatience.
“Ain't I been tellin' you?” he snapped, testily. “Ain't I this minute told you? This Ed Farmer had cleared out and run off and he'd took with him every cent of Hall and Company's money that he could rake and scrape. He'd been stealin' and speculatin' for years, it turned out. 'Twas him, the dum thief, him and his stealin's that made the firm fail. Wan't that enough to happen, I'd like to know? But that wan't all; no, sir, that wan't the worst of it.”
He paused, evidently expecting his hearer to make some comment. She was leaning forward, her eyes fixed upon his face, but she did not speak. Mr. Chase, judging by her expression that he had created the sensation which, as story-teller, he considered his due, went on.
“No, sir-ee! that wan't the worst of it. You and me might have thought losin' all our money was the worst that could be, but Marcellus and Shadrach didn't think so. Marcellus was pretty nigh stove in himself—there was nothin' on earth he loved the way he loved that sister of his—but when he and Cap'n Shad thought of poor Zoeth they couldn't think of much else. Shadrach had liked her and Marcellus had loved her, but Zoeth had fairly bowed down and worshiped the ground she trod on. Anything she wanted, no matter what, she could have if 'twas in Zoeth's power to get it for her. He'd humored her and spiled her as if she was a child and all he asked for doin' it was that she'd pat him on the head once in a while, same as you would a dog. And now she'd gone—run off with that thief! Why—”
Mary interrupted again. “Wait! Wait, Isaiah,” she cried. “I tell you I don't understand. You say—you say Captain Hall's sister had gone with Mr. Farmer?”
“Sartin! she run off with him and nobody's laid eyes on either of 'em since. That was why—”
“Stop! stop! What I don't understand is why Uncle Zoeth was so stricken by the news. Why had HE humored and spoiled her? Was he in love with her?”
Isaiah stared at her in blank astonishment.
“In love with her!” he repeated. “Course he was! Why wouldn't he be? Wan't she his wife?”
There was no doubt about the sensation now. The color slowly faded from Mary's cheeks.
“His WIFE?” she repeated slowly.
“Sartin! They'd been married 'most five year. Didn't I tell you? She was a good deal younger'n he was, but—”
“Wait! What—what was her name?”
“Eh? Didn't I tell you that neither? That's funny. Her name was Patience—Patience Hall.”
The last doubt was gone. Clear and distinct to Mary's mind came a sentence of Crawford's: “I saw her name first on the gravestone and it made an impression on me because it was so quaint and old-fashioned. 'Patience, wife of Edwin Smith.'”
She heard very little of Isaiah's story thereafter. Scattered sentences reached her ears. Isaiah was telling how, because of Zoeth's pleading and the latter's desire to avoid all the public scandal possible, no attempt was made to trace the fugitives.
“They went West somewheres,” said Isaiah. “Anyhow 'twas supposed they did 'cause they was seen together on the Chicago train by an Orham man that knew Farmer. Anybody but Marcellus and your uncles, Mary-'Gusta, would have sot the sheriff on their track and hauled 'em back here and made that Farmer swab give up what he stole. I don't imagine he had such a terrible lot with him, I cal'late the heft of it had gone in stock speculatin', but he must have had somethin' and they could have got a-holt of that. But no, Zoeth he says, 'Don't follow 'em! For her sake and mine—don't make the shame more public than 'tis.' You see, Zoeth was the same then as he is now; you'd have thought HE was to blame to hear him talk. He never said a word against her then nor since. A mighty good man, your Uncle Zoeth Hamilton is, Mary-'Gusta. Saint on earth, I call him.”
He went on to tell how Marcellus and Shadrach had fought to keep the firm on its feet, how for a time it struggled on against the load of debt left it by their former partner, only to go down at last.
“Marcellus went down with it, as you might say,” continued Isaiah. “Between losin' his sister and losin' his business he never was the same man afterwards, though he did make consider'ble money in other ways. Him and Cap'n Shadrach both went back to seafarin' again and after a spell I went with 'em. Poor Zoeth, when he got on his feet, which took a long spell, he started a little store that by and by, when Cap'n Shad joined in with him, was Hamilton and Company, same as now. And when Shadrach come I come too, as cook and steward, you understand. But from that day to this there's been two names never mentioned in this house, one's Patience Hall's and t'other's Ed Farmer's. You can see now why, when I thought that tintype was his, I was so took aback. You see, don't you, Mary-'Gusta? Why! Where you goin'?”
Mary had risen from her chair, taken up the lamp, and was on her way to the door.
“I'm going to my room,” she said. “Good night, Isaiah.”
“What are you goin' now for? I could tell you a lot more partic'lars if you wanted to hear 'em. Now I've told so much I might as well tell the rest. If I'm goin' to be hove overboard for tellin' I might as well make a big splash as a little one. If you got any questions to ask, heave ahead and ask 'em. Fire away, I don't care,” he added, recklessly.
But Mary shook her head. She did not even turn to look at him.
“Perhaps I may ask them some other time,” she said. “Not now. Thank you for telling me so much. Good night.”
Alone in her own room once more she sat down to think. It was plain enough now. All the parts of the puzzle fitted together. Edwin Smith having been proved to be Edgar Farmer, everything was explainable. It had seemed queer to her, Mr. Smith's aversion to the East, his refusal to come East even to his son's graduation; but it was not at all queer that Edgar Farmer, the embezzler, should feel such an aversion, or refuse to visit a locality where, even after all these years, he might be recognized. It was not odd that he disliked to be photographed. And it certainly was not strange that he should have behaved as he did when his son announced the intention of marrying her, Mary Lathrop, stepdaughter of one of his former partners and victims' and adopted niece and ward of the other two.
What a terrible surprise and shock Crawford's communication must have been to him! The dead past, the past he no doubt had believed buried forever, had risen from the tomb to confront him. His only son, the boy he idolized, who believed him to be a man of honor, whose love and respect meant more than the world to him—his only son asking to marry the ward of the man whom he had wronged beyond mortal forgiveness, asking to marry her and intimating that he would marry her whether or no. And the secret which he had guarded so jealously, had hidden from his son and the world with such infinite pains, suddenly threatening to be cried aloud in the streets for all, his boy included, to hear. Mary shuddered as she realized what the man must have felt. It must have seemed to him like the direct hand of avenging Providence. No wonder he at first could not believe it to be merely accident, coincidence; no wonder that he asked if Zoeth Hamilton had sent Crawford to him, and had demanded to know what Zoeth Hamilton had told.
It was dreadful, it was pitiful. She found herself pitying Edwin Smith—or Edgar Farmer—even though she knew the retribution which had come upon him was deserved.
She pitied him—yes; but now she could spare little pity for others, she needed as much herself. For minute by minute, as she sat there thinking out this great problem just as the little Mary-'Gusta used to think out her small ones, her duty became clear and more clear to her mind. Edgar Farmer's secret must be kept. For Crawford's sake it must be. He need not—he must not—learn that the father he had honored and respected all his life was unworthy of that honor and respect. And her uncles—they must not know. The old skeleton must not be dug from its grave. Her Uncle Zoeth had told her only a little while before that he was learning to forget, or if not to forget at least to be more reconciled. She did not understand him then; now she did. To have him learn that Edgar Farmer was alive, that his son—Oh, no, he must not learn it! Ill as he was, and weak as he was likely to be always, the shock might kill him. And yet sooner or later he would learn unless the secret remained, as it had been for years, undisclosed.
And to keep it still a secret was, she saw clearly, her duty. She might rebel against it, she might feel that it was wicked and cruel, the spoiling of her life to save these others, but it was her duty nevertheless. Because she loved Crawford—and she was realizing now that she did love him dearly, that there could never be another love in the world for her—-she must send him away, she must end the affair at once. If she did that she could save him from learning of his father's disgrace, could avert the otherwise inevitable quarrel between them, could make his career and his future secure. And her uncles would be happy, the skeleton would remain undisturbed.
Yes, she must do it. But it was so hard to do. Philosophy did not help in the least. She had tried to convince herself when she gave up her school work that it meant the end of her romance also. She had tried to tell Crawford so. But she had been weak, she had permitted herself to hope. She had realized that for the present, perhaps for years, she must work for and with the old men who had been father and mother both to her, but—he had said so—Crawford would wait for her, and some day—perhaps—
But now there was no perhaps—now she knew. She must receive no more letters from him. She must never see him again. The break must be absolute and final. And there was but one way to bring that about. He had said repeatedly that only her declaration that she did not love him would ever prevent his marrying her. Very well, then for his sake she must lie to him; she must tell him that very thing. She must write him that she had been considering the matter and had decided she could never love him enough to become his wife.
It was almost two o'clock when she reached this decision but she sat down at her desk to write then and there the letter containing it, the last letter she would ever write him. And when the morning light came streaming in at the windows she still sat there, the letter unwritten. She had made many beginnings, but not an end. She must try again; she was too tired, too nervous, too hopeless and heartbroken to make another attempt that morning, but before the day was over it should be done. She threw herself down upon the bed but she could not sleep. Why had she been selected to bear this burden? What had she done that God should delight to torture her in this way?