He threw up his hand as a signal that the line should be drawn in.He threw up his hand as a signal thatthe line should be drawn in.
He threw up his hand as a signal that the line should be drawn in.He threw up his hand as a signal thatthe line should be drawn in.
The startled man pulled frantically at the piece of rope in his hand, but found to his horror that it offered no assistance; it was evident that the break was between him and the shore. He kicked and paddled rapidly, but seemed to make no headway, and while Alice, realizing the danger, commenced to cry piteously, Mr. Putchett plainly saw on the shore the child's mother in an apparent frenzy of excitement and terror.
The few men present—mostly boarding-house keepers and also ex-sailors and fishermen—hastened with a piece of the broken rope to drag down a fishing-boat which lay on the sand beyond reach of the tide. Meanwhile a boy found a fishing-line, to the end of which a stone was fastened and thrown toward the imperiled couple.
Mr. Putchett snatched at the line and caught it, and in an instant half a dozen women pulled upon it, only to have it break almost inside Mr. Putchett's hands. Again it was thrown, and again the frightened broker caught it. This time he wound it about Alice's arm, put the end into her hand, kissed her forehead, said, "Good-by, little angel, God bless you," and threw up his hand as a signal that the line should be drawn in. In less than a minute little Alice was in her mother's arms, but when the line was ready to be thrown again, Mr. Putchett was not visible.
By this time the boat was at the water's edge, and four men—two of whom were familiar with rowing—sat at the oars, while two of the old fishermen stood by to launch the boat at the proper instant. Suddenly they shot it into the water, but the clumsy dip of an oar turned it broadside to the wave, and in an instant it was thrown, waterlogged, upon the beach. Several precious moments were spent in righting the boat and bailing out the water, after which the boat was safely launched, the fishermen sprang to the oars, and in a moment or two were abreast the buoy.
Mr. Putchett was not to be seen—even had he reached the buoy it could not have supported him, for it was but a small stick of wood. One of the boarders—he who had swamped the boat—dived several times, and finally there came to the surface a confused mass of humanity which separated into the forms of the diver and the broker.
A few strokes of the oars beached the boat, and old "Captain" Redding, who had spent his Winters at a government life-saving station, picked up Mr. Putchett, carried him up to the dry sand, laid him face downward, raised his head a little, and shouted:
"Somebody stand between him and the sun so's to shade his head! Slap his hands, one man to each hand. Scrape up some of that hot, dry sand, and pile it on his feet and legs. Everybody else stand off and give him air."
The captain's orders were promptly obeyed, and there the women and children, some of them weeping, and all of them pale and silent, stood in a group in front of the bathing-house and looked up.
"Somebody run to the hotel for brandy," shouted the captain.
"Here's brandy," said a strange voice, "and I've got a hundred dollars for you if you bring him to life."
Every one looked at the speaker, and seemed rather to dislike what they saw. He was a smart-looking man, but his face seemed very cold and forbidding; he stood apart, with arms folded, and seemed regardless of the looks fastened upon him. Finally Mrs. Blough, one of the most successful and irrepressible gossips in the neighborhood, approached him and asked him if he was a relative of Mr. Putchett's.
"No, ma'am," replied the man, with unmoved countenance. "I'm an officer with a warrant for his arrest, on suspicion of receiving stolen goods. I've searched his traps at the hotel and boarding-house this morning, but can't find what I'm looking for. It's been traced to him, though—has he shown any of you ladies a large diamond?"
"No," said Mrs. Blough, quite tartly, "and none of us would have believed it of him, either."
"I suppose not," said the officer, his face softening a little. "I've seen plenty of such cases before, though. Besides, it isn't my first call on Putchett—not by several."
Mrs. Blough walked indignantly away, but, true to her nature, she quickly repeated her news to her neighbors.
"He's coming to!" shouted the captain, turning Mr. Putchett on his back and attempting to provoke respiration. The officer was by his side in a moment. Mr. Putchett's eyes had closed naturally, the captain said, and his lips had moved. Suddenly the stranger laid a hand on the collar of the insensible man, and disclosed a cord about his neck.
"Captain," said the officer, in a voice very low, but hurried and trembling with excitement, "Putchett's had a very narrow escape, and I hate to trouble him, but I must do my duty. There's been a five thousand dollar diamond traced to him. He advanced money on it, knowing it was stolen. I've searched his property and can't find it, but I'll bet a thousand it's on that string around his neck—that's Putchett all over. Now, you let me take it, and I'll let him alone; nobody else need know what's happened. He seems to have behaved himself here, judging by the good opinion folks have of him, and he deserves to have a chance which he won't get if I take him to jail."
The women had comprehended, from the look of the stranger and the captain, that something unusual was going on, and they had crowded nearer and nearer, until they heard the officer's last words.
"You're a dreadful, hateful man!" exclaimed little Alice.
The officer winced.
"Hush, daughter," said Alice's mother; then she said: "Let him take it, captain; it's too awful to think of a man's going right to prison from the gates of death."
The officer did not wait for further permission, but hastily opened the bathing-dress of the still insensible figure.
Suddenly the officer started back with an oath, and the people saw, fastened to a string and lying over Mr. Putchett's heart, a small scallop-shell, variegated with pink and yellow spots.
"It's one I gave him when I first came here, because he couldn't find any," sobbed little Alice.
The officer, seeming suddenly to imagine that the gem might be secreted in the hollow of the shell, snatched at it and turned it over. Mr. Putchett's arm suddenly moved; his hand grasped the shell and carried it toward his lips; his eyes opened for a moment and fell upon the officer, at the sight of whom Mr. Putchett shivered and closed his eyes again.
"That chill's a bad sign," muttered the captain.
Mr. Putchett's eyes opened once more, and sought little Alice; his face broke into a faint smile, and she stooped and kissed him. The smile on his face grew brighter for an instant, then he closed his eyes and quietly carried the case up to a Court of Final Appeals, before which the officer showed no desire to give evidence.
Mr. Putchett was buried the next day, and most of the people in the neighborhood were invited to the funeral. The story went rapidly about the neighborhood, and in consequence there were present at the funeral a number of uninvited persons: among these were the cook, bar-keeper and hostler of the hotel, who stood uncomfortably a little way from the house until the procession started, when they followed at a respectful distance in the rear.
When the grave was reached, those who dug it—who were also of those who carried the bier—were surprised to find the bottom of the coffin-box strewn and hidden with wild flowers and scraps of evergreen.
The service of the Church of England was read, and as the words, "Ashes to ashes; dust to dust," were repeated, a bouquet of wild flowers was tossed over the heads of the mourners and into the grave. Mrs. Blough, though deeply affected by the services, looked quickly back to see who was the giver, and saw the officer (who had not been seen before that day) with such an embarrassed countenance as to leave no room for doubt. He left before daylight next morning, to catch a very early train: but persons passing the old graveyard that day beheld on Putchett's grave a handsome bush of white roses, which bush old Mrs. Gale, living near the hotel, declared was a darling pot-plant which had been purchased of her on the previous evening by an ill-favored man who declared hemusthave it, no matter how much he paid for it.
THE MEANEST MAN AT BLUGSEY'S.
THE MEANEST MAN AT BLUGSEY'S.
To miners, whose gold-fever had not reached a ridiculous degree of heat, Blugsey's was certainly a very satisfactory location. The dirt was rich, the river ran dry, there was plenty of standing-room on the banks, which were devoid of rocks, the storekeeper dealt strictly on the square, and the saloon contained a pleasing variety of consolatory fluids, which were dispensed by Stumpy Flukes, ex-sailor, and as hearty a fellow as any one would ask to see.
All thieves and claim-jumpers had been shot as fast as discovered, and the men who remained had taken each other's measures with such accuracy, that genuine fights were about as unfrequent as prayer-meetings.
The miners dug and washed, ate, drank, swore and gambled with that delightful freedom which exists only in localities where society is established on a firm and well-settled basis.
Such being the condition of affairs at Blugsey's, it seemed rather strange one morning, hours after breakfast, to see, sprinkled in every direction, a great number of idle picks, shovels and pans; in fact, the only mining implements in use that morning were those handled by a single miner, who was digging and carrying and washing dirt with an industry which seemed to indicate that he was working as a substitute for each and every man in the camp.
He was anything but a type of gold-hunters in general; he was short and thin, and slight and stooping, and greatly round-shouldered; his eyes were of a painfully uncertain gray, and one of them displayed a cast which was his only striking feature; his nose had started as a very retiring nose, but had changed its mind half-way down; his lips were thin, and seemed to yearn for a close acquaintance with his large ears; his face was sallow and thin, and thickly seamed, and his chin appeared to be only one of Nature's hasty afterthoughts. Long, thin gray hair hung about his face, and imparted the only relief to the monotonous dinginess of his features and clothing.
Such being the appearance of the man, it was scarcely natural to expect that miners in general would regard him as a special ornament to the profession.
In fact, he had been dubbed "Old Scrabblegrab" on the second day of his occupancy of Claim No. 32, and such of his neighbors as possessed the gift of tongues had, after more intimate acquaintance with him, expressed themselves doubtful of the ability of language to properly embody Scrabblegrab's character in a single name.
The principal trouble was, that they were unable to make anything at all of his character; there was nothing about him which they could understand, so they first suspected him, and then hated him violently, after the usual manner of society toward the incomprehensible.
And on the particular morning which saw Scrabblegrab the only worker at Blugsey's, the remaining miners were assembled in solemn conclave at Stumpy Fluke's saloon, to determine what was to be done with the detested man.
The scene was certainly an impressive one; for such quiet had not been known at the saloon since the few moments which intervened between the time, weeks before, when Broadhorn Jerry gave the lie to Captain Greed, and the captain, whose pistol happened to be unloaded, was ready to proceed to business.
The average miner, when sober, possesses a degree of composure and gravity which would be admirable even in a judge of ripe experience, and miners, assembled as a deliberative body, can display a dignity which would drive a venerable Senator or a British M.P. to the uttermost extreme of envy.
On the occasion mentioned above, the miners ranged themselves near the unoccupied walls, and leaned at various graceful and awkward angles. Boston Ben, who was by natural right the ruler of the camp, took the chair—that is, he leaned against the centre of the bar. On the other side of the bar leaned Stumpy Flukes, displaying that degree of conscious importance which was only becoming to a man who, by virtue of his position, was sole and perpetual secretary and recorder to all stated meetings at Blugsey's.
Boston Ben glanced around the room, and then collectively announced the presence of a quorum, the formal organization of the meeting, and its readiness for deliberation, by quietly remarking:
"Blaze away!"
Immediately one of the leaners regained the perpendicular, departed a pace from the wall, rolled his tobacco neatly into one cheek, and remarked:
"We've stood it long enough—the bottom's clean out of the pan, Mr. Chairman. Scrabblegrab's declined bitters from half the fellers in camp, an' though his gray old topknot's kept 'em from takin' satisfaction in the usual manner, they don't feel no better 'bout it than they did."
The speaker subsided into his section of wall, composed himself into his own especial angles, and looked like a man who had fully discharged a conscientious duty.
From the opposite wall there appeared another speaker, who indignantly remarked:
"Goin' back on bitters ain't a toothful to what he's done. There's young Curly, that went last week. That boy played his hand in a style that would take the conceit clean out uv an angel. But all to onct Curly took to lookin' flaxed, an' the judge here overheard Scrabblegrab askin' Curly what he thort his mother'd say ef she knew he was makin' his money that way? The boy took on wuss an' wuss, an' now he's vamosed. Don't b'lieve me ef yer don't want ter, fellers—here's the judge hisself."
The judge briskly advanced his spectacles, which had gained him his title, and said:
"True ez gospel; and when I asked him ef he wasn't ashamed of himself fur takin' away the boy's comfort, he said No, an' that I'd be a more decent man ef I'd give up keards myself."
"He's alive yit!" said the first speaker, in a tone half of inquiry and half of reproof.
"I know it," said the judge, hastening to explain. "I'd lent my pepperbox to Mose when he went to 'Frisco, an' the old man's too little fur a man uv my size to hit."
The judge looked anxiously about until he felt assured his explanation had been generally accepted. Then he continued:
"What's he good fur, anyhow? He can't sing a song, except somethin' about 'Tejus an' tasteless hours,' that nobody ever heard before, an' don't want to agin; he don't drink, he don't play keards, he don't even cuss when he tumbles into the river. Ev'ry man's got his p'ints, an' ef he hain't got no good uns, he's sure to have bad uns. Ef he'd only show 'em out, there might be somethin' honest about it; but when a feller jist eats an' sleeps an' works, an' never shows any uv the tastes uv a gentleman, ther's somethin' wrong."
"I don't wish him any harm," said a tall, good-natured fellow, who succeeded the judge; "but the feller's looks is agin the reputation uv the place. In a camp like this here one, whar society's first-class—no greasers nur pigtails nur loafers—it ain't the thing to hev anybody around that looks like a corkscrew that's been fed on green apples and watered with vinegar—it's discouragin' to gentlemen that might hev a notion of stakin' a claim, fur the sake uv enjoyin' our social advantages."
"N-none uv yer hev got to the wust uv it yit," remarked another. "The old cuss is too fond uv his dust. Billy Banks seen him a-buyin' pork up to the store, an' he handled his pouch ez ef 'twas eggs instid of gold dust—poured it out as keerful ez yer please, an' even scraped up a little bit he spilt. Now, when I wuz a little rat, an' went to Sunday-school, they used to keep a-waggin' at me 'bout evil communication a-corruptin' o' good manners. That's whathe'lldo—fust thing yer know,otherfellers'll begin to be stingy, an' think gold dust wuz made to save instid uv to buy drinks an' play keards fur.That'swhat it'll come to."
"Beggin' ev'rybody's pardon," interposed a deserter from the army, "but these here perceedin's is irreg'lar. 'Tain't the square thing to take evidence till the pris'ner's in court."
Boston Ben immediately detailed a special officer to summon Old Scrabblegrab, declared a recess of five minutes, and invited the boys to drink with him.
Those who took sugar in theirs had the cup dashed from their lips just as they were draining the delicious dregs, for the officer and culprit appeared, and the chairman rapped the assembly to order.
Boston Ben had been an interested attendant at certain law-courts in the States, so in the calm consciousness of his acquaintance with legal procedure he rapidly arraigned Scrabblegrab.
"Scrabblegrab, you're complained uv for goin' back on bitters, coaxin' Curly to give up keards, thus spoilin' his fun, an' knockin' appreciatin' observers out of their amusement; uv insultin' the judge, uv not cussin' when you stumble into the river, uv not havin' any good p'ints, an' not showin' yer bad ones; uv bein' a set-back on the tone uv the place—lookin' like a green-apple-fed, vinegar-watered corkscrew, or words to that effect; an', finally, in savin' yer money. What hev you got to say agin' sentence bein' passed on yer?"
The old man flushed as the chairman proceeded, and when the indictment reached its end, he replied, in a tone which indicated anything but respect for the court:
"I've got just this to say, that I paid my way here, I've asked no odds of any man sence I've ben here, an' that anybody that takes pains to meddle with my affairs is an impudent scoundrel!"
Saying which, the old man turned to go, while the court was paralyzed into silence.
But Tom Dosser, a new arrival, and a famous shot, now stepped in front of the old man.
"I ax yer parding," said Tom, in the blandest of tones, "but, uv course, yer didn't mean me when yer mentioned impudent scoundrels?"
"Yes, I did—I meant you, and ev'rybody like yer," replied the old man.
Tom's hand moved toward his pistol. The chairman expeditiously got out of range. Stumpy Flukes promptly retired to the extreme end of the bar, and groaned audibly.
The old manwasin the wrong; but, then, wasn't ittoomean, when blood was so hard to get out, that these difficultiesalwaystook place just after he'd got the floor clean?
'I don't generally shoot till the other feller draws.'"I don't generally shoot till the other feller draws."
'I don't generally shoot till the other feller draws.'"I don't generally shoot till the other feller draws."
"I don't generally shoot till the other feller draws," explained Tom Dosser, while each man in the room wept with emotion as they realized they had lived to see Tom's skill displayed before their very eyes—"I don't generally shoot till the other feller draws; but you'd better be spry. I usually make a little allowance for age, but—"
Tom's further explanations were indefinitely delayed by an abnormal contraction of his trachea, the same being induced by the old man's right hand, while his left seized the unhappy Thomas by his waist-belt, and a second later the dead shot of Blugsey's was tossed into the middle of the floor, somewhat as a sheaf of oats is tossed by a practiced hand.
"Anybody else?" inquired the old man. "I'll back Vermont bone an' muscle agin' the hull passel of ye, even if Ibea deacon.' The angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear him.'"
"The angel needn't hurry hisself," said Tom Dosser, picking himself up, one joint at a time. "Ef that's the crowd yer travelin' with, and they've got a grip anything like yourn, I don't want nothin' to do with 'em."
Boston Ben looked excited, and roared:
"This court's adjournedsine die."
Then he rushed up to the newly announced deacon, caught him firmly by the right hand, slapped him heartily between the shoulders, and inquired, rather indignantly:
"Say, old Angelchum, why didn't you ever let folks know yer style, instead uv trottin' 'round like a melancholy clam with his shells shut up tight? That's what this crowd wants to know! Now yev opened down to bed-rock, we'll git English Sam from Sonora, an' git up the tallest kind uv a rasslin' match."
"Not unless English Sam meddles with my business, you won't," replied the deacon, quickly. "I've got enough to do fightin' speretual foes."
"Oh," said Boston Ben, "we'll manage it so the church folks needn't think 'twas a set-up job. We'll put Sam up to botherin' yer, and yer can tackle him at sight. Then—"
"Excuse me, Boston," interrupted Tom Dosser, "but yer don't hit the mark. I'm from Vermont myself, an' deacons there don't fight for the fun of it, whatever they may do in the villageyouhail from." Then, turning to the old man, Tom asked: "What part uv the old State be ye from, deacon, an' what fetched ye out?"
"From nigh Rutland," replied the deacon, "I hed a nice little place thar, an' wuz doin' well. But the young one's eyes is bad. None uv the doctors thereabouts could do anythin' fur 'em. Took her to Boston; nobody thar could do anythin'—said some of the European doctors were the only ones that could do the job safely. Costs money goin' to Europe an' payin' doctors—I couldn't make it to hum in twenty year; so I come here."
"Only child?" inquired Tom Dosser, while the boys crowded about the two Vermonters, and got up a low buzz of sympathetic conversation.
The old man heard it all, and to his lonesome and homesick soul it was so sweet and comforting, that it melted his natural reserve, and made him anxious to unbosom himself to some one. So he answered Tom:
"Only child of my only darter."
"Father dead?" inquired Tom Dosser.
"Better be," replied the deacon, bitterly. "He left her soon after they were married."
"Mean skunk!" said Tom, sympathetically.
"I want to judge as I'dbejudged," replied the deacon; "but I feel ez ef I couldn't call that man bad enough names. Hesby was ez good a gal ez ever lived, but she went to visit some uv our folks at Burlington, an' fust thing I know'd she writ me she'd met this chap, and they'd been married, an' wanted us to forgive her; but he was so good, an' she loved him so dearly."
"Good for the gal," said Tom, and a murmur of approbation ran through the crowd.
"Of course, we forgave her. We'd hev done it ef she married Satan himself," continued the deacon. "But we begged her to bring her husband up home, an' let us look at him. Whatever was good enough forherto love was good enough for us, and we meant to try to love Hesby's husband."
"Done yer credit, deacon, too," declared Tom, and again the crowd uttered a confirmatory murmur. "Ef some folks—deacons, too—wuz ez good—But go ahead, deac'n."
"Next thing we heard from her, he had gone to the place he was raised in; but a friend of his, who went with him, came back, an' let out he'd got tight, an' been arrested. She writ him right off, beggin' him to come home, and go with her up to our place, where he could be out of temptation an' where she'd love him dearer than ever."
"Pure gold, by thunder!" ejaculated Tom, while a low "You bet," was heard all over the room.
Tom's eyes were in such a condition that he thought the deacon's were misty, and the deacon noticed the same peculiarities about Tom.
"She never got a word from him," continued the deacon; "but one of her own came back, addressed in his writing."
"The infernal scoundrel!" growled Tom, while from the rest of the boys escaped epithets which caused the deacon, indignant as he was, to shiver with horror.
"She was nearly crazy, an' started to find him, but nobody knowed where he was. The postmaster said he'd come to the office ev'ry day for a fortnight, askin' for a letter, so he must hev got hers."
"Ef all women had such stuff in 'em," sighed Tom, "there'll be one fool less in California. 'Xcuse me, deac'n."
"She never gev up hopin' he'd come back," said the deacon, in accents that seemed to indicate labored breath "an' it sometimes seems ez ef such faith 'd be rewarded by the Lord some time or other. She teaches Pet—that's her child—to talk about her papa, an' to kiss his pictur; an' when she an' Pet goes to sleep, his pictur's on the pillar beween 'em."
"An' the idee that any feller could be mean enough to go back on such a woman! Deacon, I'd track him right through the world, an' just tell him what you've told us. Efthatdidn't fetch him, I'd consider it a Christian duty an' privilege to put a hole through him."
"I couldn't do that," replied the deacon, "even ef I was a man uv blood; fur Hesby loves him, an' he's Pet's dad; Besides, his pictur looks like a decent young chap—ain't got no hair on his face, an' looks more like an innercent boy than anythin' else. Hesby thinks Pet looks like him, an' I couldn't touch nobody looking like Pet. Mebbe you'd like to see her pictur," continued the deacon, drawing from his pocket an ambrotype, which he opened and handed Tom.
"Looks sweet ez a posy," said Tom, regarding it tenderly. "Them little lips uv hern look jest like a rose when it don't know whether to open a little further or not."
The deacon looked pleased, and extracted another picture, and remarked, as he handed it to Tom:
"That's Pet's mother."
'That's Pet's mother....The Deacon looked pleased, and extracted anotherpicture, and remarked, as he handed it to Tom, "That'sPet's mother." Tom took it, looked at it and screamed,"My wife!"
'That's Pet's mother....The Deacon looked pleased, and extracted anotherpicture, and remarked, as he handed it to Tom, "That'sPet's mother." Tom took it, looked at it and screamed,"My wife!"
Tom took it, looked at it, and screamed:
"My wife!"
He threw himself on the floor, and cried as only a big-hearted mancancry.
The deacon gazed wildly about, and gasped:
"What's his name?—tell me quick!"
"Tom Dosser!" answered a dozen or more.
"That's him! Bless the Lord!" cried the deacon, and finding a seat, dropped into it, and buried his face in his hands.
For several moments there was a magnificent attempt at silence, but it utterly failed. The boys saw that the deacon and Tom were working a very large claim, and to the best of their ability they assisted.
Stumpy Flukes, under the friendly shelter of the bar, was able to fully express his feelings through his eyelids, but the remainder of the party, by taking turns at staring out the windows, and contemplating the bottles behind the bar, managed to delude themselves into the belief that their eyes were invisible. Finally, Tom arose. "Deacon—boys," he said, "I never got that letter. I wus afeard she'd hear about my scrape, so I wrote her all about it, ez soon ez I got sober, an' begged her to forgive me. An' I waited an' hoped an' prayed for an answer, till I growed desperate; an' came out here."
"She never heerd from you, Thomas," sighed the deacon.
"Deac'n," said Tom, "do you s'pose I'd hev kerried this for years"—here he drew out a small miniature of his wife—"ef I hadn't loved her? Yes, an' this too," continued Tom, producing a thin package, wrapped in oilskin. "There's the only two letters I ever got from her, an', just cos her hand writ 'em, I've had 'em just where I took 'em from for four years. I got 'em at Albany, 'fore I got on that cussed tare, an' they was both so sweet an' wifely, that I've never dared to read 'em since, fur fear that thinkin' on what I'd lost would make me even wuss than I am. But I ain't afeard now," said Tom, eagerly tearing off the oilskin, and disclosing two envelopes.
He opened one, took out the letter, opened it with trembling hands, stared blankly at it, and handed it to the deacon.
"Thar's my letter now—I got 'em in the wrong envelope!"
"Thomas," said the deacon, "the best thing you can do is to deliver that letter yourself. An' don't let any grass grow under your feet, ef you ken help it."
"I'm goin' by the first hoss I ken steal," said Tom.
"An' tell her I'll be along ez soon as I pan out enough," continued the deacon.
"An' tell her," said Boston Ben, "that the gov'nor won't be much behind you. Tell her that when the crowd found out how game the old man was, and what was on his mind, that the court was so ashamed of hisself that he passed around the hat for Pet's benefit, and"—here Boston Ben thoughtfully weighed the hat in his hands—"and that the apology's heavy enough to do Europe a dozen times; I know it, for I've had to travel myself occasionally."
Here he deposited the venerable tile with its precious contents on the floor in front of the deacon. The old man looked at it, and his eyes filled afresh, as he exclaimed:
"God bless you! I wish I could do something for you in return."
"Don't mention it," said Boston Ben, "unless—you—Youcouldn'tmake up your mind to a match with English Sam, could you?"
"Come, boys," interrupted Stumpy Flukes; "its my treat—name your medicine—fill high—all charged?—now then—bottom up, to 'The meanest man at Blugsey's'!"
"Thatdidmeanyou, deacon!" exclaimed Tom; "but I claim it myself now, so—so I won't drink it."
The remainder of the crowd clashed glasses, while Tom and his father-in-law bowed profoundly. Then the whole crowd went out to steal horses for the two men, and had them on the trail within an hour. As they rode off, Stumpy Flukes remarked:
"There's a splendid shot ruined for life."
"Yes," said Boston Ben, with a deep sigh struggling out of his manly bosom, "an' a bully rassler, too. The Church has got a good deal to answer fur, fur sp'ilin' that man's chances."
DEACON BARKER'S CONVERSION.
DEACON BARKER'S CONVERSION.
Of the several pillars of the Church at Pawkin Centre, Deacon Barker was by all odds the strongest. His orthodoxy was the admiration of the entire congregation, and the terror of all the ministers within easy driving distance of the Deacon's native village. He it was who had argued the late pastor of the Pawkin Centre Church into that state of disquietude which had carried him, through a few days of delirious fever, into the Church triumphant; and it was also Deacon Barker whose questions at the examination of seekers for the ex-pastor's shoes had cast such consternation into divinity-schools, far and near, that soon it was very hard to find a candidate for ministerial honors at Pawkin Centre.
Nor was his faith made manifest by words alone. Be the weather what it might, the Deacon was always in his pew, both morning and evening, in time to join in the first hymn, and on every Thursday night, at a quarter past seven in winter, and a quarter before eight in summer, the good Deacon's cane and shoes could be heard coming solemnly down the aisle, bringing to the prayer-meeting the champion of orthodoxy. Nor did the holy air of the prayer-meeting even one single evening fail to vibrate to the voice of the Deacon, as he made, in scriptural language, humble confessions and tearful pleadings before the throne, or—still strictly scriptural in expression—he warned and exhorted the impenitent. The contribution-box always received his sixpence as long as specie payment lasted, and the smallest fractional currency note thereafter; and to each of the regular annual offerings to the missionary cause, the Bible cause, and kindred Christian enterprises, the Deacon regularly contributed his dollar and his prayers.
The Deacon could quote scripture in a manner which put Biblical professors to the blush, and every principle of his creed so bristled with texts, confirmatory, sustentive and aggressive, that doubters were rebuked and free-thinkers were speedily reduced to speechless humility or rage. But the unregenerate, and even some who professed righteousness, declared that more fondly than to any other scriptural passage did the good Deacon cling to the injunction, "Make to yourselves friends of the mammon of unrighteousness." Meekly insisting that he was only a steward of the Lord, he put out his Lord's money that he might receive it again with usury, and so successful had he been that almost all mortgages held on property near Pawkin Centre were in the hands of the good Deacon, and few were the foreclosure sales in which he was not the seller.
The new pastor at Pawkin Centre, like good pastors everywhere, had tortured himself into many a headache over the perplexing question, "How are we to reach the impenitent in our midst!" The said impenitent were, with but few exceptions, industrious, honest, respectable, law-abiding people, and the worthy pastor, as fully impregnated with Yankee-thrift as with piety, shuddered to think of the waste of souls that was constantly threatening. At length, like many another pastor, he called a meeting of the brethren, to prayerfully consider this momentous question. The Deacon came, of course, and so did all the other pillars, and many of them presented their views. Brother Grave thought the final doom of the impenitent should be more forcibly presented; Deacon Struggs had an abiding conviction that it was the Man of Sin holding dominion in their hearts that kept these people away from the means of grace; Deacon Ponder mildly suggested that the object might perhaps be attained if those within the fold maintained a more godly walk and conversation, but he was promptly though covertly rebuked by the good Deacon Barker, who reminded the brethren that "it is theSpiritthat quickeneth"; Brother Flite, who hadn't any money, thought the Church ought to build a "working-man's chapel," but this idea was promptly and vigorously combated by all men of property in the congregation. By this time the usual closing hour had arrived, and after a benediction the faithful dispersed, each with about the ideas he brought to the meeting.
Early next morning the good Deacon Barker, with his mind half full of the state of the unconverted, and half of his unfinished cow-shed, took his stick and hobbled about the village in search of a carpenter to finish the incomplete structure. There was Moggs, but Moggs had been busy all the season, and it would be just like him to want full price for a day's work. Stubb was idle, but Stubb was slow. Augur—Augur used liquor, and the Deacon had long ago firmly resolved that not a cent ofhismoney, if he could help it, should ever go for the accursed stuff. But there was Hay—he hadn't seen him at work for a long time—perhaps he would be anxious enough for work to do it cheaply.
The Deacon knocked at Hay's door, and Hay himself shouted:
"Come in."
"How are ye, George," said the Deacon, looking hastily about the room, and delightfully determining, from the patient face of sad-eyed Mrs. Hay and the scanty furnishing of the yet uncleared breakfast-table, that he had been providentially guided to the right spot. "How's times with ye?"
"Not very good, Deac'n," replied Hay. "Nothin' much doin' in town."
"Money's awful sceerce," groaned the Deacon.
"Dreadful," responded George, devoutly thanking the Lord that he owed the Deacon nothing.
"Got much to do this winter?" asked the Deacon.
"Not by a d—day's job—not a single day," sorrowfully replied Hay.
The Deacon's pious ear had been shocked by the young man's imperfectly concealed profanity, and for an instant he thought of administering a rebuke, but the charms of prospective cheap labor lured the good man from the path of rectitude.
"I'm fixin' my cow-shed—might p'raps give ye a job on't. 'Spose ye'd do it cheap, seein' how dull ev'ry thin' is?"
The sad eyes of Mrs. Hay grew bright in an instant. Her husband's heart jumped up, but he knew to whom he was talking, so he said, as calmly as possible:
"Three dollars is reg'lar pay."
The Deacon immediately straightened up as if to go.
"Too much," said he; "I'd better hire a common lab'rer at a dollar 'n a half, an' boss him myself. It's only a cow-shed, ye know."
"Guess, though, ye won't want the nails druv no less p'ticler, will ye, Deac'n?" inquired Hay. "But I tell yer what I'll do—I'll throw off fifty cents a day."
"Two dollars ort to be enough, George," resumed the Deacon. "Carpenterin's pooty work, an' takes a sight of headpiece sometimes, but there's no intellec' required to work on a cow-shed. Say two dollars, an' come along."
The carpenter thought bitterly of what a little way the usual three dollars went, and of how much would have to be done with what he could get out of the cow-shed, but the idea of losing even that was too horrible to be endured, so he hastily replied:
"Two an' a quarter, an' I'm your man."
"Well," said the Deacon, "it's a powerful price to pay for work on a cow-shed, but I s'pose I mus' stan' it. Hurry up; thar's the mill-whistle blowin' seven."
Hay snatched his tools, kissed a couple of thankful tears, out of his wife's eyes, and was soon busy on the cow-shed, with the Deacon looking on.
"George," said the Deacon suddenly, causing the carpenter to stop his hammer in mid-air, "think it over agen, an' say two dollars."
Hay gave the good Deacon a withering glance, and for a few moments the force of suppressed profanity caused his hammer to bang with unusual vigor, while the owner of the cow-shed rubbed his hands in ecstasy at the industry of hisemploye.
The air was bracing, the Winter sun shone brilliantly, the Deacon's breakfast was digesting fairly, and his mind had not yet freed itself from the influences of the Sabbath. Besides, he had secured a good workman at a low price, and all these influences combined to put the Deacon in a pleasant frame of mind. He rambled through his mind for a text which would piously express his condition, and texts brought back Sunday, and Sunday reminded him of the meeting of the night before. And here was one of those very men before him—a good man in many respects, though hewashigher-priced than he should be. How was the cause of the Master to be prospered if His servants made no effort? Then there came to the Deacon's mind the passage, "—he which converteth the sinner from the error of his way shall save a soul from death, and shall hide a multitude of sins." What particular sins of his own needed hiding the Deacon did not find it convenient to remember just then, but he meekly admitted to himself and the Lord that he had them, in a general way. Then, with that directness and grace which were characteristic of him, the Deacon solemnly said:
"George, what is to be the sinner's doom?"
"I dunno," replied George, his wrath still warm; "'pears to me you've left that bizness till pretty late in life, Deac'n!"
"Don't trifle with sacrid subjec's, George," said the Deacon, still very solemn, and with a suspicion of annoyance in his voice. "The wicked shall be cast into hell, with—"
"They can't kerry their cow-sheds with 'em, neither," interrupted George, consolingly.
"Come, George," said the good Deacon, in an appealing tone, "remember the apostle says, 'Suffer the word of exhortation.'"
"'Xcuse me, Deac'n, but one sufferin' at a time; I ain't through sufferin' at bein' beaten down yet. How about deac'ns not being 'given to filthy lucre?'"
The good Deacon was pained, and he was almost out of patience with the apostle for writing things which came so handy to the lips of the unregenerate. He commenced an industrious search for a text which should completely annihilate the impious carpenter, when that individual interrupted him with:
"Out with it, Deac'n—ye had a meetin' las' night to see what was to be done with the impenitent. I was there—that is, I sot on a stool jest outside the door, an' I heerd all 'twas said. Ye didn't agree on nothin'—mebbe ye'v fixed it up sence. Any how, ye'v sot me down fur one of the impenitent, an' yer goin' fur me. Well—"
"Go on nailin'," interrupted the economical Deacon, a little testily; "the noise don't disturb me; I can hear ye."
"Well, what way am I so much wickeder 'n you be—you an' t'other folks at the meetin'-house?" asked Hay.
"George, I never saw ye in God's house in my life," replied the Deacon.
"Well, s'pose ye hevn't—is God so small He can't be nowheres 'xcept in your little meetin'-house? How about His seein' folks in their closets?"
"George," said the Deacon, "ef yer a prayin' man, why don't ye jine yerself unto the Lord's people?"
"Why? 'Cos the Lord's people, as you call 'em, don't want me. S'pose I was to come to the meetin'-house in these clothes—the only ones I've got—d'ye s'pose any of the Lord's people 'd open a pew-door to me? An' spose my wife an' children, dressed no better 'n I be, but as good 's I can afford, was with me, how d'ye s'pose I'd feel?"
"Pride goeth before a fall, an' a haughty sperit before," groaned the Deacon, when the carpenter again interrupted.
"I'd feel as ef the people of God was a gang of insultin' hypocrites, an' ez ef I didn't ever want to see 'em again. Ef that kind o' pride's sinful, the devil's a saint. Ef there's any thin' wrong about a man's feelin' so about himself and them God give him, God's to blame for it himself; but seein' it's the same feelin' that makes folks keep 'emselves strait in all other matters, I'll keep on thinkin' it's right."
"But the preveleges of the Gospel, George," remonstrated the Deacon.
"Don't you s'pose I know what they're wuth?" continued the carpenter. "Haven't I hung around in front of the meetin'-house Summer nights, when the winders was open, jest to listen to the singin' and what else I could hear? Hezn't my wife ben with me there many a time, and hevn't both of us prayed an' groaned an' cried in our hearts, not only 'cos we couldn't join in it all ourselves, but 'cos we couldn't send the children either, without their learnin' to hate religion 'fore they fairly know'd what 'twas? Haven't I sneaked in to the vestibule Winter nights, an' sot just where I did last night, an' heard what I'd 'a liked my wife and children to hear, an' prayed for the time to come when the self-app'inted elect shouldn't offend the little ones? An' after sittin' there last night, an' comin' home and tellin' my wife how folks was concerned about us, an' our rejoicin' together in the hope that some day our children could hev the chances we're shut out of now, who should come along this mornin' but one of those same holy people, and Jewed me down on pay that the Lord knows is hard enough to live on."
The Deaconhada heart, and he knew the nature of self-respect as well as men generally. His mind ran entirely outside of texts for a few minutes, and then, with a sigh for the probable expense, he remarked:
"Reckon Flite's notion was right, after all—ther' ort to be a workin'-man's chapel."