The Life-saving Station was very still. Nos. 3 and 5 had gone out on the eight-o'clock patrol. The seventh man was taking his twenty-four hours off at his home on the shore. The keeper was working over his report in the office. The other members of the crew were up-stairs asleep, and Abe and Samuel were bearing each other company in the mess-room.
Abe lay asleep on the carpet-covered sofa which had been dragged out of the captain's room for him, so that the old man need not spend the night in the cold sleeping-loft above. He was fully dressed except for his boots; for he was determined to conform to the rules of the Service, and sleep with his clothes on ready for instant duty.
"Talk erbout him a-dyin'!" growled Samuel to himself, lounging wearily in a chair beside the stove. "He's jest startin' his life. He's a reg'lar hoss. I didn't think he had it in him."
Samuel's tone was resentful. He was a little jealous of the distinction which had been made between him and Abe; and drawing closer to the fire, he shivered in growing distaste for the cot assigned to him with the crew up-stairs, where the white frost lay on the window-latches.
What uncomfortable chairs they had in this station! Samuel listened to the mooing of the breakers, to the wind rattling at the casements,—and wondered if Blossy had missed him. About this time, she must be sitting in her chintz-covered rocker, combing out the ringlets of her golden-white hair in the cheery firelight.
Now, that would be a sight worth seeing! Abe opened his mouth and began to snore. What disgusting, hideous creatures men were, reflected Samuel. Six months' living with an unusually high-bred woman had insensibly raised his standards.
Why should he spend a week of his ever-shortening life with such inferior beings, just for Abraham's sake—for Abraham's sake, and to bear out a theory of his own, which he had already concluded a mistake?
Abe gave a snort, opened his eyes, and muttered sleepily: "This is what I call a A No. 1 spree. Naow, ter-morrer—" But mumbling incoherently he relapsed into slumber, puffing his lips out into a whistling sound.
Samuel reached for a newspaper on the table, folded it into a missile, and started to fling it into the innocent face of the sleeper. But, fortunately for Abraham, it was Captain Darby's custom to count ten whenever seized by an exasperated impulse, and at the ninth number he regretfully dropped the paper.
Then he began to count in another way. Using the forefinger of his right hand as a marker, he counted under his breath, "one" on his left thumb, then after a frowning interval, "two" on his left forefinger, "three" on the middle digit, and so on, giving time for thought to each number, until he had exhausted the fingers of his left hand and was ready to start on the right.
Count, count, went Samuel, until thrice five was passed, and he began to be confused.
Once more Abe awoke, and inquired if the other were trying to reckon the number of new wigwags and signals which the Service had acquired since they had worked for the government; but on being sharply told to "Shet up!" went to sleep again.
What the projector of the trip was really trying to recall was how many times that day he had regretted saving Abe from the devastating clutches of the old ladies.
"Him need hardenin'?" muttered Samuel blackly. "Why, he's harder now 'n nails an' hardtack!"
Again he ran over on his fingers the list of high crimes and misdemeanors of which Abe had been guilty.
First,—thumb, left hand,—Abe had insisted on extending their scooter sail until he, Samuel, had felt his toes freezing in his boots.
Second,—forefinger, left hand,—on being welcomed by the entire force at Bleak Hill and asked how long they expected to stay, Abe had blurted out, "A hull week," explaining that Samuel's rule requiring at least seven days of exile from his wife every six months barred them from returning in less time.
The keeper was a widower, all the other men bachelors. How could they be expected to understand? They burst into a guffaw of laughter, and Abe, not even conscious that he had betrayed a sacred confidence, sputtered and laughed with the rest.
Samuel had half a mind to return to-morrow, "jest to spite 'em." Let's see, how many days of this plagued week were left? Six. Six whole twenty-four hours away from Blossy and his snug, warm, comfortable nest.
She wasn't used to keepin' house by herself, neither. Would she remember to wind the clock on Thursday, and feed the canary, and water the abutilon and begonias reg'lar?
Grimly Samuel took up offense No. 3. Abraham had further told the men that he had been brought over here for a hardening process; but he was willing to bet that if Samuel could keep up with him, he could keep up with Samuel.
Then followed offense on offense. Was Samuel to be outdone on his own one-time field of action by an old ladies' darling? No!
When Abe sat for a half-hour in the lookout, up in the freezing, cold cupola, and did duty "jest to be smart," Samuel sat there on top of his own feet, too.
When Abe helped drag out the apparatus-cart over the heavy sands for the drill, Samuel helped, too. And how tugging at that rope brought back his lumbago!
When Abe rode in the breeches-buoy, Samuel insisted on playing the sole survivor of a shipwreck, too, and went climbing stiffly and lumberingly up the practice-mast.
Abraham refused to take a nap after dinner; so did Samuel. Abe went down to the out-door carpenter-shop in the grove, and planed a board just for the love of exertion. Samuel planed two boards and drove a nail.
"We've got two schoolboys with us," said the keeper and the crew.
"Ef I'd a-knowed that yew had more lives 'n my Maltese cat," Samuel was muttering over Abe by this time, "I'd—"
Count, count went Captain Darby's fingers. He heard the keeper rattling papers in the office just across the threshold, heard him say he was about to turn in, and guessed Samuel had better do likewise; but Samuel kept on counting.
Count, count went the arraigning fingers. Gradually he grew drowsy, but still he went over and over poor Abe's offenses, counting on until of a sudden he realized that he was no longer numbering the sins of his companion; he was measuring in minutes the time he must spend away from Blossy and Twin Coves, and the begonias, and the canary, and the cat.
What would Blossy say if she could feel the temperature of the room in which he was supposed to sleep? What would Blossy say if she knew how his back ached? Whatever would Blossy do to Abe Rose if she could suspect how he had tuckered out her "old man?"
"He's a reg'lar hoss," brooded Samuel. "Oh, my feet!" grabbing at his right boot. "I'll bet yer all I got it's them air chilblains. That's what," he added, unconsciously speaking aloud.
Abe's lids slowly lifted. He rubbed his eyes and yawned. He turned his head on his hard, blue gingham-covered pillow, and stared sleepily at the other.
"Yew been noddin', Sam'l? Ain't gittin' sleepy a'ready, are yer?" He glanced at the clock. "Why, it's only half past nine. Say, what's the matter with me an' yew goin' west ter meet No. 5? Leetle breath o' fresh air 'll make us sleep splendid."
He started up from the couch, but dropped back, too heavy with weariness to carry off his bravado. Samuel, however, not noticing the discrepancy between speech and action, was already at the door leading up-stairs.
"Yew don't drag me out o' this station ter-night, Abe Rose. Yew 're a reg'lar hoss; that 's what yew be. A reg'lar hoss! A reg'lar—a reg'lar—"
He flung open the door and went trudging as fast as his smarting feet could carry him up the steep and narrow steps, wherein the passing of other feet for many years had worn little hollows on either side.
Abraham limped from the couch to the door himself, and called after him:
"Sam'l, don't yew want tew sleep by the fire? Yew seem a leetle softer than I be. Let me come up-stairs."
There was no answer beyond the vicious slamming of Samuel's boots upon the floor above.
Abe raised his voice again, and now came in answer a roar of wrath from the cot next to Samuel's.
"Go to bed!" shouted No. 6, a burly, red-headed Irishman. "Go to bed, wid ye! Th' young folks do be nadin' a little schlape!"
Abe flung himself back on his hard couch, drew the thick, gray blanket over him, and straightway fell into a deep, childlike slumber from which he was aroused by the rough but hearty inquiry:
"Say, Cap, like to have some oyster-stew and a cup of coffee?"
Abe sat up, rubbing his eyes, wondering since when they had begun to serve oyster-stew for breakfast on the Beach; then he realized that he had not overslept, and that it was not morning.
The clock was striking twelve, the midnight patrol was just going out, and the returning "runners" were bidding him partake of the food they had just prepared to cheer them after their cold tramp along the surf.
The old man whiffed the smell of the coffee, tempted, yet withheld by the thought of Angy's horror, and the horror of the twenty-nine sisters.
"Cap'n Abe"—Clarence Havens, No. 5, with a big iron spoon in his hand and a blue gingham apron tied around his bronzed neck, put him on his mettle, however—"Cap'n Abe, I tell yew, we wouldn't have waked no other fellow of your age out of a sound sleep. Cap'n Darby, he could snooze till doomsday; but we knowed you wouldn't want to miss no fun a-going."
"Cap'n Sam'l does show his years," Abe admitted. "Much obliged fer yew a-wakin' me up, boys," as he drew on his boots. "I was dreamin' I was hungry. Law, I wish I had a dollar apiece fer all the eyester-stews I've et on this here table 'twixt sunset an' sunrise."
Under the stimulus of the unaccustomed repast, Abe expanded and began to tell yarns of the old days on the Beach—the good old days. His cheeks grew red, his eyes sparkled. He smoked and leaned back from the table, and ate and drank, smoked and ate again.
"A week amongst yew boys," he asserted gaily, "is a-goin' tew be the makin' of me. Haow Sam'l kin waste so much time in sleep, I can't understand."
"I don't think he is asleep," said No. 3. "When I was up-stairs jest now fer my slippers, I heard him kind o' sniffin' inter his piller."
The laugh which followed brought the keeper out of the office in his carpet slippers, a patchwork quilt over his shoulders. His quick eyes took in the scene—the lamp sputtering above the table, the empty dishes, the two members of the crew sleepily jocular, with their blue flannel elbows spread over the board, the old man's rumpled bed, and his brilliant cheeks and bright eyes.
"Boys, you shouldn't have woke up Cap'n Rose," he said reprovingly. "I'm afraid, sir," turning to Abraham, "that you find our manners pretty rough after your life among the old ladies."
Abe dropped his eyes in confusion. Was he never to be rid of those apron-strings:
"Well, there's worse things than good women," proceeded the captain. "I wish we had a few over here." He sighed with the quiet, dull manner of the men who have lived long on the Beach. "Since they made the rule that the men must eat and sleep in the station, it's been pretty lonely. That's why there's so many young fellows in the Service nowadays; married men with families won't take the job."
"Them empty cottages out thar," admitted Abe, pointing to the window, "does look kind o' lonesome a-goin' ter rack an' ruin. Why, the winter I was over here, every man had his wife an' young 'uns on the Beach, 'cept me an' Sam'l."
Again the keeper sighed, and drew his coverlid closer. "Now, it's just men, men, nothing but men. Not a petticoat in five miles; and I tell you, sometimes we get mad looking at one another, don't we, boys?"
The two young men had sobered, and their faces also had taken on that look engendered by a life of dull routine among sand-hills at the edge of a lonely sea, with seldom the sound of a woman's voice in their ears or the prattle of little children.
"For two months last winter nobody came near us," said Havens, "and we couldn't get off ourselves, either, half the time. The bay broke up into porridge-ice after that big storm around New Year's; yew dasn't risk a scooter on it or a cat-boat. Feels to me," he added, as he rose to his feet, "as if it was blowin' up a genuwine old nor'-easter again."
The other man helped him clear the table. "I'm goin' to get married inJune," he said suddenly, "and give up this here blamed Service."
"A wife," pronounced Abe, carrying his own dishes into the kitchen, "is dretful handy, onct yew git used to her."
The keeper went into the office with a somewhat hurried "Good-night," and soon Abe found himself alone again, the light in the kitchen beyond, no sound in the room save that of the booming of the surf, the rattling of the windows, and now and again the fall of a clinker in the stove.
The old man was surprised to find that he could not fall back into that blissful slumber again. Not sleeping, he had to think. He thought and thought,—sober night thoughts,—while the oysters "laid like a log in his stummick" and the coffee seemed to stir his brain to greater activity.
"Suppose," said the intoxicated brain, "another big storm should swoop down upon you and the bay should break up, and you and Samuel should be imprisoned on the beach for two or three months with a handful of men-folks!"
"Moo! Moo!" roared the breakers on the shore. "Serve you right for finding fault with the sisters!"
Come to think of it, if he had not been so ungracious of Miss Abigail's concern for him, he would now be in possession of a hop pillow to lull him back to sleep. Well, he had made his bed, and he would have to lie on it, although it was a hard old carpet-covered lounge. Having no hop pillow, he would count sheep—
One sheep going over the fence, two sheep, three—How tired he was! How his bones ached! It's no use talking, you can't make an old dog do the tricks of his puppy days. What an idiot he had been to climb that practice-mast! If he had fallen and broken his leg?
Four sheep. Maybe he was too old for gallivanting, after all. Maybe he was too old for anything except just to be "mollycoddled" by thoughtful old ladies. Now, be honest with yourself, Abe. Did you enjoy yourself to-day—no, yesterday? Did you? Well, yes and—no! Now, if Angy had been along!
Angy! That was why he could not go to sleep! He had forgotten to kiss her good-by! Wonder if she had noticed it? Wonder if she had missed him more on account of that neglect? Pshaw! What nonsense! Angy knew he wa'n't no hand at kissin', an' it was apt to give him rheumatism to bend down so far as her sweet old mouth.
He turned to the wall at the side of the narrow lounge, to the emptiness where her pillow should be. "Good-night, Mother," he muttered huskily. Mother did not answer for the first time in nights beyond the counting. Mother would not be there to answer for at least six nights to come. A week, thought this old man, as the other old man had reflected a few hours before, is a long time when one has passed his threescore years and ten, and with each day sees the shadows growing longer.
Abraham put out his hard time-shrunken hand and touched in thought his wife's pillow, as if to persuade himself that she was really there in her place beside him. He remembered when first he had actually touched her pillow to convince himself that she was really there, too awed and too happy to believe that his youth's dream had come true; and he remembered now how his gentle, strong hand had crept along the linen until it cupped itself around her cheek; and he had felt the cheek grow hot with blushes in the darkness. She had not been "Mother" then; she had been "Dearest!" Would she think that he was growing childish if he should call her "Dearest" now?
Smiling to himself, he concluded that he would try the effect of the tender term when he reached home again. He drew his hand back, whispering once more, "Good-night, Mother." Then he fancied he could hear her say in her soft, reassuring tone, "Good-night, Father." Father turned his back on the empty wall, praying with a sudden rush of passionate love that when the last call should come for him, it would be after he had said "Good-night, Mother," to Angy and after she had said "Good-night, Father," to him, and that they might wake somewhere, somehow, together with God, saying, "Good-morning, Mother," "Good-morning, Father!" And "Fair is the day!"
At dawn the Station was wide-awake and everybody out of bed. Samuel crept down-stairs in his stocking-feet, his boots in his hand, his eyes heavy with sleeplessness, and his wig awry. He shivered as he drew close to the fire, and asked in one breath for a prescription for chilblains and where might Abe be. Abe's lounge was empty and his blankets neatly folded upon it.
The sunrise patrol from the east, who had just returned, made reply that he had met Captain Abe walking along the surf to get up an appetite for his griddle-cakes and salt pork. Samuel sat down suddenly on the lounge and opened his mouth.
"Didn't he have enough exercise yist'day, for marcy's sake! Put' nigh killed me. I was that tired las' night I couldn't sleep a wink. I declar', ef 't wa'n't fer that fool newspaper a-comin' out ter-night, I'd go home ter-day. Yer a-gwine acrost, hain't yer, Havens?"
Havens laughed in response. Samuel glowered at him.
"I want home comforts back," he vowed sullenly. "The Beach hain't what it used ter be. Goin' on a picnic with Abe Rose is like settin' yer teeth into a cast-iron stove lid covered with a thin layer o' puddin'. I'm a-goin' home."
The keeper assured him that no one would attempt to detain him if he found the Station uncomfortable, and that if he preferred to leave Abraham behind, the whole force would take pleasure in entertaining the more active old man.
"That old feller bates a phonograph," affirmed the Irishman. "It's good ter hear that he'll be left anyhow for comp'ny with this storm a-comin' up."
Samuel rushed to the window, for up-stairs the panes had been too frosty for him to see out. A storm coming up? The beach did look gray and desolate, dun-colored in the dull light of the early day, with the winter-killed grass and the stunted green growth of cedar and holly and pine only making splotches of darkness under a gray sky which was filled with scurrying clouds. The wind, too, had risen during the night, and the increased roar of the surf was telling of foul weather at sea.
A storm threatening! And the pleasant prospect of being shut in at the beach with the cast-iron Abraham and these husky life-savers for the remainder of the winter! No doubt Abe would insist upon helping the men with the double duties imposed by thick weather, and drag Samuel out on patrol.
"When dew yew start, Havens?" demanded Samuel in shaking tones. "Le' 's get off afore Abe gits back an' tries ter hold me. He seems ter be so plagued stuck on the life over here, he'll think I must be tew."
But, though Havens had to wait for the return of the man who had gone off duty yesterday morning, still Abe had not put in an appearance when Samuel and the life-saver trudged down the trail through the woods to the bay. As he stepped into the scooter, Samuel's conscience at last began to prick him.
"Yew sure the men will look arter the old fellow well an' not let him over-dew?"
But the whizz of the flight had already begun and the scooter's nose was set toward Twin Coves, her sail skimming swiftly with the ring of the steel against the ice over the shining surface of the bay.
"Law, yes," Samuel eased his conscience; "of course they will. They couldn't hurt him, anyhow. I never seen nobody take so kindly ter hardenin' as that air Abe."
The shore at Twin Coves was a somewhat lonely spot, owing to stretches of marshland and a sweep of pine wood that reached almost to the edge of the water.
Samuel, however, having indicated that he wished to be landed at the foot of a path through the pines, found himself on the home shore scarcely ten minutes after he had left Bleak Hill—Havens already speeding toward his home some miles to the eastward, the bay seemingly deserted except for his sail, a high wind blowing, and the snow beginning to fall in scattered flakes.
Samuel picked up his grip, trudged through the heavy sand of the narrow beach, and entered the sweet-smelling pine wood. He was stiff with cold after the rough, swift voyage; his feet alone were hot—burning hot with chilblains. Away down in his heart he was uneasy lest some harm should come to Abe and the old man be caught in the approaching storm on the Beach. But, oh, wasn't he glad to be home!
His house was still half a mile away; but he was once more on good, solid, dry land.
"I'll tell Blossy haow that air Abe Rose behaved," he reassured himself, when he pictured his wife's astonished and perhaps reproachful greeting, "an' then she won't wonder that I had ter quit him an' come back."
He recollected that Angy would be there, and hoped fervently that she might not prove so strenuous a charge as Abraham. Moreover, he hoped that she would not so absorb Blossy's attention as to preclude a wifely ministering to his aching feet and the application of "St. Jerushy Ile" to his lame and sore back.
The torture of the feet and back made walking harder, too, than he had believed possible with the prospect of relief so near. As he limped along he was forced to pause every now and again and set down the carpet-bag, sometimes to rub his back, sometimes to seat himself on a stump and nurse for a few moments one of those demon-possessed feet. Could he have made any progress at all if he had not known that at home, no matter if there was company, there would at least be no Abe Rose to keep him going, to spur him on to unwelcome action, to force him to prove himself out of sheer self-respect the equal, if not the superior, in masculine strength?
Abe had led him that chase over at the Station, Samuel was convinced, "a-purpose" to punish him for having so soundly berated him when he lay a-bed. That was all the thanks you ever got for doing things for "some folks."
Samuel hobbled onward, his brow knit with angry resentment. Did ever a half-mile seem so long, and had he actually been only twenty-three hours from home and Blossy? Oh, oh! his back and his feet! Oh, the weight of that bag! How much he needed sleep! How good it would be to have Blossy tuck him under the covers, and give him a hot lemonade with a stick of ginger in it!
If only he had hold of Abe Rose now to tell him his opinion of him! Well, he reflected, you have to summer and winter with a person before you can know them. This one December day and night with Abe had been equal to the revelations of a dozen seasons. The next time Samuel tried to do good to anybody more than sixty-five, he'd know it. The next time he was persuaded into leaving his wife for over night, he'd know that, too. Various manuals for the young husband, which he had consulted, to the contrary notwithstanding, the place for a married man was at home.
Samuel sat down on a fallen tree which marked the half-way point between his place and the bay. The last half of the journey would seem shorter, and, at the end, there would be Blossy smiling a welcome, for he never doubted but that Blossy would be glad to see him. She thought a good deal of him, nor had she been especially anxious for that week of separation.
His face smoothed its troubled frowns into a look of shining anticipation—the look that Samuel's face had worn when first he ushered Blossy into his tidy, little home and murmured huskily:
"Mis' Darby, yew're master o' the vessel naow; I'm jest fo'castle hand."
Forgetting all his aches, his pains, his resentments, Samuel took a peppermint-lozenge out of his pocket, rolled it under his tongue, and walked on. Presently, as he saw the light of the clearing through the trees, he broke into a run,—an old man's trot,—thus proving conclusively that his worry of lumbago and chilblains had been merely a wrongly diagnosed case of homesickness.
He grinned as he pictured Abe's dismay on returning to the Station to find him gone. Still, he reflected, maybe Abe would have a better time alone with the young fellows; he had grown so plagued young himself all of a sudden. Samuel surely need not worry about him.
More and more good-natured grew Samuel's face, until a sociable rabbit, peeping at him from behind a bush, decided to run a race with the old gentleman, and hopped fearlessly out into the open.
"Ah, yew young rascal!" cried Samuel. "Yew're the feller that eat up all my winter cabbages."
At this uncanny reading of his mind, Mr. Cottontail darted off into the woods again to seek out his mate and inform her that their guilt had been discovered.
Finally, Samuel came to the break in the woodland, an open field of rye, green as springtime grass, and his own exquisitely neat abode beckoning across the gray rail-fence to him.
How pretty Blossy's geraniums looked in the sitting-room windows! Even at this distance, too, he could see that she had not forgotten to water his pet abutilon and begonias. How welcome in the midst of this flurry of snow—how welcome to his eye was that smoke coming out of the chimneys! All the distress of his trip away from home seemed worth while now for the joy of coming back.
Before he had taken down the fence-rail and turned into the path which led to his back door, he was straining his ears for the sound of Blossy's voice gossiping with Angy. Not hearing it, he hurried the faster.
The kitchen door was locked. The key was not under the mat; it was not in the safe on the porch, behind the stone pickle-pot. He tried the door again, and then peered in at the window.
Not even the cat could be discerned. The kitchen was set in order, the breakfast dishes put away, and there was no sign of any baking or preparations for dinner.
He knocked, knocked loudly. No answer. He went to a side door, to the front entrance, and found the whole house locked, and no key to be discovered. It was still early in the morning, earlier than Blossy would have been likely to set out upon an errand or to spend the day; and then, too, she was not one to risk her health in such chilly, damp weather, with every sign of a heavy storm.
Samuel became alarmed. He called sharply, "Blossy!" No answer. "Mis'Rose!" No answer. "Ezra!" And still no sound in reply.
His alarm increased. He went to the barn; that was locked and Ezra nowhere in sight. By standing on tiptoe, however, and peeping through a crack in the boards, he found that his horse and the two-seated surrey were missing.
"Waal, I never," grumbled Samuel, conscious once more of all his physical discomforts. "The minute my back's turned, they go a-gallivantin'. I bet yer," he added after a moment's thought, "I bet yer it's that air Angy Rose. She's got ter git an' gad every second same as Abe, an' my poor wife has been drug along with her."
There was nothing left for him to do but seek refuge in his shop and await their return. Like nearly every other bayman, he had a one-room shanty, which he called the "shop," and where he played at building boats, and weaving nets, and making oars and tongs.
This structure stood to the north of the house, and fortunately had an old, discarded kitchen stove in it. There, if the wanderers had not taken that key also, he could build a fire, and stretch out before it on a bundle of sail-cloth.
He gave a start of surprise, however, as he approached the place; for surely that was smoke coming out of the chimney!
Ezra must have gone out with the horse, and Blossy must be entertaining Angy in some outlandish way demanded by the idiosyncrasies of the Rose temperament.
Samuel flung open the door, and strode in; but only to pause on the threshold, struck dumb. Blossy was not there, Angy was not there, nor any one belonging to the household. But sitting on that very bundle of canvas, stretching his lean hands over the stove, with Samuel's cat on his lap, was the "Old Hoss"—Abraham Rose!
The cat jumped off Abe's lap, running to Samuel with a mew of recognition. Abe turned his head, and made a startled ejaculation.
"Sam'l Darby," he said stubbornly, "ef yew've come tew drag me back to that air Beach, yew 're wastin' time. I won't go!"
Samuel closed the door and hung his damp coat and cap over a suit of old oilskins. He came to the fire, taking off his mittens and blowing on his fingers, the suspicious and condemnatory tail of his eye on Abraham.
"Haow'd yew git here?" he burst forth. "What yew bin an' done with my wife, an' my horse, an' my man, an' my kerridge? Haow'd yew git here? What'd yew come fer? When'd yew git here?"
"What'd yew come fer?" retorted Abe with some spirit. "Haow'd yew git here?"
"None o' yer durn' business."
A glimmer of the old twinkle came back into Abe's eye, and he began to chuckle.
"I guess we might as waal tell the truth, Sam'l. We both tried to be so all-fired young yesterday that we got played out, an' concluded unanermous that the best place fer a A No. 1 spree was ter hum."
Samuel gave a weak smile, and drawing up a stool took the cat upon his knee.
"Yes," he confessed grudgingly, "I found out fer one that I hain't no spring lamb."
"Ner me, nuther," Abe's old lips trembled. "I had eyester-stew an' drunk coffee in the middle o' the night; then the four-o'clock patrol wakes me up ag'in. 'Here, be a sport,' they says, an' sticks a piece o' hot mince-pie under my nose. Then I was so oneasy I couldn't sleep. Daybreak I got up, an' went fer a walk ter limber up my belt, an' I sorter wandered over ter the bay side, an' not a mile out I see tew men with one o' them big fishin'-scooters a-haulin' in their net. An' I walked a ways out on the ice, a-signalin' with my bandana han'kercher; an' arter a time they seen me. 'T was Cap'n Ely from Injun Head an' his boy. Haow them young 'uns dew grow! Las' time I see that kid, he wa' n't knee-high tew a grasshopper.
"Waal, I says tew 'em, I says: 'Want ter drop a passenger at Twin Coves?' 'Yes, yes,' they says. 'Jump in.' An' so, Sam'I, I gradooated from yer school o' hardenin' on top a ton o' squirmin' fish, more er less. I thought I'd come an' git Angy," he ended with a sigh, "an' yer hired man 'd drive us back ter Shoreville; but thar wa' n't nobody hum but a mewin' cat, an' the only place I could git inter was this here shop. Wonder whar the gals has gone?"
No mention of the alarm that he must by this time have caused at the Station. No consciousness of having committed any breach against the laws of hospitality. But there was that in the old man's face, in his worn and wistful look, which curbed Samuel's tongue and made him understand that as a little child misses his mother so Abe had missed Angy, and as a little homesick child comes running back to the place he knows best so Abe was hastening back to the shelter he had scorned.
So, with an effort, Samuel held his peace, merely resolving that as soon as he could get to a telephone he would inform their late hosts of Abe's safety.
There was no direct way of telephoning; but a message could be sent to the Quogue Station, and from there forwarded to Bleak Hill.
"I've had my lesson," said Abe. "The place fer old folks is with old folks."
"But"—Samuel recovered his authoritative manner—"the place fer an old man ain't with old hens. Naow, Abe, ef yew think yew kin behave yerself an' not climb the flagpole or jump over the roof, I want yer to stay right here, yew an' Angy both, an' spend yer week out. Yes, yes," as Abe would have thanked him. "I take it," plunging his hand into his pocket, "yew ain't stowed away nothin' since that mince-pie; but I can't offer yer nothin' to eat till Blossy gits back an' opens up the house, 'cept these here pepp'mints. They're fine; try 'em."
With one of those freakish turns of the weather that takes the conceit out of all weather-prophets, the snow had now ceased to fall, the sun was struggling out of the clouds, and the wind was swinging around to the west.
Neither of the old men could longer fret about their wives being caught in a heavy snow; but, nevertheless, their anxiety concerning the whereabouts of the women did not cease, and the homesickness which Abe felt for Angy, and Samuel for Blossy, rather increased than diminished as one sat on the roll of canvas and the other crouched on his stool, and both hugged the fire, and both felt very old, and very lame, and very tired and sore.
Toward noontime they heard the welcome sound of wheels, and on rushing to the door saw Ezra driving alone to the barn. He did not note their appearance in the doorway of the shop; but they could see from the look on his face that nothing had gone amiss.
Samuel heard the shutting of the kitchen door, and knew that Blossy was at home, and a strange shyness submerged of a sudden his eagerness to see her.
What would she say to this unexpected return? Would she laugh at him, or be disappointed?
"Yew go fust," he urged Abe, "an' tell my wife that I've got the chilblains an' lumbago so bad I can't hardly git tew the house, an' I had ter come hum fer my 'St. Jerushy Ile' an' her receipt fer frosted feet."
Abe had no such qualms as Samuel. He wanted to see Angy that minute, and he did not care if she did know why he had returned.
He fairly ran to the back door under the grape arbor, so that Samuel, observing his gait, was seized with a fear that he might be that young Abe of the Beach, during his visit, after all.
Abraham rushed into the kitchen without stopping to knock. "I'm back,Mother," he cried, as if that were all the joyful explanation needed.
She was struggling with the strings of her bonnet before the looking-glass which adorned Blossy's parlor-kitchen. She turned to him with a little cry, and he saw that her face had changed marvelously—grown young, grown glad, grown soft and fresh with a new excited spirit of jubilant thanksgiving.
"Oh, Father! Weren't yew s'prised tew git the telephone? I knowed yew'd come a-flyin' back."
Blossy appeared from the room beyond, and slipped past them, knowing intuitively where she would find her lord and master; but neither of them observed her entrance or her exit.
Angy clung to Abe, and Abe held her close. What had happened to her, the undemonstrative old wife? What made her so happy, and yet tremble so? Why did she cry, wetting his cheek with her tears, when she was so palpably glad? Why had she telephoned for him, unless she, too, had missed him as he had missed her?
Recalling his memories of last night, the memories of that long-ago honeymoon-time, he murmured into his gray beard, "Dearest!"
She did not seem to think he was growing childish. She was not even surprised. At last she said, half between sobbing and laughing:
"Oh, Abe, ain't God been good to us? Ain't it jist bewtiful to be rich?Rich!" she cried. "Rich!"
Abe sat down suddenly, and covered his face with his hands. In a flash he understood, and he could not let even Angy see him in the light of the revelation.
"The minin' stock!" he muttered; and then low to himself, in an awed whisper: "Tenafly Gold! The minin' stock!"
After a while he recovered himself sufficiently to explain that he had not received the telephone message, and therefore knew nothing.
"Did I git a offer, Mother?"
"A offer of fifteen dollars a share. The letter come last night fer yew, an' I—"
"Fifteen dollars a share!" He was astounded. "An' we've got fivethousand shares! Fifteen dollars, an' I paid ninety cents! Angy, ef everI ketch yew fishin' yer winter bunnit out of a charity barrel ag'in,I'll—Fifteen dollars!"
"But that ain't the best of it," interrupted Angy. "I couldn't sleep a wink, an' Blossy says not ter send word tew yew, 'cuz mebbe 't was a joke, an' to wait till mornin' an' go see Sam'l's lawyer down ter Injun Head. That's whar we've jest come from, an' we telephoned ter Quogue Station from thar. An' the lawyer at fust he didn't 'pear tew think very much of it; but Blossy, she got him ter call up some broker feller in 'York, an' 'Gee whizz!' he says, turnin' 'round all excited from the 'phone. 'Tenafly Gold is sellin' fer twenty dollars on the Curb right this minute!' An' he says, says he: 'Yew git yer husband, an' bring that air stock over this arternoon; an',' says he, 'I'll realize on it fer yer ter-morrer mornin'.'"
Abe stared at his wife, at her shining silk dress with its darns and careful patches, at her rough, worn hands, and at the much mended lace over her slender wrists.
"That mine was closed down eighteen years ago; they must 'a' opened it up ag'in"; he spoke dully, as one stunned. Then with a sudden burst of energy, his eyes still on his wife's figure: "Mother, that dress o' yourn is a disgrace fer the wife of a financierer. Yew better git a new silk fer yerself an' Miss Abigail, tew, fust thing. Her Sunday one hain't nothin' extry."
"But yer old beaver, Abe!" Angy protested. "It looks as ef it come out o'the Ark!"
"Last Sunday yew said it looked splendid"; his tone was absent-minded again. He seemed almost to ramble in his speech. "We must see that Ishmael gits fixed up comfortable in the Old Men's Home; yew remember haow he offered us all his pennies that day we broke up housekeepin'. An' we must do somethin' handsome fer the Darbys, tew. Ef it hadn't been fer Sam'l, I might be dead naow, an' never know nothin' erbout this here streak o' luck. Tenafly Gold," he continued to mutter. "They must 'a' struck a new lead. An' folks said I was a fool tew invest."
His face lightened. The weight of the shock passed. He threw off the awe of the glad news. He smiled the smile of a happy child.
"Naow, Mother, we kin buy back our old chair, the rocker with the red roses onto it. Seems ter me them roses must 'a' knowed all the time that this was a-goin' ter happen. They was jest as pert an' sassy that last day—"
Angy laughed. She laughed softly and with unutterable pride in her husband.
"Why, Father, don't yer see yew kin buy back the old chair, an' the old place, too, an' then have plenty ter spare?"
"So we kin, Mother, so we kin"; he nodded his head, surprised. He plunged his hands into his pockets, as if expecting to find them filled with gold. "Wonder ef Sam'l wouldn't lend me a dollar or so in small change. Ef I only had somethin' ter jingle, mebbe I could git closer to this fac'." He drew her to him, and gave her waist a jovial squeeze. "Hy-guy, Mother, we're rich! Hain't it splendid?"
Their laughter rang out together—trembling, near-to-tears laughter. The old place, the old chair, the old way, and—plenty! Plenty to mend the shingles. Aye, plenty to rebuild the house, if they chose. Plenty with which to win back the smiles of Angy's garden. The dreadful dream of need, and lack, and want, of feeding at the hand of charity, was gone by.
Plenty! Ah, the goodness and greatness of God! Plenty! Abe wanted to cry it out from the housetops. He wanted all the world to hear. He wished that he might gather his wealth together and drop it piece by piece among the multitude. To give where he had been given, to blossom with abundance where he had withered with penury!
The little wife read his thoughts. "We'll save jest enough fer ourselves ter keep us in comfort the rest of our lives an' bury us decent."
They were quiet a long while, both sitting with bowed heads as if in prayer; but presently Angy raised her face with an exclamation of dismay:
"Don't it beat all, that it happened jest tew late ter git in this week's 'Shoreville Herald'!"
"Tew late?" exclaimed the new-fledged capitalist. "Thar hain't nothin' tew late fer a man with money. We'll hire the editor tew git out another paper, fust thing ter-morrer!"
The services of the "Shoreville Herald," however, were not required to spread the news. The happiest and proudest couple on Long Island saw their names with the story of their sudden accession to wealth in a great New York daily the very next morning.
A tall, old gentleman with a real "barber's hair-cut," a shining, new high hat, a suit of "store clothes" which fitted as if they had been made for him, a pair of fur gloves, and brand-new ten-dollar boots; and a remarkably pretty, old lady in a violet bonnet, a long black velvet cape, with new shoes as well as new kid gloves, and a big silver-fox muff—this was the couple that found the paper spread out on the hall table at the Old Ladies' Home, with the sisters gathered around it, peering at it, weeping over it, laughing, both sorrowing and rejoicing.
"This'll be good-by ter Brother Abe," Aunt Nancy had sniffed when the news came over the telephone the day before; and though Miss Abigail had assured her that she knew Abe would come to see them real often, the matriarch still failed to be consoled.
"Hain't you noticed, gals," she persisted, "that thar hain't been a death in the house sence we took him in? An' I missed my reg'lar spell o' bronchitis last winter an' this one tew—so fur," she added dismally, and began to cough and lay her hands against her chest. "That was allus the way when I was a young 'un," she continued after a while; "I never had a pet dog or cat or even a tame chicken that it didn't up an' run erway sooner or later. This here loss, gals, 'll be the death o' me! Naow, mark my words!"
Then followed a consultation among the younger sisters, the result of which was that they met Abe in the morning with a unanimous petition. They could neither ask nor expect him to remain; that was impossible, but—
"Hip, hooray! Hip, hip, hooray!" cried Abe, waving an imaginary flag as he entered. "Sam'l dropped us at the gate. Him an' Blossy went on ter see Holmes tew dicker erbout buyin' back the old place. Takes Blossy an' Sam'l tew dew business. They picked out my clothes between them yist'day arternoon deown ter Injun village, in the Emporium. Haow yew like 'em? Splendid, eh? See my yaller silk handkerchief, tew? We jest dropped in ter git our things. We thought mebbe yew'd want ter slick up the room an' git ready fer the new—"
He was allowed to say no more. The sisters, who had been kissing and hugging Angy one by one, now swooped upon him. He was hugged, too, with warm, generous congratulation, his hands were both shaken until they ached, and his clothes and Angy's silently admired. But no one said a word, for not one of the sisters was able to speak. Angy, thinking that she divined a touch of jealousy, hastened to throw off her wrap and display the familiar old worn silk gown beneath.
"I told Abe I jest wouldn't git a new silk until you each had one made tew. Blossy sent for the samples. Blossy—"
"All I need's a shroud," interrupted Aunt Nancy grimly.
Angy and Abe both stared at her. She did look gray this morning. She did seem feeble and her cough did sound hollow. The other sisters glanced also at Aunt Nancy, and Sarah Jane took her hand, while she nudged Mrs. Homan with her free elbow and Mrs. Homan nudged Ruby Lee and Ruby Lee glanced at Lazy Daisy and Lazy Daisy drawled out meaningly:
"Miss Abigail!"
Then Miss Abigail, twisting the edge of her apron nervously, spoke:
"Much obliged to you I be in behalf o' all the sisters, Brother Abe an' ter Angy tew. We know yew'll treat us right. We know that yew," resting her eyes on Abe's face, "will prove ter be the 'angel unawares' that we been entertainin', but we don't want yew ter waste yer money on a cart-load o' silk dresses. All we ask o' yew is jest ernough tew allow us ter advertise fer another brother member ter take yer place."
Who could describe the expression that flashed across Abe's face?—hurt astonishment, wounded pride, jealous incomprehension.
"Ter take my place!" he glanced about the hall defiantly. Who dared to enter there and take his place?—his place!
"This is a old ladies' home," he protested. "What right you got a-takin' in a good-fer-nuthin' old man? Mebbe he'd rob yew er kill yew! When men git ter rampagin', yew can't tell what they might dew."
Sarah Jane nodded her head knowingly, as if to exclaim:
"I told yer so!"
But Miss Abigail hurriedly explained that it was a man and wife that they wanted. She blushed as she added that of course they would not take a man without his wife.
"No, indeed! That'd be highly improper," smirked Ruby Lee.
Then Abe went stamping to the stairway, saying sullenly:
"All right. I'll give yew all the money yew want fer advertisin', an' yew kin say he'll be clothed an' dressed proper, tew, an' supplied with terbaccer an' readin'-matter besides; but jest wait till the directors read that advertisement! They had me here sorter pertendin' ter be unbeknownst. Come on, Angy. Let 's go up-stairs an' git our things. Let's—"
Aunt Nancy half arose from her chair, resting her two shaking hands on the arms of it.
"Brother Abe," she called quaveringly after the couple, "I guess yew kin afford ter fix up any objections o' the directors."
Angy pressed her husband's arm as she joined him in the upper hall.
"Don't yer see, Abe. They don't realize that that poor old gentleman, whoever he may be, won't be yew. They jest know thatyewwasyew; an' they want ter git another jest as near like yew as they kin."
Abe grunted, yet nevertheless went half-way down-stairs again to call more graciously to the sisters that he would give them a reference any time for knowing how to treat a man just right.
"That feller'll be lucky, gals," he added in tremulous tones. "I hope he'll appreciate yew as I allers done."
Then Abe went to join Angy in the room which the sisters had given to him that bitter day when the cry of his heart had been very like unto:
"Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani!"
After all, what was there of his and Angy's here? Their garments they did not need now. They would leave them behind for the other old couple that was to come. There was nothing else but some simple gifts. He took up a pair of red wristlets that Mrs. Homan had knit, and tucked them in his new overcoat pocket. He also took Abigail's bottle of "Jockey Club" which he had despised so a few days ago, and tucked that in his watch-pocket. When he bought himself a watch, he would buy a new clock for the dining-room down-stairs, too,—a clock with no such asthmatic strike as the present one possessed. All his personal belongings—every one of them gifts—he found room for in his pockets. Angy had even less than he. Yet they had come practically with nothing—and compared with that nothing, what they carried now seemed much. Angy hesitated over the pillow-shams. Did they belong to them or to the new couple to come? Abe gazed at the shams too. They had been given to him and Angy last Christmas by all the sisters. They were white muslin with white cambric frills, and in their centers was embroidered in turkey-red cotton, "Mother," on one pillow, "Father," on the other. Every sister in the Home had taken at least one stitch in the names.
Father and Mother—not Angy and Abe! Why Father and Mother? A year ago no one could have foreseen the fortune, nor have prophesied the possession of the room by another elderly couple.
Angy drew near to Abe, and Abe to Angy. They locked arms and stood looking at the pillows. He saw, and she saw, the going back to the old bedroom in the old home across the woods and over the field—the going back. And in sharp contrast they each recalled the first time that they had stepped beneath that roof nearly half a century ago,—the first home-coming,—when her mother-heart and his father-heart had been filled with the hope of children—children to bless their marriage, children to complete their home, children to love, children to feed them with love in return.
"Let's adopt some leetle folks," said Angy, half in a whisper. "I'm afeard the old place'll seem lonesome without—"
"Might better adopt the sisters"; he spoke almost gruffly. "I allers did think young 'uns would be the most comfort tew yew after they growed up."
"A baby is dretful cunnin'," Angy persisted. "But," she added sadly, "I don't suppose a teethin' mite would find much in common with us."
"Anyway," vowed Abe, suddenly beginning to unfasten the pillow-shams, "these belong ter us, an' I'm a-goin' ter take 'em."
They went down-stairs silently, the shams wrapped in a newspaper carried under his arm.
"Waal, naow,"—he tried to speak cheerfully as they rejoined the others, and he pushed his way toward the dining-room,—"I'll go an' git my cup an' sasser."
But Miss Abigail blocked the door, again blushing, again confused.
"That 'Tew-our-Beloved-Brother' cup," she said gently, her eyes not meeting the wound in his, "we 'bout concluded yew'd better leave here fer the one what answers the ad. Yew got so much naow, an' him—"
She did not finish. She could not. She felt rather than saw the blazing of Abe's old eyes. Then the fire beneath his brows died out and a mist obscured his sight.
"Gals," he asked humbly, "would yew ruther have a new 'beloved brother'?"
For a space there was no answer. Aunt Nancy's head was bowed in her hands. Lazy Daisy was openly sobbing. Miss Ellie was twisting her fingers nervously in and out—she unwound them to clutch at Angy's arm as if to hold her. At last Miss Abigail spoke with so unaccustomed a sharpness that her voice seemed not her own:
"Sech a foolish question as that nobody in their sound senses would ask."
Abe sat down in his old place at the fireside and smiled a thousand smiles in one. He smiled and rubbed his hands before the blaze. The blaze itself seemed scarcely more bright and warm than the light from within which transfigured his aged face.
"Gals," he chuckled in his old familiar way, "I dunno how Sam'l Darby'll take it; but if Mother's willin', I guess I won't buy back no more of the old place, 'cept'n' jest my rockin'-chair with the red roses onto it; an' all the rest o' this here plagued money I'll hand over ter the directors, an' stay right here an' take my comfort."
Angy bent down and whispered in his ear: "I'd ruther dew it, tew, Father. Anythin' else would seem like goin' a-visitin'. But yew don't want ter go an' blame me," she added anxiously, "ef yew git all riled up an' sick abed ag'in."
"Pshaw, Mother," he protested; "yew fergit I wasadoptedthen; naow I beadoptin'. Thar's a big difference."
She lifted her face, relieved, and smiled into the relieved and radiant faces of Abe's "children," and her own.