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THE GOLD BRICK.
BY
MRS. AM S. STEPHENS.
AUTHOR OF "FASHION AND FAMINE," "MARY DERWENT," "THE OLD
HOMESTEAD," "THE REJECTED WIFE," "THE HEIRESS,"
"TUB WIFE'S SECRET," "SILENT STRUGGLES," ETC.
His was the deepest sorrow, for it grew
Oat from his crime, a night-shade of the soul. There, fed on poison — bathed with bitter dew,
She found the evil thing. Her sweet control Unearthed thd root, and softly planted there
A tiny germ, all white and pure as snow, And then with tears, and smiles, and silent prayer.
Through grief and darkness, watched the lone plant ffrow A stately tree, rooted so deep in Love, That its best fruitage must be found above.
T. B. PETERSON AND BROTHERS; 306 CHESTNUT STREET.
Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1866, by MRS. ANN S. STEPHENS,
In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States, in and for the Southern District of New York.
TO MY DEAR FRIEND,
MRS, BENJAMIN F, LOAN
OP ST. JOSEPH, MISSOURI, THIS VOLUME
IS AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED.
ANN S. STEPHENS. NEW YORK, March, 1866.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I. PAflB
THE MASSACRE * 27
CHAPTER II.
THE JEWEL BOX..... 33
CHAPTER III.
THE BURIAL 39
CHAPTER IV.
THE FAITHFUL SLAVE 46
CHAPTER V.
THE SEARCH FOR GOLD , 54
CHAPTER VI.
THE FLOGGING 61
CHAPTER VII.
A REBELLIOUS SPIRIT 67
CHAPTER VIII.
THE BOX OF JEWELS 76
CHAPTER IX.
CHAINED IN THE HOLD 81
CHAPTER X.
THE HOUSE IN THE PINE WOODS 92
CHAPTER XL
KATHARINE ALLEN'S VISIT TO THE WHITE COTTAGE 97
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22 CONTENTS.
CHAPTER XII.
HOME FROM SEA 104
CHAPTER XIII.
THE WAY-SIDE MEETING 110
CHAPTER XIV.
THE OLD HOME AND THE OLD PEOPLE. 116
CHAPTER XV.
BREAKFAST IN THE OLD HOMESTEAD 125
CHAPTER XVI.
A PAINFUL INTERVIEW 135
CHAPTER XVJI.
JEALOUS PANGS REGARDING MRS. MASON 139
CHAPTER XVIII. MRS. MASON'S RICH UNCLE IN THE SOUTH 144
CHAPTER XIX.
MRS. MASON LEAVES THE PINE WOODS 152
CHAPTER XX.
ANOTHER SEPARATION 160
CHAPTER XXI.
THE MINISTER AT BAYS HOLLOW GETS A WIFE 164
CHAPTER XXII. THE MINISTER'S WIFE TAKES PUPILS 171
CHAPTER XXIII.
THE VILLAGE DOCTOR IN A SNOW-STORM 175
CHAPTER XXIV.
THE GRANDMOTHER RELENTING 183
CHAPTER XXV.
A GRAVE IN THE SNOW . 190
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER XXVI. PAG*
A CROWD UNDER THE BUTTERNUT TREE 195
CHAPTER XXYII.
THE SAILOR AND HIS TWO COMPANIONS 201
CHAPTER XXVIII.
OUT OP HER DELIRIUM 207
CHAPTER XXIX.
STRANGERS IN THE VILLAGE 214
CHAPTER XXX.
THE WELCOME LETTER 223
CHAPTER XXXI.
THE RED SCHOOL-HOUSE AT SHRUB OAK 232
CHAPTER XXXII.
A TERRIBLE DISCLOSURE 239
CHAPTER XXXIII.
THE OLD COUPLE ON THEIR SHADOWED HEARTH-STONE.. 244
CHAPTER XXXIV.
THE SNOW FRESHET 248
CHAPTER XXXV.
ALL SORTS OF TREASON 254
CHAPTER XXXVI.
MRS. MASON AT HER STUDIES 265
CHAPTER XXXVII.
SETTLING THE WEDDING DAY 2T2
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
A DOUBLE GUARD 280
CHAPTER XXXIX.
OUT IN THE DEPTHS OF THE NIGHT 284
24 CONTENTS.
CHAPTER XL.
TAKEN IN FROM THE COLD 293
CHAPTER XLL
THE MARRIAGE CERTIFICATE. 298
CHAPTER XLII.
ON THE FIRST STAGE TO PRISON 307
CHAPTER XLIII.
FRIENDS IN COUNCIL. 313
CHAPTER XLIV.
THE SEPARATION 319
CHAPTER XLV.
PAUL FINDS A NEW HOME 326
CHAPTER XLVI.
JUBE FINDS HIS WAY TO BATS HOLLOW 331
CHAPTER XLVII.
A CHILDISH CONSULTATION 336
CHAPTER XLYIII.
PAUL SEES HIS MOTHER'S NECKLACE 341
CHAPTER XLIX.
A PALACE READY FOR ITS MISTRESS 348
CHAPTER L.
COMING HOME OF THE BRIDE , 351
CHAPTER LI.
THE DAY BEFORE TRIAL 355
CHAPTER LIT.
THE STREETS AND THE COURT HOUSE 362
CHAPTER LIII. THE DOCTOR'S EVIDENCE 361
CONTENTS. 25
CHAPTER LIV. **«
THE VERDICT 3t2
+•
CHAPTER LY.
THE TEAIL OP THE SERPENT 3T6
CHAPTER LVI.
LOVE'S GOLDEN HARVEST 382
CHAPTER LVIL
ONE HOUR OP SHAME.. -. 386
CHAPTER LVIII.
THE MOTHER AND SON 390
CHAPTER LIX.
THE EMPTY HOUSE 397
CHAPTER LX.
TOM HUTCHINS' LETTER 400
CHAPTER LXI.
UNSATISFIED VANITY 404
CHAPTER LXIL
ARTFUL FASCINATIONS 409
CHAPTER LXIII.
GATHERING APPLES 41f
CHAPTER LXIV.
MARRIED AGAIN 423
CHAPTER LXV.
THE FANCY BALL 421
CHAPTER LXVI.
STRANGE GUESTS 431
CHAPTER LXVII.
TOGETHER, YET SEPARATED 439
26
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER LXVIII. PAOB
THE TREASURE VAULT 445
CHAPTER LXIX.
BIMSBURY MINES 448
CHAPTER LXX.
THE PRISON ANGEL 455
CHAPTER LXXL
THE SWEATING OVEN 460
CHAPTER LXXII.
UNDER THE APPLE TREE 468
CHAPTER LXXIII.
OUT OP A SCRAPE 474
CHAPTER LXXIV.
THE LONELY HOUSE 481
CHAPTER LXXY. THE MANIAC'S TOILET 486
CHAPTER LXXVI. THE DOCTOR'S RIDE 491
CHAPTER LXXYII. THE CONVICT'S RETURN 498
CHAPTER LXiVIII.
TOM HUTCHINS' QUARREL «... 50o
CHAPTER LXXIX.
THE WEDDING AND THE BAPTISM ..... 508
THE GOLD BRICK.
CHAPTER I.
THE MASSACRE.
A LOW coast, burdened in every foot of its soil with the luxuriant growth of a tropical climate ; a large town, straggling and flat, swarming like a hive of bees with turbulent life. Lights flickering wildly from the win- dows and dancing with a fantastic and red glare up and down the streets. A dull, hollow sound rolling con- stantly out upon the stillness of the waters, broken now and then with sharp shrieks as lightning cleaves the thunder gust.
This was the scene commanded from the deck of a New England brig, lying in the harbor of Port au Prince, on one of those terrible nights in the end of the last century, when the horrible passions that had rioted through France, like wild beasts ravening for blood, fled across seas and fired themselves anew in the hot life of the tropics.
The contrast between the stillness of the harbor, where the starlight fell smilingly, and the waters rippled like kisses around the vessels, and that demon riot on the shore, was awful. To lie so near, with death shrieks
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28 THE MASSACRE.
cutting the air every instant, with murderous yells chasing them, like fiends, was enough to drive men mad. The iron-hearted New England sailors on that deck, grew restive as caged lions, while the tumult swelled louder and louder around them. The young captain turned white as he took short marches up and down the deck. The men drew close together, eyeing each other with fierce glances. A word from the captain would hare sent them headlong into the massacre, in a wild effort to save the women and children, whose shrieks, even from the distance, drove them frantic.
But what could they do ? — a handful of men against thousands on thousands of brutalized blacks, swarming in that doomed city. It was terrible to remain, but mad- ness to go. The captain ground his teeth and clenched his hands in the agony of this restraint. Every cry that reached the ship pierced him like a sword ; every fresh gleam of light quivering across the waters seemed to lure him to the rescue.
"Oh, my God! my God! I cannot bear this!" he cried, as a group of wooden buildings near the shore burst into a volume of fire, and one appalling shriek told that scores on scores of human beings were engulphed in the flames that danced and leaped and shed floods of fiery gold far out on the harbor. " Neither my owners nor my Maker could wish me to stand still now."
Going up to the group of sailors, he called out, "All hands to work, my boys I lower the boats. Such of you as want to help the poor wretches they are murdering yonder, come with me."
"Aye, aye," broke in a smothered shout from the sailors, and each man sprang to his duty — from cabin boy to mate, not a soul lagged behind. Yes, one man,
THEMASSACBE. 29
the first mate, he neither repeated his superior's orders, or moved toward the boats, but stood near the captain, looking quietly unconcerned, with a half smile on his lip.
" You will not go, Thrasher," said the captain. " I am glad of it ; some one must take charge of the ship. Stay on board, and be ready to lend a hand — we may bring back some of those poor creatures."
" And if your men are killed, who will work the ship, Captain Mason ? Remember the craft belongs neither to you nor me."
" They shall not be killed, Thrasher, these brutes have plenty to do without minding us ; besides, I'll keep off shore, and only lie to, ready to haul any poor creature in that takes to the water. They are sure to try, if they think of the ship."
" Well, well, captain, you command here, and know your own business best," answered Thrasher, with that same smile creeping across his lips ; " for my part, I stand by the ship."
" That's right ; I won't risk the men — never fear ! As for the brig, what can harm her ?"
"Nothing, while I'm aboard," answered the mate, turning suddenly townward, where another broad sheet of smoky flame blazed forth. " There," he cried, almost with a shout, " there goes another bonfire. The whole town will be roaring hot at this rate. Ha, look at that flock of women rushing out of the smoke like rats — hot work that — how plainly you can see 'em with their hair in the wind, turning and rushing hither and yon, between fire and water I Ho, ho, the black rascals are after 'em — Lord, how they rim ! — how they fling up their arms toward the ship — scatter on the beach — take to the
30 THEMASSACBE.
water — they're on 'em — the nigger hounds are on 'em tooth and nail. What an infernal yell !"
Even that hard man turned away and covered his face with both hands ; when he looked again it was with wild, heavy eyes.
" Heavens and earth," he muttered, " how still it is in spite of the roaring pit behind. The brutes have done their work, and gone into the smoke again. How softly the waves lick up the dead bodies from the sand and sweep 'em under. But they'll come to daylight again ; perhaps here under our bows, a hundred women — who knows how many — with long hair, weltering up and down like sea-weed after a storm. Faugh ! the dread of it makes one childish. I wonder if they are all gone. What, ho !"
Two persons, the cook and cabin-boy, had been left behind by the boats, much against their will. They, also, had witnessed the fearful scene on the beach, and shuddering with terror, crouched together behind some barrels that stood upon the deck. One of them tried to answer Thrasher's shout, but his voice broke in a hoarse whisper, and he really had neither the strength nor courage to move.
By this time the captain's boat was nearing the shore rapidly. If the scene of revolt had been terrible from the distance, it was crowded with horrors now. The fierce, hot breath of the fire came surging toward the coast like a sirocco. The roar of that infernal massacre, the pleadings and shrieks, the moans and shouts, horri- bly mingling and rising above each other, oppressed the very air. Out of the reeking melee of the town human beings darted like scared birds, and hid among the chap- arral or rushed madly toward the beach.
THE MASSACRE.
31
The captain was brave and humane, but he was honest too, and in the midst of all this gave a thought to the obligations he owed to his command. He would go close to the shore, ready to save those who fled to the water for death or refuge. If it proved possible for the nature within him to resist the temptation to offer more, he would resist ; if not, he was but human, and life was a precious thing to every breathing being ; God would forgive him for saving it, though his owners might not.
As he neared the shore, that portion of the town which lay close to the water was in a bright blaze ; the boat, the wharves, and the foam-fringed waves reddened and glowed under the hot smiles of the fire. Deep into the lurid caves made by the whirl of glowing smoke men and women struggled madly, and tore at each other like wild beasts, smothering their yells beneath the tumultu- ous elements.
From this lurid torrent the people scattered, both pursuers and pursued, out upon the open country. The poor wretches who were to die sought the darkest spots, hiding behind clumps of aloes and cactus hedges, or creeping under torn masses of wild vines, panting with terror and dread, and striving to hold the very breath that threatened to betray them.
Secure of their victims in the end, the triumphant hordes of negroes came huddling forth like demons, hooting, dancing, and rioting in the brazen light their own fiends' work had kindled. A group of palm trees stood close to the shore a little distance from the town, and to that point the insurgents swarmed in hundreds, dragging the pale beings whose death was to be their sport, brutally after them. When they reached the palm trees there was a rush from the crowd, and a score
32 THE MASSACRE.
of dark objects leaped upon the slender stems, strug gling upward, hustling over each other, the lowermost seizing his neighbor by the bare, glistening shoulders and hurling him down to the crowd amid wild shouts and stormy oaths.
At last the palms swayed and bent almost double under the burden of fiends, who dropped off by dozens into the yelling crowd. The beautiful trees, relieved of their weight, swayed back and penciled themselves against the flaming sky, not green and free as they had appeared a moment before ; but with the bark torn from their delicate trunks, and the symmetrical foliage broken and ragged. From the point of each leaf flaunted a gorgeous scarf or tawdry ribbon — red, orange, purple, and flame colored — which fluttered wildly in the hot draughts of wind that swept over them from the burning town.
Out from the crowd, like sharks leaping in the black waves of a tempest, the negro women sprang upward, seizing the ribbons, tearing them away from the leaves, or bending down the stately trees until they took uncouth forms, and seemed tortured like the group of women and children whose death cries rang out from the midst of the fiendish dance. The mingled mirth and horror grew more and more maddening, till the sand all around re- fused to soak in the blood they had shed, and the naked feet of the dancers plashed to their own barbarous war cry, or stumbled over the dead bodies of the slain ; for with every turn of the dance, an axe had fallen, and a soul gone shrieking up to its Maker.
Captain Mason saw all this from his boat, while it was far out in the harbor ; with a cry of horror he seized the oars and worked them till they bent like saplings under
THE JEWEL BOX. 83
his iron handling. But human strength was not equal to human cruelty. While he was yet some fathoms from the shore, the demons under the palm trees, scattered back to the town in search of fresh victims, leaving the dead and the dying to their agonies, with those mocking ribbons waving fantastically in the wind, as if a May dance had just passed beneath them.
Panting and breathless, their hearts burning with in- dignation, the captain and his men rested on their oars ; their work of mercy cut short, for alas ! rage is quicker than charity. They could see the pale, dead faces of the white women and children that had been murdered under the palm trees, with terrible distinctness. Their rich garments and delicate features, bespoke them of the higher classes, but there they lay, like soldiers heaped on a battle-field, with nothing but the stars of heaven to pity them — the pure stars that seemed affrighted by the tumult, and grew pallid in the smoke.
CHAPTER II.
THE JEWEL BOX.
As the captain sat with his face toward the palm trees, he saw a woman rise up from among the dead, and turn first toward the town, then seaward, in a wild despairing search for help.
The captain stood up in his boat and shouted aloud, while all hands pulled for the shore.
She heard him, reeled back against the stem of the 2
34 THE JEWEL BOX.
nearest palm tree, and clung to it, waving her hand to- ward the boat. But as they looked, a young boy was standing at her side, grasping her garments with his hand, while his face was turned toward the boat. He seemed urging her to flee. Twice her arm was unwound from the palm, and a step tried, but she fell back again, as if severely hurt or frightened out of her strength. The boy still pleaded. They could see it in his gestures, in the eager hand that motioned toward the shore, which the boat almost touched.
He pointed this out ; he pulled frantically at her gar- ments ; he fell upon his knees, lifting his clasped hands toward her imploringly.
Something gave her desperate strength. She left the palm, staggered, and sprang forward, more than keeping pace with the boy, who, clinging to her hand, rushed on with his great, wild eyes, uplifted to her face.
The captain sprang on shore, and met them on the verge of the surf. The woman reeled toward him blindly, with both hands outstretched, and fell into his arms headlong, as she must have fallen on the sand but for his presence.
He gathered her to his broad bosom, and wading through the surf, waist deep, laid her in the boat, upon & pile of jackets that his men hurriedly took off their persons, and cast at his feet.
She was coldly pale, and did not seem to breathe. But the captain had no time to remark this or any thing else. A group of negroes who had been pursuing their death work among the cactus hedges, saw the boy and turned upon him.
The lad saw them, and with a desperate bound, leaped into the surf — struggled, lost his foothold, and was in
THEJEWELBOX. 35
the very sweep of the undertow, when the captain snatched him away. The savages hurled their sharp missiles after him, which the water swallowed instantly. So, as they were without firearms, the boy was saved, while his pursuers raged and hooted on the shore.
When the boy saw his mother lying so pale and still in the boat, he struggled from the captain's arms, and kneeling by her side, pressed the beautiful face — for it was beautiful — between his little trembling hands, while in the purest and most pathetic French he besought her to look up. He told her that they were safe now — away on the sea, where nothing could hurt them. He en- treated her to wake up, only for one minute, just long enough to kiss him, and then she might go to sleep again for ever so long.
The touching anguish in the boy's voice would have called any mother back to life. She opened her eyes ; a look of divine tenderness came softly to her face, and died in a smile upon her lips, as the boy bent down with a gush of tearful gladness and kissed her.
" There," he said, touching her raven hair with infi- nite tenderness, " go to sleep now. Paul will sit by and watch."
She seemed to understand him, for a serene smile beamed on her face, and softly as white rose-leaves fall, the-licls drooped over her eyes.
The child was satisfied, and looking up at the cap- tain, said — " Yes, yes, she will have a sweet, long sleep. We will not wake her — I promised, you know. If I forget, and begin to kiss her, don't let me, please, sir, for she always wakes, and smiles, when I do that. How softly the boat rocks ! Oh, it will make her well."
The captain turned away his face, for he knew how long that sleep would be.
36 THE JEWEL BOX.
Slowly and sadly they rowed toward the ship. Fire and massacre raged behind them, but there was safety and solemn stillness on the waters. The boy clung to his mother's garments, and drooped his head wearily. The motion of the boat — the soft stars, smiling down, and scattering their broken images on the waves — affected him peacefully. He longed to fall asleep with his mother ; but somehow the idea that she needed his care, kept the lids from sinking entirely over those beautiful eyes.
At last the boat drew close to the sides of the brig. The captain attempted to take the boy in his arms and carry him on board. But the little fellow struggled manfully, and insisted that his mother should be carried up first. Captain Mason, with his imperfect knowledge of French, understood this, for the child's face was more eloquent than words ; but the men only compre- hended his gestures, and interposed their superstitions against his generous wishes.
" No," they protested, with sullen determination, "the woman is dead — what have we to do with a corpse on board the brig ? Ain't the signs agin her bad enough, without that one ? Hoist the youngster aboard, captain, and let us row the boat over to White's Island, and bury the poor critter there !"
The child turned upon the sailors and searched their faces eagerly, as if he guessed that they were planning something against him. The men dropped their gloomy eyes beneath his glances, but were not the less resolved.
Captain Mason knew the superstition of his men too well for any idea of opposing it while his ship lay in that dangerous neighborhood. He cast one pitying look on the beautiful young woman who lay at his feet, in her
THEJEWELBOX. 37
calm, eternal slumber, then tenderly addressed the boy: "Your mother is asleep, let her stay here," he said, in very confused French. But the attention of the boy was keenly directed ; he understood clearly, and sat down, folding his little arms with a pleading smile.
" Me too ?" he said.
" No, my child, you shall go on deck and wait while the boat rocks here. All shall go, and leave your mother to sleep alone."
" Is it best ?" inquired the boy ; " will she sleep longer if we go ?"
" Yes, poor orphan, her sleep will be long enough," cried the captain, all his generous sympathy bursting forth in English.
"What!" said the boy, gently, "will her sleep be sweeter — did you say that ? Lift me up, I will go. Let one of those big men put me on his shoulder. I shan't be afraid. My father is — oh, how brave! — so am I." The captain lifted the little fellow in his arms, and held him against as good and true a heart as ever beat in man's bosom — a heart pained with many compunctions by the humane deception he was compelled to practice. The men made the boat fast, and came up the side of the brig, leaving it rocking softly on the water.
" Wait till he is asleep," the captain said, as they stood in a group, anxious for orders. " Then we will take her to the island."
The men retired, somewhat dissatisfied at any delay, but made no further protest.
" Let me sit here, please, where I can look over and see her face as she sleeps," said the gentle child, in a sweet, pleading way, that went to that captain's heart ; "besides, I want to watch for papa. When the negroes
'38 THEJEWELBOX.
dragged us away, mamma and I — he followed after a little while, and when I looked back and he was lying on the ground, tired with running, I suppose ; but he'll come, so if you don't mind, monsieur, I'll just wait here."
The boy had clambered up to a cask that stood near the side of the vessel, as he spoke, and folding his arms on the bulwarks, looked down with touching watchful- ness upon the face of his mother, which lay, white as marble, in the starlight.
How beautiful, and how patient was that childlike watch. Sometimes the boy would lift his eyes with a troubled look, and turn them toward the town, which, still glaring and riotous, kept up its atrocious noises. Then he would search the harbor for some boat, and finding none, sink to his patient watch again, murmur- ing, " Oh, but he will come, when it is daylight — when it is daylight."
At last the struggles of nature were too strong for a child so delicately nurtured, and with his little arms folded on the bulwark he dropped into a profound sleep. But it was almost break of day before he became thus unconscious, and the captain had no time to spare. Taking the little fellow once more in his arms he laid him on his own bed, and going instantly on deck, sum- moned his men. With eager alacrity they descended to the boat. The captain followed with a large cloak over his arm, with which he reverently covered the dead. One man brought a pickaxe and spade, which he had taken from the cargo, and sat them in the stern of the boat ; now that all danger of a dead person being carried aboard was over, they went quietly and seriously to their duties. As they gave the boat to her oars
THE BURIAL. 39
every arm fell softly to its work, it seemed as if they feared that a single splash of water would be followed by wails of pain from the poor child whose mother was floating away into eternity while he dreamed.
Across the waters and through the gray gleams of early dawn the boat cut its way to White's Island — which as yet was calm and peaceful. In a jungle of roses, where lofty cedars sheltered the beautiful coffee trees, the sailors dug a grave, leaving the murdered woman in the boat till their work was done. The cap- tain, saddened by this individual instance of wrong, sat down upon the bank watching the boat, while his men completed their task. Once or twice he heard a move- ment in the chaparral, as if some wild animal were dis- turbed by his presence, but he took no heed, and at last his men came back.
CHAPTER III.
THE BURIAL.
CAPTAIN MASON would not leave that delicate crea- ture to his men, but folding his cloak carefully around her, supported her head as she was lifted from the boat. Under the bending trees and through the fragrant shrubs they carried her, with hushed voices and cautioiis steps; for wrapped in the stillness of the morning there was something awful in that hastily prepared burial which penetrated to the hearts of those New England sailors as no ceremony could have done. But the vines,
40 T-H E BURIAL.
that fell in garlands from the trees, and the flowering branches which they were compelled to sweep aside, made the passage difficult. Once a patriarch aloe, which had shot up its great spikes of yellow blossoms for the first time in that year of blood, caught an ornament of the cloak on one of its sharp leaves and tore it from the dead, leaving the beautiful face and the long, sweep- ing hair exposed.
That instant there arose a fierce, rustling sound in the chaparral, followed by a cr}^ that made the sailors pause in their holy work. The captain, pained by this sudden exposure of the dead, stooped, and with one hand strove to gather up the cloak which was now drawn entirely away, and trailed like a pall along the path they had taken. But at that instant a powerful ne- gro tore a passage through the chaparraV, and throwing himself on the ground, seized upon the garments of the dead lady, and broke into a passion of grief so wild and poignant that the sailors looked at each other awe- stricken.
" Is she dead — is she dead ?" cried the negro, in wild, broken French, which the captain could hardly under- stand. "My mistress — my beautiful — beautiful mis- tress. They have killed her — why did she send Jube away ? — where is the little master ? — where is monsieur ? All dead, all murdered, burned, trampled in the ashes."
" Did you know this lady ?" said the captain, in his broken French. " Did you know her ?"
The man looked up ; tears rained down his face, and he sobbed out an incoherent answer amid plaintive moans over his mistress, for such evidently the lady had been.
" Me know her — me that swung her first hammock on
THE BURIAL. 41
the mangoe trees — me ! ah, strange master, tell me, is she dead ? gone forever and ever ? no more smiles, no more sweet words for Jube when he brings her fruit."
" Get up, poor fellow, get up, and let us pass," said the captain, in a kindly voice. " She is dead, and it is dangerous to wait."
The man drew back, but still kept on his knees. "And the master," he said piteously.
"I can tell you nothing cf him," said the captain; "but the boy, the little one, is safe in my ship yonder."
The negro sprang to his feet, searched for the ship with eager glances, and began to clasp and wring his hands in alternate paroxysms of grief and joy.
" The little master ! The poor, poor mistress !" he kept exclaiming.
" Come, let us pass," said the captain, a little im- patiently, for the morning had dawned, and rays of soft, rosy light flushed the sky, and fell trembling on the water. " Let us pass, we are not safe a minute here."
The negro stood aside, shaking with grief, and when the funereal group had passed him half a dozen paces, he followed it with his head bowed down, and his clasped hands falling heavily before him. Thus he stood till the body was placed in its shallow grave, but when the first shovelful of earth was lifted, he came forward with both hands extended imploringly, and pushed the spade back. An orange tree stood near, on which the yellow fruit and white blossoms hung clustering together among the fragrant leaves ; the negro went to this tree, seized one of the most richly laden boughs, and tore the blossoming branches away with both hands. Then he gathered them eagerly up, carried them to the grave, and over the body of his mistress he scattered the
42 THEBURIAL.
flowers till the turf all around was flooded with fra- grance, like an altar at some holy festival.
When this was done the poor fellow drew back, and covering his face with his hands, stood trembling in all his limbs till the sailors had done their work, and dragged some shrubs and vines over the earth under which his murdered lady — more fortunate than thousands massa- cred that fatal night — had found a death shelter.
The sailors moved away from the grave they had made, but the negro did not look up, and they started for the boat, leaving him behind. Then the stillness aroused him, and as the party neared the shore, he fol- lowed with a look of painful entreaty in his face, beg- ging to go with them to the ship.
The captain made a prompt motion for him to come on ; but gesticulating energetically for them to wait, he ran back to the spot where they had first seen him, stooping downward, he began to tear up the earth with both hands, flinging the leaves and sods on one side in wild haste, only pausing to entreat their patience, with a pitiful glance of the eyes. At last he dropped on his knees, lifted something from the hole he had dug, and came forward with the moist soil dropping from his hands, which were clutched tightly around a bronze box. He followed the men into the boat, and sat down hugging the box to his bosom, and muttering to him- self in hurried, eager words, which no one present understcod
When they reached the ship the negro climbed up the sides like a cat. Once on the deck, he ran back and forth, searching every corner. Then, with a de- spairing cry, he sprang upon the bulwarks, lifted the box over his head, and poised himself for a plunge.
THEBURIAL. 43
The captain saw this desperate attempt, threw both arms around the negro, and dragged him back upon the deck.
The poor fellow scrambled to his knees, and looking up with pitiful abjectness, said :
" He is not here — the young master is not here ; you said he was."
" Get up and come this way, my poor fellow !" said the captain, touched by the humble pathos of his disap- pointment.
The negro sprang up and seized the box, which had fallen with a crash on the deck.
" I come, master, I come."
" Hush 1" said the kind-hearted sailor, pointing to his berth as they entered the cabin. " Hush ! and tell me if that is your young master."
The negro drew in his breath with a sob, and scarcely seemed to respire after that. He crept close up to the berth, and looked down upon the boy with a glow in his black face that it is impossible to describe, for every ugly feature quivered with tenderness, while his eyee filled with light, like those of a Newfoundland dog when he has done brave work for his master.
" What will you do with us, strange master ?" he said at last, addressing the captain in a humble whisper. " Not send us back yonder ?"
He made a motion toward the town with his hand, and a slow horror crept over his face.
" No, my poor fellow, I will take the child to my own thrice-blessed land, if there is no one left to claim him."
"And Jube — let him go too. If the strange master wants a slave, Jube is strong, like a lion, and honest as a dog."
44 THBBURIAL.
"Poor fellow!"
" See if Jube is not honest," he added, pressing the bronze box between his hands, and forcing some secret spring to recoil. " They told Jube to keep them, and he did. The master went back after mis — went after them. Jube wanted to go with him, but the master said, ' No, stay on the island, and guard that ;' so Jube staid, waiting — waiting — waiting for master to come with mis- tress and the little boy. He never come — never — never will come again. The mistress sleeps I but where shall Jube go to find him, and give back the box ?"
" My poor fellow, I fear your master is dead, from some words I gathered from the boy ; I am almost sure of it."
" You will take the little boy and Jube away ?" said the negro, anxiously, still holding the box half-shut be- tween his hands.
" If no one comes to claim him or you, I will."
The lid of the box flew open, and a ray of sunshine from the cabin window flashed upon the jewels with which it was filled — diamond necklaces, bracelets flaming wil« rubies and emeralds, ropes of oriental pearls, and armlets flashing like rainbows, broke the sunshine into sparkles of fire.
Mason looked wonderingly on the eager face of the negro.
"And this treasure — did it belong to your master?" he questioned. " Was it to guard this, you hid in the chaparral at White Island?"
"All his ; more, more, much more in the great house out there ; but heavy gold — too heavy — we had to leave it and go back. He went — wouldn't take Jube — master went, but never he comes to see if Jube is faithful !"
THEBUBIAL. 45
"And all this belongs to the little fellow yonder. God help him!"
" You take little boy — take the box, and take Jube ; he gives you all 1"
Jube closed the box, dropped on both knees, and held it up.
Captain Mason hesitated, looked at the sleeping child and its strange guardian, shrinking from the trust which chance had imposed upon him. But he felt that a sacred duty was placed before him, from which no honest man should wish to retreat.
He took the box, but as his hands touched the metal a cold chill crept to his heart, and a mist floated before his eyes — an unstable, reddish mist, such as floods a room when the light is filtered through crimson drapery.
Perhaps the red curtain had fluttered before the cabin window ; but if so, he felt the startling effect without knowing its cause, and the box shook in his hands, till the jewels within gave forth a faint sound.
" You will take us," pleaded the negro, frightened by the change in Captain Mason's countenance.
"Yes," answered the brave man, casting off the feel- ing that had seized upon him ; " I accept the trust ; God has placed it in my hands. As I discharge it, may he prove merciful to me and mine."
The captain spoke to himself, and from the feelings that filled his heart, rather than in reply to the negro ; but the expression of his face was full of grand resolve, which the slave could read better than language. So he looked on with a glow of satisfaction while the box was packed up among the most valuable property the cap- tain possessed.
46 THE FAITHFUL SLAVE.
All this time the cabin door had been ajar, and but for the excitement consequent to the scene, Captain Mason might have heard cautious steps creeping down the stairs, and the suppressed breathing of a man who skulked on the lowest steps, with his greedy eyes fixed on the jewels, as they flashed that one minute in the negro's hands. The listener waited until he saw the treasure put safely away, and heard the captain's promise. Then he went up the steps, two at a time, with soft, cautious leaps, like those of a fox, and when the captain came on deck, his mate was busy superintending the boat, as it was hauled to its fastenings.
CHAPTER IV.
THE FAITHFUL SLAVE.
IN France, the awful strife of the Revolution had sprung out of oppressions heaped by one class upon another, from century to century, until the people be- gan to comprehend the powers that lay in mere physi- cal strength, and hurled themselves in a phrensy of hate on their oppressors. But even Paris, whose awful ex- ample had run like wildfire all over France and its de- pendencies, plunged into its carnival of blood with far less ferocity than marked this outbreak of Negroes in St. Domingo. In Paris, it was an upheaving of classes, marked and established by men of kindred blood, and born to the same soil. A struggle of men clamorous for their birthright of freedom, which they were deter- mined to wrest from the strong hand of power.
THE FAITHFUL SLAVE. 47
Ages of oppression could not be hurled off thus sud- denly, without horrible carnage. But there, it was the people against a government — white men struggling against white men. In a mighty effort to upheave the foundations of despotism, the people grew mad. In their ardor for liberty, and in the ignorance of her very visage, they trampled her in the dust, setting up red handed murder in her place, dealing death on every hand, as they hurled themselves with mighty force on their op- pressors and trampled upon them with that ferocious hate continual wrongs will ever engender. But in the hot tropics, this struggle became a war of races, the most fierce, terrible, and relentless that humanity has yet known. It became a war of blacks against whites. Slaves against their masters. Where hate and ignorance hurled their massive strength against luxurious refine- ment. The brightest features of this horrible struggle were, the murders that gave Paris so many blood red pages in history, pages that all her after greatness and glory will never have power to wash white.
The massacre of St. Domingo was one of intense hate. The black slave, brutalized by the chains he wore, stood on every hearthstone ready for revenge on his white master. That which followed was not merely a massacre but a hurried carnival of ruin, a riot of awful passions, of atrocities for which there is no language, and from which the imagination revolts with sickening inability of comprehension.
Of all the horrors perpetrated in the French Revolu- tion, which was one great horror in itself, that of St. Domingo was the most brutal the most demoniac. And such a war of races — a war between white men and negroes must ever be. With the despotism of long
48 THE FAITHFUL SLAVE.
established power, luxurious ease, and pampered intel- ligence, opposed to the hot blood of Africa, scarcely subdued from its first savage state, fired by the memory of slave ships, chains, starvation, barter, and above all, the wild freedom which preceded these wrongs, who can wonder at the scenes which made that lovely island a purgatory of crime.
But these scenes no human being can ever describe. It would require a pen of adamant and the heart of a fiend to depict a single act of that fearful outbreak.
All the night, and deep into the sweet rosiness of the morning the terrible strife raged on in that doomed city. But in the broad day these black savages began to retreat from their ghastly orgies, and, for a time, the delirium of murder waned from its climax. The thirst for rapine slackened to a degree, and the monsters who had found this ferocious pastime full of intoxication, grew sluggish like wild beasts satiated with blood.
Some of these wretches lay down in the public streets, and fell asleep in the hot sun ; others huddled together in torpid masses and sunk into stupor, dreaming of coming nights, which should give them a new riot of blood and fire. Stumbling over these, fierce crowds of untired demons kept on their work, stabbing right and left in brutal wantonness, for a lack of victims, and sick- ening the air with boasts of hideous acts performed in the night, and which another night should witness. Never on this earth had a scene more revolting presented itself to the beautiful sunshine.
But human nature is not all vile, and even among those ignorant, ill-used blacks, germs of compassion, tenderness, and good faith are found, redeeming, in a degree, the harrowing cruelties of the many. Among
THE FAITHFUL SLAVE. 49
these good men — good in spite of ignorance and wrong endured — was the black man Jube. If ever faithful- ness, natural feeling, and a simple sense of honor, dwelt in a human being, these feelings throve in the broad, cloudy bosom of the slave, and many another household servant became a household saviour in that cruel time.
While his little master was wrapped in the deep slum- ber which follows exhaustion, the negro had besought per- mission to go on shore and search for his master. Cap- tain Mason, in his generous pity of the poor fellow, sent the boat back to the place it had reached the night be- fore, to lie in wait for the negro while he searched around the palm trees and the neighboring chaparral for some traces of the noble master who had won his whole savage heart by great kindness.
The men who waited in the boat saw him wandering along the shore in a dejected attitude, for a long time. At last he came near a great spreading aloe, whose broad under leaves were half buried in the sand. Those who watched, heard a low, wailing cry, and saw the negro fall upon his knees, and rock to and fro in an agony of grief over some object concealed behind the aloe.
" He's found something that's cut him down like grape shot," said one of the sailors, flinging a quid of tobacco, which he had just cut for himself, back into his box, and closing it softly.
" Such a scream as that is enough to take a man off his tobacco for a month," answered another tar, taking off his tarpaulin, and wiping his bald head with the sleeve of his jacket.
" Supposen we pull in and see what it is ?" said Rice.
" No ; the captain told us not to go ashore. Some of 3
50 THE FAITHFUL SLAVE.
them tarual niggers 'ed get hold of the boat, spite of us," answered the old tar.
" But we'll row up into shallow water, and one of us can go see what's the matter, and the rest 'ell take cai-e of the cutter. Every thing seems to be still along there, not a nigger in sight," answered Rice, who commanded the boat.
The boat was urged into water so shallow that one of the sailors rolled up his duck trousers and stepped in, wading easily ashore. With a long, rolling step he swung himself forward up the beach, and soon found Jube on his knees by the body of a dead man, who lay in the gaunt shadow of the aloe, pierced through the heart, with a spear broken short in the wound.
Jube looked up, his black face wet with tears, his great hands clasped and pressed downward in the sand.
" It is him. Me has found the master," he said in broken English. " Cold ! cold ! oh, so dead !"
The sailor looked down into the calm, aristocratic face of the dead patrician — for such the man evidently was — no marble could ever have been more finely cut, or coldly pale than those features. But for the masses of glossy hair and the black eyes, that remained partly open, the idea of some perfect specimen of sculpture would have been complete.
Jube unclasped his great hands, and with a reveren- tial touch attempted to close the eyes.
" It's of no sorts of use," said the sailor, " you poor heathen nigger you. It ain't possible to shut them eyes now ; they'll stay wide awake till the judgment day. All we can do is to dig a trench here, close by this thing with the notched leaves, and lay him in. Come, bear a hand, and I'll help you, if you are black ; this
THE FAITHFUL SLAVE. 51
ain't no time to be perticular, besides I've kinder took a notion to you, anyhow."
Jube did not comprehend many of the words, but he understood the gestures, and went to work, raining great tears on the sand as he scraped it up.
The sailor fell to, and worked vigorously, comforting the negro, in his rough way, all the time. At last a trench of some depth was dug, and the sailor bade Jube help him lift the body into its poor resting-place. Then Jube began to sob, and tremble through all his massive frame, but he obeyed meekly. The garments upon the body were rich and of value. That sailor only got ten dollars a month for his hard labor, but he never thought of taking a fragment of those rich clothes, nor attempted to examine the pockets, though a clink of gold, as they lifted the body, told him that what might have been wealth to him was there. As for Jube, poor fellow, he scarcely knew what money meant, and if he had, would have guarded that about his master's person with his life.
So they lifted that proud and noble man from the red sand where he had been murdered, and laid him in the best grave they had the power to make. Jube tore away one of the great aloe leaves, and laid it over the •white face, moaning like a wounded creature, as he shut it out from his own sight ; but he shook so violently, that the sailor, with rough kindness, bade him go away, while he filled in the grave, and evened the sand. So • Jube sat down in the shade of the aloe, and covering his face with his hands, sat still waiting.
When that boat neared the vessel, Jube saw his young master leaning over the bulwarks, and watching it with. v longing impatience.
52 THE FAITHFUL SLAVE.
" Jube, oh, Jube ! why did they not come ? I thought they would both be with you!" he cried, in a voice of keen disappointment. " Come up, come vip, and tell me ; the time has seemed so long."
Jube climbed up the rope ladder very slowly, with his black face bent toward the water. At last he stood on the deck, his heavy shoulders drooping, his eyes cast down, and his great bare feet trembling on the boards they pressed.
" Jube, Jube ! tell me where they are ? Why did mamma go away, and not call me ? It wasn't kind, Jube."
" Mistress always kind, very kind, little master," stam- mered Jube, trying hard to control the tremulous motion that contracted his heavy lips.
"But where ? Is she with papa ?"
" Yes, little master. She — she is with papa, sure."
"Jube, did they both go home and leave me ?" ques- tioned the child, with tears in his eyes. " Did they, Jube ?"
"No, little master, they didn't do that; how could they ?"
" Well, then, where are they ?"
" Not in the old home, be sure, not there ; bad slaves, bad negro there."
" But are they safe ?"
"Yes; safe."
" On shore ?"
"Yes, little master, safe on the shore."
" But when will they come after us, Jube ? I do so want to see them. Mamma was so tired she couldn't say good-night, and papa — I feel very, very unhappy about papa ; he never left me so long before."
THE FAITHFUL SLAVE. 53
"But he couldn't help it, little master; sure he couldn't."
" I know that. Of course he couldn't ; but, oh ! when will he come ? Jube, Jube, my heart aches so !"
" Jube's heart aches, too."
" Does it, Jube, like mine — heavy, heavy ; and when I ask you about them, it aches worse ? Dear old Jube, I won't do it. You shall see how bravely I can wait."
The child took one of Jube's hard hands in his, as he spoke, and led the negro away.
"Why, how you shake, Jube! What for? I never felt you shake so before !" he said, laying his other deli- cate hand caressingly over that of the black man's.
" Jube helped row the boat, little master, and it is hard work."
" But you are so strong, Jube ; strong as a lion, and as brave ; papa said so."
" Did he say that, little master ; did he ?"
" There, you are shaking again ! Sit down, Jube. Don't be afraid ; I won't ask any thing. There, lean your head against the mast ; I will watch for them while you rest."
"No, don't watch. They won't come yet — not yet."
"Not before night, perhaps."
Jube closed his eyes heavily, and groaned.
It was mournful — the sight of that strange child, sit- ting upon Jube's knee and watching the shore with a trusting, earnest hope that his father and mother would seek him over the water where she had fallen asleep and floated away, but would be sure to come back when papa was found. The child said this a hundred times, as he patted the hard palm of the slave with his little hand, while Jube answered bravely, each time, "Oh, yes,
64: THE SEARCH FOE GOLD.
Master Paul, sometime they shall see us again. That's what the captain was saying to me just now. I hope it's true, little master; for your sake I hope he knows."
When he had done speaking, Jube would turn his head quite away, and shake the tears from his eyes, while the boy fell to his patient watch again.
CHAPTER V.
THE SEARCH FOR GOLD.
PAUL saw that questions wounded his black friend, and fell into silence, thinking of his parents with mourn- ful yearning, but not mentioning them again.
It was a long, dreary day ; but the sunset came at last, flooding the harbor with crimson, which made the water look ensanguined like the land. One by one the lights of the town began to flame out again, and hoarse sounds mingled with the surf of the tide. Now the boy became restless, and his eyes began to gleam impatiently.
" Jube, dear Jube, let us go ashore with a big boat, and bring them away! don't you hear the noise — don't you see how the fire flashes. They'll be hurt, Jube, and we shan't be there to help them."
Thrasher, the mate, was passing as the boy said this ; he paused, and patted the little fellow's head.
" Who is it you want to help, my little man ?" he said.
The child shrunk against his black guardian, and
THE SEARCH FOR GOLD. 55
looked up with such gentle earnestness that Thrasher's eyes fell under the glance.
" We want to go after them, monsieur. My papa and mamma ; she couldn't wait for me, because papa wanted her, and so rowed away after him. But she sent dear old Jube to stay with me, didn't she Jube ?"
He lifted both hands, and pressed the palms lovingly against the black cheeks of the slave, with a childish- ness which was the more touching because of its mournful trust.
" So you think your mother has gone back to the shore again?" said Thrasher, whose attention to this child was singular, for he was in no way a man of fine sensibilities, and had received the boy, and, afterward, the slave, rather grudgingly.
" Yes," answered Paul ; " after papa lay down to rest, you know, mamma wanted to go back there, and strug- gled, and cried ; but they wouldn't let her. You might know she'd be off the minute she woke up and found the captain had left her with a boat all to herself; but she's a long time. Don't you think it's a long time. I'm so tired of waiting."
"And who was your mamma, my little man ?"
"My mamma! she was a beautiful lady, oh! so beau- tiful ! I know that's true, because papa told her so every day, when she put the red roses in her hair that Jube brought. You remember, Jube ?"
"Yes, little master, I remember; but turn your eyes away, I can't bear 'em just now."
" And where did your father live ?" persisted the mate, feeling his way adroitly, as a pointer scents his game.
The child pointed toward the town.
" In a luroe house ?" said Thrasher.
56 THE SEARCH FOR GOLD.
" The biggest house on the island," answered Jube, true to the instincts of his class.
"And they drove }-our master away like the rest ?"
" Like the meanest of them all. It was his own slaves began. They knew of his gold, and that he wanted to send it off to some other country."
" He was rich, then ?"
" Rich — no man like him in all Domingo ! It was a great family — six brothers ; they all gathered up their gold and brought it to my master's, ready to be put on board some ship — this one it may be. I had care of the gold, but the boxes were heavy, and the other slaves guessed what was in them, and told about it. But they did not know where it was hid, for my master and his brothers only went with me to the cellar. It was a heavy lift for gentlemen like them, but we got it all into the vault, and heaped stones and rubbish against the door. They meant to move it that very night. A boat was ready to carry it to White's Island. The day before, masters and I went there, and dug a pit to bury it in."
"And did you take it there ?" asked the mate, with suppressed eagerness.
" JSo, surety — no !" answered the slave, with a sudden gleam of caution. " The patriots fell upon us — they began to burn and kill without warning. My master sent me to the boat, and told me to wait till he came with the mistress ; but they fired the wharves, which made the water one blaze of light ; and I could not come near the shore, try as I would. So at last I went to the island, and waited ; but instead of my master — oh know what came there I"
" But the gold — did any one find the gold ?"
" How do I know ?"
THE SEARCH FOB GOLD. 57
"And the house — was it burned ?"
" No ; little master says they were dancing, and shout- ing, and drinking wine from the cellars when the family was driven out."
"And your master, where is he — his brothers, what became of them ?" questioned the mate, so excited that his voice grew hoarse.
" Hush," said Jube, glancing at the boy.
"All ?" whispered Thrasher.
"All, master."
" Where did you say the house stood ?"
" Yonder, on the edge of the town ; you can see its white walls in the sunset behind the mango trees."
"What, that house ? I know it, I have passed its gar- dens a hundred times."
" Oh, I shall never pass them again," said Jube, with tears in his eyes.
" Oh yes ; papa will come after us, don't say that, Jube," whispered the boy.
The mate, who had taken so much interest in them both, now turned abruptly away, and began to pace the deck, with the quick, heavy tread of a man who thinks excitedly. At last he paused, stood looking over the bulwarks awhile, and then went below.
The captain was in his cabin when the mate entered rather abruptly.
" Captain Mason," he said, "you had the luck to do some good on shore last night, what if I take a turn with three or four of the men ? The black rascals will be at their work again, no doubt
The captain looked up surprised. It was the first in- stance of humanity he had ever known in his mate.
58 THE SEARCH FOR GOLD.
" Go by all means," he said ; " pick your men and God speed you !"
Thrasher did not start so promptly as his eagerness seemed to promise. He was a long time lowering the boat, and paused more than once to cross-question the slave and the little boy, always managing to gain some fresh knowledge with every innocent answer he re- ceived.
At last, after the night had set fairly in, he descended to the boat, followed by four stout men, selected from the crew. The boy watched his movements with anxious e}res, and Jube seemed troubled as the boat glided off into the twilight.
They reached the shore, Thrasher and his crew, with- out molestation ; a broken attempt at riot had been made early in the evening, but the blacks were besotted with a carousal of blood which had now lasted forty- eight hours, and fell into sluggish inactivity ; so the band of sailors, always popular men with the blacks, made their way safely enough up to the walls of the white villa, which Jube had pointed out from the ship. It was a vast pile, built low on the ground, but covering a spacious area, and enclosing a court, overrun with flowers, that filled the air with fragrance, trampled and torn as they had been.
It was one vast scene of desolation. The broad gates were flung open, the trees that overhung them were broken, and their branches trailed on the ground ; while a host of rude feet had trampled the luscious fruit upon the pavement of the court. Among the roses, and pas- sion-flowers, and cape-jessamines that trailed along the court, a fountain flung up jets of pure water ; but its basin of white marble was clouded with broad crimson
THE SEARCH FOR GOLD. 59
stains, that all the crystal springs on earth would never wash out. Over the arched entrances that led to the separate apartments of the house, lamps of colored glass were swinging exactly as they had been lighted when the family were surprised by the murderers, flee- ing from them only to meet a more terrible fate outside the walls. No one had cared to put the lamps out, so they burned on through the daytime, and into this second gloomy night.
The mate and his men stood a moment in the court, not to breathe its delicious atmosphere, but to take their bearings, as he said, with unseemly spirit. Lights burned in a few of the windows, and he saw by the gossamer draperies, and silken gleam within — for the latter shone richly through a lattice-work of flowers which filled the verandas — that he was near that wing of the vast building usually occupied by the family, now utterly dispersed, save one little child and a single slave.
" From these rooms there should be some passage leading to the cellars," reasoned the mate, as he mounted a flight of marble stairs that led to the first gallery, and was followed by his men, whose heavy footsteps broke the bell-like fall of the fountain with their coarse noise.
The work of desolation was complete in those vast saloons. The broad silken divans were trampled over by the tracks of naked feet, left on the delicate fabric in long trails of soot. Chandeliers of frosted silver, and lamps of delicate alabaster, were torn down and overturned, with their wax candles, broken and trampled upon the floor, and perfumed oil dripping along the pure marble. Many of the lace window-curtains were
60 THE SEARCH FOR GOLD.
torn to shreds ; others were gathered up and twisted in soiled wisps over the cornices ; some still floated in gossamer softness over the windows, through which orange branches, heavy with bloom and golden with fruit, looked in, rustling to the night wind with sweet, lulling sounds.
The men passed through these saloons, trampling many a precious thing under their feet, which a delicate feminine taste had gathered to beautify the dwelling. They rushed through the broad saloons, and into the more private apartments — apartments in themselves so pure and spotless, that the insurgents had turned from them, as fiends might be supposed to shrink away from the resting-place of angels. The couches were un- touched, and white as snow; flowers stood, but half withered, on the marble consoles ; a few ornaments, dropped on the floor, bespoke some haste, but no vio- lence. One of the sailors crushed a string of pearls under his foot, and ground it to powder upon the mar- ble floor. Another tangled his boot in a web of costly lace, that had been hastily taken from a drawer and dropped in the terror of a sudden assault. The man tore it away from his boot with a smothered growl, and the party went on, looking cautiously back to be sure that no one followed.
The mate had guessed well. He found a passage leading from one of the lower galleries into the cellar, which was now half flooded with wine that had been left to flow from the reeking casks without check. Here the blacks had held a grand carouse after the massacre under the palm trees. Bottles had been dashed against the walls, and the fragments were trodden into the earth, which sent up mingled fumes of wines and liquors,
THEFLOGGING. 61
with a strength that almost stifled even those tough sailors.
Plashing across the moist floor till his boots were red with wine, the mate found a pile of rubbish heaped against the wall. He held up a little silver lamp, which had burned its perfumed oil long after the fair hand was cold that filled it, and bade the men go to work. lie spoke in a hoarse whisper, that almost startled him- self.
The bricks and loose stones flew right and left, reveal- ing a low iron door. The foremost man swung the crowbar over his head to dash the door in, but that in- stant Thrasher seized him by the arm. The man turned angrily around. Then, struck by the dead whiteness of Thrasher's face, glanced over his shoulder, and the iron fell heavily from his grasp.
CHAPTER VI.
THE FLOGGING.
THEY were far out to sea, the New England brig which lay in the harbor of Port au Prince on that terri- ble night, with the unhappy and helpless creatures who had found protection under its flag. Thrasher, who was the commander now, sat in his cabin at breakfast. He held a cup of coffee in one hand which seemed to have excited his disfavor, for setting it on the table and dash- ing the spoon so angrily into the coffee that it scattered the drops all around, he called out,
62 THEF LOGGING.
" Come here, you brat."
Paul, the little boy whom Captain Mason had saved, came reluctantly forward, his black eyes heavy with fear, and his delicate limbs trembling, as you see those of an Italian greyhound when driven into the cold.
Why don't you move — what do you stand there shaking like a thief for ?"
These coarse words were made even more brutal by the base French in which they were uttered. At any time the boy could with difficulty have understood them ; in his fright he could only stand still, with his terror stricken face turned away from the man who per- secuted him.
" Why don't you move, I say ?" repeated the com- mander.
" What for, monsieur — what shall I do ?" asked the child.
" What shall you do ?" answered the man, mimicking the gentle terror in the child's voice with a rough drawl of mockery. " What shall you do ? why go to Jube, your father, and tell him to come here this instant ! I'll teach him to send coffee like that to a gentleman's table. Bah, it's bitter as gall and thick as mud. Go call your father, I say."
" My father !" said the boy — " my father !" and his beautiful eyes were instantly flooded with tears.
" Yes, that nigger, Jube."
" But Jube is our slave, not my father."
" What ! don't let me hear you tell that again or I'll give you a taste of the cat-o-nine-tails, no humbug with me, now I tell you "
The boy shrank back, but gleams of fire shot through
THE FLOGGING. 63
the tears that still trembled in his eyes ; he felt that the man was insulting hini, but did not quite comprehend how.
" Go call your father, I say," repeated his tormentor.
" I'll call Jube if you want me to," said Paul, with the dignity of a little prince, " but if I were to call ever so long my father — oh, my father 1 — will never, never come."
The pale face of the child burned red as he began to speak, but it was pallid again before he closed, and his proud voice broke into sobs.
" Take that, and mind how you howl when I speak to you again," cried the tyrant, giving that pale cheek a blow with the palm of his hand.
The little fellow staggered back and uttered a faint cry, but in an instant the dignity of blood aroused itself even in that childish heart. He stood up bravely, pride of race sparkling through his tears.
" I am not a slave, and you have struck me."
The mate laughed.
" Well done, my little bantam rooster, give us another fling."
The boy's face flamed red under the insulting laugh.
" I am only a little boy ; besides, papa says gentlemen never fight with their fists, so if I were a man it would be all the same — but Jube can fight like you — he knows how — yes, I'll call Jube."
" Not till I've knocked all the infernal pride out of your little body," exclaimed Thrasher, starting up and making a dash at the boy.
He was too late. The little fellow had cleared the cabin stairs with the leap of a fawn, and rushing across the deck where Jube was standing, seized him by the garments.
64 THE FLOGGING.
" Jube, good Jube, you can fight — that man down- stairs wants you — he struck me here on my face, the very spot my mother kissed — with his hands so — he struck me."
There was no need for the boy to say this, for three blood red finger marks glowed like living fire across his delicate cheek.
The gladiator broke into Jube's eyes as he saw these marks. His hand clenched and unclenched itself, and he ground his white teeth in ferocious rage. The savage African was fully aroused in him then.
" Look," he said, towering upward, till his athletic person was revealed in all its powerful proportions — " look, your master has struck my master's son — I'll kill him !"
"You will, ha!" cried the loud voice of Thrasher, who had followed the boy on deck. " You will, lump of ebony, will you ? Well, let's begin at once. I say, Rice, take that fellow to the rigging, and give him a couple of dozen. I'll let him know that white folks have the say here."
Jube did not understand this order, for it was given in English, but he guessed something of the truth when the group of sailors, that had stood looking on, broke up in a commotion, and two of the strongest came toward him menacingly.
" What is it, tell me — what are you going to do with Jube?" inquired the boy, going up to Rice, who, with all the men who had been trading to St. Domingo for 3^ears, had a rude knowledge of French.
" Go away, shaver, get down below, nobody wants to hurt you, and if they did I wouldn't let 'em by jingo I
THE FLOGGING: 65
but the nigger there, mutinied, and hell have to catch it."
"Don't, don't hurt Jube," cried the boy in an agony of fear, " what has he done ?"
" He's threatened the captain — that is, he's threatened the one who took the captain's place, and that 'ere's mutiny on the high seas, do you understand ?"
The sailor put Paul aside as he gave the desired in- formation, and joined his comrade who had seized upon Jube, who inquired fiercely what they wanted with him.
" Don't stand to talk, but lash the nigger up, and give him an extra dozen for his impudence !" shouted the captain; "no parley, but go to work."
While Jube stood half at bay, doubtful of the evil that threatened him, the two sailors sprang upon him, and began to take off his outer garments, while half a dozen others stood ready to aid them, should the poor fellow resist. There was a desperate struggle, but it lasted only a few moments ; great as Jube's strength was, it proved nothing opposed to the powerful force arrayed against him. In a few moments the poor fellow stood with his bare shoulders glistening in the sunshine, and all his muscles quivering with the fierce restraint that had been put upon them. Each hand was manacled by the iron gripe of his captors, who were stern but not mocking, while Thrasher, who looked on with a cold smile, muttered :
" Yes, my fine fellow, we'll teach you the difference between this deck and Port au Prince — here white folks are white folks."
Paul stood looking on, wild with terror. "What 4
66 THEFLOGGING.
were they doing ? Would they kill Jube before his eyes ? Had he been the cause of this ?"
The men dragged Jube away, heedless of his broken cries. With them a punishment at the rigging was no very extraordinary occasion, and when exercised on a negro was not altogether a disagreeable excitement But Rice, more merciful than the rest, came back, and attempted to persuade the child away from the deck, but Thrasher confronted him at the gangway, and or- dered him back.
" Let the youngster stay and see the fun ; it'll do him good," he said; "if he keeps up that whimpering I'll give him a dose, too."
Rice stood a moment with something of revolt in his eyes, but seemed to think the question not worth a quarrel, and slowly retreated, dragging the child with him. The mate did not deem it prudent, perhaps, to urge the seaman too far, so Rice withdrew to the re- motest part of the deck, and lifting the child in his arms, pretended to point out a ship which he persisted was hovering on the line of the horizon.
But this humane ruse was of no avail. With the little heart quivering in his bosom like a wounded bird, and every sense awake to the danger of his friend, Paul was not to be interested in any thing. His white face was turned anxiously over the sailor's shoulder, and he lis- tened keenly.
It came at last, a sharp, cutting twang. The boy uttered a shriek, and struggling from the sailor's arms, fell upon the floor, shuddering all over. Again, again, and again ; harder, fiercer, and with a biting sharpness that made the blood curdle in that young heart, the blows fell, then a cry, shrill with agony.
A REBELLIOUS SPIRIT. 67
The boy leaped to his feet, and breaking away from the kind hold of the sailor, went staggering across the deck, pale and wild, stung almost to death with the pain of those lashes.
The captain stood near the masthead, smoking a cigar. He did not lose a single puff — nay, between the lashes he would sometimes retain the smoke with his lips, and emit it enjoyingly, as the blows fell, thus keep- ing lazy time with the torture he was inflicting.
Half blind, almost dead, the boy came toward him, and fell at his feet, clasping his hands and holding them up in dumb, pitiful entreaty, for the voice was dead within him, and his pale lips uttered moans instead of words.
"Ha! you have come to, have you?" exclaimed the mate, taking the cigar from his mouth, and winding a loose fragment of tobacco leaf around it. " I thought as much. Well, never mind, the music's nearly half over now — then your turn shall come."
Those little hands dropped, and the child fell forward on his face ; a faint quiver which followed each crack of the lash was all the sign of life he gave.
CHAPTER VII.
A REBELLIOUS SPIRIT.
THE threat of violence which Thrasher uttered against the delicate creature at his feet, might have been only an ebullition of his dormant hatred of the boy — the bit-
68 A REBELLIOUS SPIRIT.
terest and most deadly hatred known to humanity — that of a bad man for the object he has wronged ; but wanton or earnest, the threat had its effect, for Rice strode to Thrasher's side, and bending to his ear, whis- pered.
" I say, captain, we've had enough of this ere, I reckon. Jest order the men to unsling that nigger, or I will."
Thrasher took the cigar from his mouth, and held it smoking between his fingers.
" What's the meaning of this, Rice?" he said, mildly, knocking the loose ashes away with his little finger, as he eyed the seaman with a keen side glance.
" What I said afore ; we've had enough of flogging for one day, at any rate."
"I'd do any thing to oblige you, Rice, be sure of that, any thing but give up my authority before the men."
" The men don't know what I'm saying to you. Any- way, jest give orders for 'em to wait till we understand one another."
The mate lifted his hand, at which signal the man who had just raised the lash, which was growing red and wet in the sunshine, dropped it heavily. The thong fell upon the deck, leaving a crimson trail along the white boards, while its holder stood panting and out of breath from the violence of his exercise.
" Well now, Rice, what is the meaning of all this ?" said the mate, a little anxiously.
" It don't mean nothing, only this, captin — I won't have that ere nigger struck another blow in this child's hearin'. As for the nigger hisself, I don't care a quid of tobaccer, but human natur' can't stand that sight — at
A REBELLIOUS SPIRIT. 69
any rate, I cant and won't — so if you expect me to keep a close jaw, order them to let the nigger down at once."
" Hush — speak lower, Rice. You see I must keep up my authority. You can understand that. I'd give the fellow up with pleasure to please you, Rice ; but this is the first punishment on board since I came into the command."
" Since you came into the command — -jest so."
"And if I give up now, it'll be all day with my authority; and that'll never do."
" There's something in that ere," answered Rice, with an uneasy hitch of his garments, " but then there mustn't be no more flogging afore this little chap, no how. I don't want to be obstreperous neither. Sup- posing you shut the fellow up, and keep him on bread and water a few days — I shouldn't mind that."
" But, he's a good cook — we can't spare him, Rice."
" Must," answered the sailor.
" Must," repeated the the mate, with a gleam in his side glance.
" Must," repeated Rice, settling his garments afresh.
The mate hesitated awhile, eyeing the sailor askance, but Rice stood solidly on the deck, looking him in the face as if certain of his answer.
"Very well, pass the order. Remember, I let off a dozen lashes, and give him irons, with bread and water, in exchange. Make that well understood."
"Aye, aye, never you fear," was the prompt reply.
"As for this imp of Satan," said the mate, spurning the prostrate boy lightly with his foot, " I'll deal with him."
" Don't do that, Mr. Thrasher ; you've struck that ere
70 A REBELLIOUS SPIRIT.
child once too often. Try it agin, and there ain't a man on board this 'ere brig as won't rise agin you."
" Indeed 1" said Thrasher, closing his teeth hard, "and you "
" I'll head 'em, and take you home in irons."
Thrasher turned a dull white, and, for an instant, a Bound as if his teeth were beginning to chatter, came faintly through his lips, but he turned it off with a laugh.
" Hang me if I care what you do with the fellow or the boy. I only wish we had left them behind ; that would have settled it once for all."
"But seeing as they're here, I won't stand by and have 'em murdered outright."
" Well, well, as you like ; it won't pay for us to quar- rel, Rice."
" Enough said, captain."
"Now I'll go down and finish my breakfast," said Thrasher, tossing the end of his cigar overboard. " Confounded coffee the fellow sent down ; that was what commenced the row, I believe ; but I'll try another cup."
"Aye, aye, better go down and leave the rest to me," said Rice, stooping tenderly over the boy. " Come, get up, my little chap ; it's all over ! No use wilting down in this way! poor fellow, poor fellow, how he shakes 1"
The child, who had been lying with a hand pressed hard over each ear, lifted his head, and turned his white face on the seaman.
" Is it over ? Have they killed him ? Oh ! Jube, Jube!"
This pathetic cry reached the unhappy man, who had just been taken down from his place of torture. With
A KEBELLIOUS SPIRIT. 71
his helpless hands hanging loose, and the red drops falling from his shoulders, he came reeling across the deck, and lay down by the boy, like a great Newfound- land dog wounded unto death.
Paul received him with a gush of tears. He took the handkerchief of delicate cambric from his bosom, where it had rested sacred till then, for his mother had placed it there, and tenderly wiped the drops of agony that still hung on Jube's brow. The poor negro, always treated with gentle household kindness till then, moaned aloud, not with the pain — he was brave enough, poor fellow — but from a sense of the desolation that had fallen on his master's son.
" Oh, young master, young master, who will help you now when Jube has only the power of a dog left ? never 'till now, never 'till now, was Jube striped with a whip ! What will become of him? He had nothing but his strength, and they have taken that !"
" Come, come," said Rice, " it isn't all over yet, by a long shot."
The negro looked up with his heavy, bloodshot eyes, in which there was a gleam of patient heroism that touched the sailor greatly, while the boy grew faint and gasped for breath.
" Don't, don't," pleaded Rice, patting the boy gently with his rough hand. "As for you, cuffy, keep a stiff upper lip. I'm to put you in the hold, and feed you on bread and water ; but I'll see that the handcuffs ain't too tight, and as for the grub, why some of us chaps will go on half rations to give you a meal now and then."
" I don't care about the place you put me in," said Jube, mournfully, " or what they feed me on. If they chain mo down hands and feet I won't say one word ; but the little master, what will they do with him?"
72 A REBELLIOUS SPIRIT.
"Never you mind about that, caffy ; I'll see to him. He shall have enough to eat, any how."
" But that man — he'll strike poor little master again, and Jube chained down in the bottom of the ship."
The great tears rolled over Jube's face as he said this, and he shook violently.
"No," said Rice, with an honest sailor's oath, which was profane in its language, but noble in its meaning, " the captain shan't touch him agin, I give you my hand on it."
Jube took the rough hand in his trembling grasp and kissed it gratefully.
" Take me down, Mr. Captain, take me down ; get out the irons ; bring on the bread and water ; you'll see that Jube will wear 'em, and sing like a bird, so long as you take care of him."
" That's hearty now," cried Rice, pleased to the depth of his really kind heart. " Just give up, and it'll be all the easier. I've had the bracelets on in my puppy days, over and agin. It aint nothing."
" I'm ready," answered Jube, making a brave effort to smile, and staggering to his feet, where he stood shaking all over from the shock of pain that had been given to his whole system. " I'm ready. Good-by, little master."
" Paul set up on the deck, and lifted his hands piti- fully, while his pale, cramped features began to quiver with coming tears.
" Botheration, 'taint nothing. I'll smuggle the little craft down to see you every day, if not oftener. Do you hear that, shaver?"
Tears swelled into the boy's eyes, and he covered them with liis hands, moaning painfully.
A REBELLIOUS SPIRIT. 73
Rice was a good deal troubled that his efforts at con- solation had so little effect, but all at once his face brightened, and thrusting a hand deep into the pocket of his trowsers, he brought forth a huge jackknife, and opened it temptingly.
" Look a here, little whipper-snapper, just look a here, no doubt about it, I'm a going to give you this very identical knife, I am, sure as a gun."
The boy took his hands away, and gazed wonder- ingly at the great, buck-horn handle, and the hooked blade, to which tiny fragments of plug tobacco clung lovingly.
"All right," he said, closing the blade with a jerk. " I thought you'd be surprised. Isn't it a sneezer ? Where's your pocket?"
As Rice thrust the knife into the silken lined pocket of Paul's dress, the boy looked downward with vague interest; but, all at once, his face brightened. He snatched at the knife eagerly, and tried to open it.
" It's rather stiff, I reckon, for them little fingers," said Rice, opening the knife again; "but, never you mind, I'll drop a little lamp ile on the jint, and it'll open easy as whistling, it will."
" Is it strong — is it sharp ?" cried the boy, touching the hooked blade with his delicate fingers. " Would it kill a man ?"
" Why, Lord love yer eyes, yes ! Jest turn the pint upwards, and it'd rip its way like blazes. But what der ye ask that for ?"
" Jube," said the boy, in sad, earnest tones, holding up the knife, "if he strikes me again, and you are by, just take this and kill me at his feet. I'd rather die a thousand times than live to see you whipped for my sake."
74 A R E B E L L I 0 U S SPIRIT.
" Give it to me," said Jube, with a gleam of his old African ferocity. "I'll use it, but not on you, little master — not on you 1"
" Look a here," said Rice, hitching about uneasily in his clothes. " You jest let the boy's knife alone, will ye ? I guv it to him for a plaything, and it's hisen, not yourn. Do ye want to be slung up again ? Here comes the captin — now up with ye, for I must be cross as blazes, or he'll think we're confabulating something against him. Come, look sharp, nigger, I can't wait here all day for you to snivel over a flogging as you ought to be grateful for, 'cause you arned it." To this Rice added, in a low tone : " Look scared, as if I had been a worrying you tooth and nail, or he won't trust you with me." Then raising his voice, he went on abusing poor Jube, till the mate came forward with a smile upon his face.
" That's right, my good fellow, take him down. He'll be an example for the men. They're beginning to want one. Off with him — plenty of irons, and don't be too particular about the bread or the water either."
"Aye, aye, I'll see to him," cried Rice, ferociously. " Come, march, tramp — off with you, cuffy ! You never seed sich a pair of bracelets as I've got for ye down below."
Jube kept his eyes bent to the deck, that no one might mark the ferocious hate that burned in them — . hate that re-strung his nerves, and made them tough as iron.
" You'll learn to threaten me !" said the captain, scoffing at the negro, as he passed.
Jube did not lift his eyes, but passed on. Paul arose and followed.
A REBELLIOUS SPIRIT. 75
" Hallo ! what is the youngster after ?" cried Thrasher.
"I want to go with Jube," said the boy, shuddering under the captain's eye.
"You want to go with Jube, ha I" cried the mate, mocking the gentle tones, which might have won pity from a Nero. " Well, you won't go with Jube, do you hear that ? I aint likely to give up cook and cabin-boy, too, so just march for the caboose."
Rice turned back, leaving Jube near the gangway. " Look a here, captain," he said, in a low voice. <( Don't put upon that little shaver so ! It's too bad ; he's a peaked child, just out of his mother's lap, and this ere sort of work will kill him sure as a gun."
"Well, if it does, Rice, what's the loss?"
"Wai, it'd be a good deal to me, anyhow. I've sort a took a shine to the boy."
" That's unfortunate," sneered the mate, " because I, being commander here, have just done the other thing."
" Hate him like pison — I knowed it from the first."
"Well, what of it?"
" Nothing — only as I've took a notion to him, and he kinder likes me, supposing you jest give in a trifle, and let the chap alone. I shall be much obleeged to you if you will."
Thrasher turned on his heel, saying, with assumed carelessness, for he did not like the gleam of those gray eyes, "Well, well, we'll talk about that another time."
" Aye, aye," responded the sailor, with a nod of the head, which had a meaning in it that Thrasher did not like.
76 THE BOX OF JEWELS.
CHAPTER VIII.
THE BOX OP JEWELS.
"I'LL have an end of this," said Thrasher, as he went into the cabin restless and anxious. Throwing himself on the locker, he began muttering to himself. " As for keeping this child to hang around my neck like a mill- stone, I never will. He's old enough to remember every thing ; and if the negro tells tales he'll be sure to cher- ish them. What possesses Rice to rise up against me in this way ? If he'd been quiet, I'd have had 'em both under water before half the voyage was over."
Thrasher lay awhile revolving these thoughts in his mind, without arriving at any satisfactory conclusion. At last, a new anxiety seized upon him ; he started up, and went to the closet set into the wall, in which he had seen Captain Mason secure the box of jewels that Jube had placed in his keeping.
" It's fortunate I secured this," he muttered, taking a key from his vest pocket, and fitting it into the lock. " He didn't know I was on the watch, careful as he was. Ha, it's all here ! and that nigger knows it as well as I do. He'll tell, and then Rice '11 take another hitch in the eternal rope that's being knotted around me. I would give any thing to know exactly what the fellow is at, but I won't ask questions, that's against my prin- ciples ; they let out too much."
As he spoke, Thrasher sat down, placed the bronze box on his knee, and forced the lid open. Just as we have seen them before, the jewels lay huddled together,
THE BOX OF JEWELS. 77
without cushions or caskets ; but, here and there, a frag- ment of crimson or white satin clung to them as if they had been torn away from their cases in wild haste.
" Now, I dare say, this is worth lots of money, if one only knew about it," he said, taking up a necklace, formed in links of large, oblong opals, with rainbows breaking in fragments from their hearts, and rivulets of diamonds running around them. " How it glitters ! This would be pretty for her. I wonder if she'd take it from me now ? or warn me off as she did that evening ? Well, I don't know about that — a poor wretch, with nothing but his good looks, and so on, to recommend him, is another thing from a fellow that can come to a woman with both hands full of yellow gold and such things as this. Wouldn't they blaze on that white neck 1 — such a neck, with shoulders that dimple like a baby's hand I I saw them once when she was dressed to go out with him. She little thought I was under the win- dow, and that a corner of the paper curtain was turned up, just leaving a peep-hole. How softly the white dress was folded over her bosom. Lord, how my heart went down as she put on that lace cape, and fastened it with a wild rose that he had given her before my very face ! No wonder I hated him ! there isn't a man on earth that could have helped it. Handsome — was he really handsomer than I ? did she love him so very much ? Oh, how it blazes ! These are real diamonds, no mistake about that. How the light rains from them ! Oh, how I'd like to see it flashing on her neck, just as it was then, with two or three of these things in her yellow curls. Women like these gew-gaws ; and she's fond of pretty things — like a child about them ; besides, she'll be poor enough before I get home, she and the child — his child."
78 THE BOX OF JEWELS.
He crushed the necklace in his hand, as the image of- a pretty, fair haired baby girl 'rose before him, and crowded it fiercely down into the box. " She'd be want- ing some of them for her, I dare say. Well, perhaps that woman could do any thing with me ; in fact, when I first knew her, any kind woman, from my mother down, would mould me as she liked, I was wax then ; but after she married him — well, it's no use thinking what one has been, or how much better things might have turned out ; there's iron enough in me now. Still, I loved her then well enough to go mad and run away from all that ever cared for me. I might have been a gentleman ; the old folks educated me well enough for that or any thing else, but she drove me out before the mast. Storms and hardships was what I wanted ; I got enough of it in the end. It made me tough and hard as the rocks we sometimes narrowly escaped. Cruel, too — every one says that — but I could be kind to her and the little girl, perhaps, if the mother loved me. If not, oh, how I should hate the blue-C3red imp."
These thoughts seemed to excite the man bej^ond anything that persons knowing his stern character would have believed. His hands clutched and unclutched themselves in the jewels, his lips quivered, and alternate gleams of fire and clouds of mist chased each other in his e}res. He started up, thrust the box back to its closet, forgetting the fears that had urged him to seek for it, and putting the key back into his pocket went on deck. The first sharp gust of wind that swept his face carried off these feverish thoughts and he grew hard as rock again.
Paul was on deck, crouching down among the barrels and bales of merchandise that offered him friendly con-
THE BOX OP JEWELS. 79
cealmcnt. Wretched and heart-broken, the child watched for Rice. When he saw Thrasher, fear made him shrink together and hold his breath as,if some wild beast were creeping along his path. After a little, the mate went down again and Rice appeared.
The boy crept from his hiding-place and came up to the sailor.
" What have you done with him? please tell me."
" Oh, here you are, as large as life," said Rice, who had missed Paul from the deck, and felt some relief at finding him alone and so quiet. " Done with him ? why cleared out a snug harbor in the hold, and anchored him safe and sound. Come along, if you want to see."
" Oh, yes, yes, I want it so much. Is it dark ?"
"Rayther, I should think."
" May I hold your hand ?"
"Aye, aye, come along afore the captain knocks us all aback."
" Who goes there," cried out a voice from the cabin stairs.
" Nobody but Rice and this 'ere little shaver," an- swered Rice, facing round to meet Thrasher.
" Where are you taking him ?"
"Nowhere just now — he wants to take a look out."
" Very well — pass on."
Thrasher went down to the cabin again ; he had seen Rice as he led the boy across the deck, and understood the opposition which was going on to his wishes. The train of thought that had seized him while examining the jewels had not entirely passed away, but with it came others appealing to his worst passions, and ming- ling themselves, as evil things sometimes will, with much that was tender and pure in the man's nature. He was
80 THE BOX OF JEWELS.
not all bad — what human being is ? — but he was a strong man, and used his evil strength without scruple to se- cure the love, which was, in truth, wounding him daily with its hungry cries.
Thrasher was afraid of Rice, and with him fear was an incentive to action. Jube and the boy Paul were also sources of great anxiety. They might interfere with his one great hope, and utterly destroy the brilliant fu- ture that lay so temptingly before him. All this was food for thought, and made him more than usually morose.
The sensitive nature of the boy Paul had suffered acutely by the indignity that had been put upon him, and still more by the awful scene of Jube's punishment. But there was a noble spirit in that little frame, and though he shrank from encountering his enemy, it was not from a cowardly feeling, but as a brave man may evade a wild beast that possesses a hundred-fold of his own physical powers. No amount of punishment would have induced the child to submit meanly ; but he was a creature of exquisite refinement, and had, all his little life, been shielded from the first approach of sorrow. Within the last few weeks, he had been cast headlong into the boiling vortex of the most terrible scenes that ever disgraced humanity — scenes that drove many a stout man insane, and left a whole population at the mercy of savage, maddened slaves. He, a young, sensi- tive child, brought up in luxury, shielded from the very breath of a flower if it was not grateful to his fine sense — loved by his parents — idolized by a host of servants — had struggled through death, and horrors sharper than death, to find himself worse off a thousand times on board that brig, than any of his father's slaves had ever been.
CHAINED IN THE HOLD. 81
And now his only friend was torn away, and cast into the black depths of the hold, smarting with pain, writh- ing under the ignominy of a first blow, and chained hand and foot like a mad dog. If little Paul had known that the captain would kill him, I think he might have found his way to that poor friend.
At last they were together, down in the bla,ck hollows of the ship, with scarcely a breath of air, and surrounded by a host of uncouth objects, which appalled them like the walls of a prison. They had no light, and the rush and gurgle of the waves sounded horribly distinct. Jube held up bravely after his little master came to bear him company. No groan escaped his lips, but he in- sisted on sitting up, and made Paul nestle close to him, striving to soothe and comfort the child, spite of his own keen suffering.
CHAPTER IX.
CHAINED IN THE HOLD.
CHAINED in the hold, drifting away — it was only after dark that Paul could visit his friend without fear of de- tection. On the third night, they were together in the hold. Thrasher himself had been down just before, and finding Jube without irons, had riveted them on his limbs with his own hands, so the poor fellow was bowed down with the weight of his chains, and could not even hold the child to his bosom when he came to share his solitude.
It was very dark, and Paul was compelled to feel his 5
82 CHAINED IN THE HOLD.
way through the freight heaped up on each side the place where Jube was confined.
" Jube, Jube ! do you hear?" he called out, in a fright- ened voice..
Jube lay still, for he was afraid of frightening the boy by the clank of his chains, but he called out softly, " Yes, little master, here I am, just here, don't hurt yourself against the boxes."
" Can't you come and help me, Jube ; it's dark as mid- night."
"Well, little master, it ain't just convenient this minute ; but if j'ou'll listen while I talk, and come by the sound, it'll bring you right straight to Jube."
"Yes — yes, I hear; keep speaking, Jube, but not too loud. What a noise the water makes to-night, and the ship pitches so I can hardly stand. Oh, here you are, dear Jube ; just hold out your hands, to steady me. What's that ?"
" Only the handcuffs ; but don't you mind, they don't amount to much after all — screwed a little tight — but not unpleasant, if it wasn't for that."
" Chained you — chained you !" said the boy, in a voice of such keen anguish that Jube forced a little, hoarse laugh, in order to convince him that being chained hand and foot, in the black hold of a vessel, was rather a re- freshing amusement than otherwise. "Why, it ain't nothing, little master, just see here !"
He tried to lift his hands, but the iron galled his wrists, and forced a groan from his brave heart.
" Oh, Jube, Jube, they will murder you !"
"Not they — why it's nothing."
" Let me help you hold the irons up, they drag on your poor hands — there, does that make them lighter ?"
CHAINED IN THE HOLD. 83
"A good deal, little master ; every thing is light when you come to se* .Tube."
The gentle boy had knelt down in the darkness, and was striving to hold up the chains that dragged in rusty links from the poor fellow's hands.
"Are you hungry, Jube ?"
" No, not at all, little master ; had a splendid dinner just now."
The poor fellow had just eaten half a cake of hard sea bread soaked in water.
" Because I've saved my dinner," said the child, " and we'll eat it together."
" Oh, little master, there never was but one angel like you that ever I saw."
" Mamma !" said Paul, softly, " you mean her, I know."
"Yes; who else?"
" I shall never be beautiful and kind like her, Jube — never I but, when she finds us, you will tell her how I have tried to be good and patient, Jube ?"
"Yes, little master."
"How mournfully you say that. Are you crying, Jube?"
" Crying ? no, no ; don't you hear how I laugh ?"
" That's worse yet ; the chains are breaking your heart, Jube."
"No, I like 'em; they're a sort of company."
" Company!"
" Yes ; when I'm all alone in the daytime, you know, ,1 can jingle tunes with 'em."
" It's awful music, Jube ; my heart trembles when I hear it. Besides, I cannot get close to you, the iron keeps me off."
" Just creep up to this side, little master, and lean against my shoulder ; the feel of you gives me heart."
B4 CHAINED IN THE HOLD.
Paul crept close to his friend, and pissed one arm over his chest as his cheek rested on the%houlder turned lovingly for its reception.
" How the water beats and roars," said Paul, clinging close to his friend ; "it sounds like that night."
"Yes, I've been listening to it all day; sometimes it seems close, too, as if it would leap in and tear me to pieces ; but that is when you are not here."
" How it moans, Jube I"
" Don't tremble, little master, it's only the water, and that isn't cruel like men."
" Hallo, here, havn't you a voice, cuffy ? Here's some prog, and I've brought something to rig np a light that you can see to eat by."
It was Rice, with a tin basin in his hand half full of lard, in which a twist of cotton lay coiled like a serpent.
" There, just wait till I set this down shipshape, and you shall see what I've got; some boiled beef and lash- ings of grog; havn't wet my whistle to-day. Hallo, cuffy, what's this — a cargo of iron on board ! — who did that ere?"
" He did it," said Jube, while Paul lifted his head; with hope in his eyes.
"He did it, did he !" Here the sailor emitted half a dozen heavy oaths, in broad English, which neither the boy nor Jube understood. " Just give us hold here ; if I don't smash every link on 'em afore ten minutes is over, call me a land lubber that's afraid of his mammy. Hold out them hands, blackball. By jingo ! can't do it without a hammer. Yes, this'll do ; smash, here it goes ! You like that music, my little commodore, does ye ? Now out with yer feet, blackball, and when the captain comes, tell him I did it."
CHAINED IN THE HOLD. 85
Jube, who had been painfully cramped for hours, stood up and stretched himself, as the irons fell with a clank to his feet.
" It seems kind o' refreshing, I reckon," said Rice, bringing one keg forward, on which he placed his light, and another which was to serve as a table. " Where's that jackknife, whipper-snapper ? Out with it, and cut up the grub. Set to, cuffy. Glory ! how the ship rolls and pitches ! We'll have work afore morning. The fel- low will crowd all sail ; he'll fetch the brig into the mid- dle of next week at this rate. Never mind ; set to, all hands, we may as well go to Davy Jones' locker with a full cargo on the stomach as with empty lockers."
Jube was nearly famished, notwithstanding his boasted dinner, and he accepted this hearty invitation with zest. Paul tasted a few mouthfuls of the food, but with strange hesitation, as if he were putting some restraint on his appetite. His own little store of provisions remained untasted, and he made no effort to bring it forth.
" Why don't you stow away ?" asked Rice, cutting a lump of beef in two and splicing it, as he observed, to a piece of bread. " What are you afeared of?"
" I — I'd like to save a little, if you please," said Paul, timidly.
" Save a little I why, what's the use ? There's plenty on board ; I can get a double allowance any time."
" You can, and will you ?" cried the boy, eagerly.
" Why, yes, but what for ?"
" We may want it, who knows ? The captain may for- bid you to come here, and then Jube would starve."
" Well, that's sensible. It ain't likely to happen, but then there's no harm in a full locker. I'll bring down a bag of bread this minute if he's in the cabin — then
86 CHAINED IN THE HOLD.
there's plenty of oranges in the cargo ; if you come to hunger, cuffy, you can stave in a box, and hide the boards. Now fall to, youngster. There's no fear of a famine. "
The boy was very hungry, but it made him faint, rather than eager. Something seemed to excite him ; perhaps it was the gathering storm, through which the brig labored heavily. Perhaps he had some vague, child- ish hope, scarcely understood by himself; certainly his eyes had never shone so brightly before. His face was that of a young hero preparing for battle.
The brig plunged and reeled more and more. Her timbers began to strain and creak ; the waves leaped and howled against her sides like charges of cavalry in fierce action. The roar and boom of the storm was terrible.
The two men who sat together in the dim light, float- ing upon the basin near by, looked at each other. The negro's face was ashen gray ; the sailor lost his ruddy color ; but the boy's eyes grew bright as stars.
" It's on us — it's on us — and every stitch of canvas out !" cried Rice. " I knew he was acting like a fool, but didn't expect this. Splurge 1 heave ! Crack — crack ! Jerusalem ! there goes the mainsail! Aye, aye."
The hoarse call of a trumpet rang through every cor- ner of the brig.
"All hands on deck 1"
"Aye, aye !" shouted Rice, kindling to his work ; " keep a stiff upper lip, cuffy, and cheer the boy, for we are just as near Davy's Locker as any of us ever will be again !"
They saw him plunge onward through the reeling freight, and he was gone. The poor negro and the
CHAINED IN THE HOLD. 87
child were left alone, not quite in darkness, for the cot- ton wick still shimmered fitfully, and made the black- ness beyond its little pale circle more dismal than ever. It seemed just enough of light to see each other perish by, and that was all.
Louder and fiercer grew the storm. The brig was tossed upon it like a handful of drift wood ; every tim- ber seemed to carry on a struggle by itself — every joint wrenched and tore against its fastenings. The strained rudder shrieked like a wild animal in the agonies of death. The hoarse cry of the trumpet sounded like a groan through the general turmoil. But all these sounds were nothing to the howl of the winds, and the great up- heaving rout of the waters, as they swelled and mingled together in one tremendous uproar. The negro fell upon his knees, trembling and ashen ; but the boy — the gentle, sensitive child — stood up, with a smile on his mouth and a beautiful brightness in his eyes.
" Don't be afraid !" he said, bending over the negro. " The God that took care of my mamma when she fell asleep, is here. Something tells me so."
The poor negro had no God of his own people to un- derstand, so he hung upon the words that fell from those young lips with unreasoning trust. The dusky color came back to his cheek, and lifting his faithful eyes upward, he said meekly :
" If you say so, young master, I believe it. Jube go where you go ; she'll be sure to want him, too."
A fierce plunge — a recoil — and the brig stood still, shivering in all her timbers, like a wild horse with its fore feet over a precipice. It was but an instant. Then a cataract of waters swept over her. She rolled upon her side, and could not right herself ; a mighty throe,
88 CHAINED IN THE HOLD.
and she struggled back, working heavily. Another plunge— a crash — a despairing cry from overhead — and the boy started from his wrapt composure.
" Come, Jube, let us go up and tell them not to be afraid."
The crew had given up. One man, Rice, stood at the helm, resolute to meet death at his post when it came. Thrasher stood firmly, with the trumpet grasped in his right hand ; but his face was like marble, and he gave no orders. The brig that he commanded was almost a wreck. The sails had been swept away ; the mainmast was in splinters ; not a vestige of her massive bulwarks was left. The men were grouped together in sullen despair. Nothing was to be done — they could only stand still and wait. With that tornado tearing through the mighty waters, and lashing them into great sheets of angry foam, there was no contending. They huddled together, that group of stout men, helpless as infants.
When despair was on every face, and the storm raged fiercest, that pale, Heaven-eyed boy, came up through the hatches, and stood among the sailors, smiling. He did not speak, but the sweet serenity of his face gave them courage.
The mainmast had fallen, dragging heavily on the ship. The last order of the mate had been to cut it away, but no one obeyed, and thus inevitable destruc- tion lay before them.
" One more onset, my men !" cried Rice. " Clear away the mast and she will right herself."
"Jube, give me an axe, I will help!" cried Paul ; and the beautiful courage that shone in his face inspired the men. They fell to work vigorously. The mast, with all its entanglement of cordage, plunged into the boiling sea, and the brig righted herself.
CHAINED IN THE HOLD. 89
The storm was over, the dismantled brig still rode the waves, for the staunch timber of New England does not yield readily, and the strongest had been put to its test in that gallant craft. Jube was sent back to his imprisonment in the hold, where Paul sought him at every opportunity ; but, from the night of the tempest, a strange animation had marked the boy, sometliing which no one could understand.
"Jube," he said, having left the deck on the third night, when the sea was calm as if it had never known a tempest, and ten thousand stars broke their flickering gold on its waves. " Jube, it is time that we look for mamma. God has taken care of her, I know, but we must search and find her."
" Little master, I know where she is, we left her on White Island."
" And you did not tell me when I was so near ; but we cannot be fax off now, the storm drove us back. Jube, I've been watching for something to happen, for it is sure mamma wants us. Look behind that barrel, and see how much bread I've saved. Then the oranges Rice spoke of; he broke open a box, and I've got plenty."
"Well, little master."
" They've been working on the side of the ship to-day, and did not haul up the b'oat. That was what I've been watching for. Take the bread and the oranges, Jube, and let us go."
Jube arose, took up the little sack which the boy pointed out, and followed his young master without a question. They crossed the deck softly, dropped down the side of the vessel unseen, and with the knife which Rice had given him, Paul cut the boat loose from the ship.
90 CHAINED IN THE HOLD.
The brig lay motionless, for she was still disabled, and the boat rocked lightly on the waves, breaking the starlight into golden ripples ; thus the boat and the half wrecked vessel drifted apart. Three days of sunshine, and calm, lonely, bright days, in which these two child- like beings floated like people in a dream. The boy wasnn search of his lost parents, and looked out for them over the bright ocean with smiling and beautiful faith. The slave hoped nothing, sought for nothing. He was content by his young master's side. They had no compass, and but one pair of oars, which proved of little use, for the boat had no destination, nor its inmates the remotest knowledge of their own reckoning. Thus they drifted on three days without accident. No vessel hove in sight, and all was a clear, heavy calm. On the fourth day the bread and fruit were gone. Not a mouth- ful of food, not a drop of water, save the great deep, a draught of which would be delirium or death. The fifth day, and the pangs of hunger had crept steadily on, and gnawed at their vitals relentlessly. Paul no longer gazed abroad on the waters, but lay faint and ill in the bottom of the boat, looking up to the stars in the night time, as if missing his mother on earth, he sought her there. Thus they drifted on day and night, until the end drew near. Jube managed to catch a little dew at sunset, which he gave to the child. Rain fell once in small quantities, and refreshed them, but still the cry of famished nature went up for food, and there was nothing but the salt water and the rainless heavens to answer it.
Paul lay in the bottom of the boat, fading away, and moaning with the pangs of famine; Jube bent over him, breaking the hot rays of the sun from, the white and
CHAINED IN THE HOLD. 91
sunken face with his body, for they had no other shelter. The boy moaned in his sleep, and called for his mother in feeble anguish. Jube was very weak, but he managed to lift that light weight so far as to lay the boy's head on his knee.
With a spasm of pain the child awoke.
" Little master."
Jube's voice was like that of an old man, hollow and broken. The boy looked up, tried to smile, and mur- mured,
" Yes, Jube."
" Would you like something to eat, little master?"
" To eat — to eat," whispered the boy, opening his eyes wildly.
" A piece of nice steak. You wouldn't mind its be- ing cooked, would you ?"
" Steak ! — something to eat ! Oh, Jube, we shall never eat again 1"
" Look here, little master, now be still and hear what I say."
The boy made a struggle to collect his faculties.
" Little master, listen : when you find me lying here in the boat, and you can't feel my heart beat when you lay your hand here, just cut a slice out of my shoulder with the jackknife."
The boy closed his eyes, shuddering.
" It won't be very hard eating."
The slave was feeling for the knife as he tempted the famished child, who lay moaning across his knee. He found it at last ; but his gaunt hands opened it with dif- ficulty, for their strength was all gone.
The poor fellow felt for the spot where his heart beat strongest. Then he spoke to the child again.
92 THE HOUSE IN THE PINE WOODS.
The knife will be open, little master, don't forget what I tell you."
He lifted the knife feebly, a flash of sunshine on the blade gleamed across the half shut eyes of the boy. He comprehended the meaning of Jube's words. He sprang up, snatched the knife, flung it into the ocean, and fell senseless on the bottom of the boat.
Jube burst into childish tears, and with his head bent down to his breast, fell into a state of apathy.
When he looked up again a ship was in sight, coming gallantly toward them. He gave a feeble shout, and strove to arouse the child, but could not. Then he took the cotton bag that had held their bread, and fas- tening it to an oar, swung it wearily to and fro, crying out with all his strength, which left nothing but moans on his parched lips.
The ship bore down upon them, she came so near that Jube could see her crew on the deck, then veered slowly and faded away.
CHAPTER X.
THE HOUSE IN THE PINE WOODS.
SOME four or five miles from that lovely spot, where the Housatonic and Naugatuc join their waters, stands a large manufacturing village of no inconsiderable im- portance. Iron foundries, paper-mills, India rubber and silk manufactories cluster around one of the finest waterfalls of New England. That waterfall is pictur- esque even now, spite of the cottages, boarding houses,
THE HOUSE IN THE PINE WOODS. 93
hotels, railroad station, and tanneries, that have taken the place of green woods, richly clothed hills, and a valley so fragrant with wild flowers, that it was happi- ness to breathe its very air.
But it is hardly worth while to describe this town aa it is. Every thing, even the name, derived from an old Revolutionary officer, is changed. My object carries me back to a time when it was indeed one of the love- liest spots in the world — a rich, deep valley, with a noble waterfall thundering at its heart. High, curving, and broken banks, almost mountainous in places, loom- ing up or sloping back on either side, and two lovely brooks pouring their bright, fresh waters into the river above the falls.
One came winding around Rock Rimmond, softened and shadowed by its grim heights. The other, pretty, sparkling Bladens Brook, ran laughing and dancing through the Wintergreen woods, on the opposite shore, with a gush of cheerfulness that seemed like sunshine, and leaped into the river just where it began to gather up its waters for a plunge over the great falls, in ono broad, rushing cataract of crystal. From the falls downward, the valley was choked up with noble forest trees, through which the river ran slowly and grandly till it swept around the shadowy base of Castle Rock, and disappeared on its way to join the Housatonic. This rock, high, precipitous, and picturesque, termi- nates all that we have to do with the valley, for its high cliffs cut off the prospect in that direction, and all the level space between it and the falls was one vast grove of white pines, which formed the grandest masses of trees I ever saw in my life.
A few hemlocks, a white poplar or so, with now and
94 THE HOUSE IN THE PINE VTOOD3.
then a magnificent oak variegated the woods, but great pines predominated everywhere. The earth was littered with their sharp leaves ; the wind sighed among their branches as if it never could win a free passage through their greenness. As for the sunshine, it only reached the forest turf and velvet moss in a golden embroidery — seldom with broad gleams. Never were there such cool, green shadows as hung about those woods. The noises that floated through them were strangely be- wildering ; there was the roar and dash of the falls — the clatter of machinery — for even in that day one factory, among the first ever established in New Eng- land, stood by the falls, and the sound of flying shuttles and the beat of heavy looms, held a cheerful rivalry with the flow of the waters and the rush of the winds. Then came the bird songs, wild, clear, and ringing, lost outside of the woods, but making heavenly music if jpu but listened under the trees.
Just below the falls, so near as almost to be sprinkled with the spray, and to gather foam wreaths about its timbers, was a long, low, wooden bridge, linking two villages together.
These villages crowned the two lofty banks overlooking the falls, from which one took its name. Fall's Hill was rendered most conspicuous by a pretty, white church, with a tall, symmetrical spire, cutting sharply against the sky, added to a cluster of superior dwelling houses, and a country store. In front of this store, just on the fork of the roads, stands, I hope to this day, a magnificent old willow tree, under which people who came from afar sometimes tied their horses, while they went up to wor- ship in the church, which stood on the very highest point of land to be found till you came to Rock Rinimond
THE HOUSE IN THE PINE WOODS. 95
on one hand, or Castle Rock on the other. These cross- roads cut in twa directions, one led to the Bungy hills, and the other toward a red school-house and some strag- gling dwellings in shrub oaks : beyond this, the geog- raphy of the country is lost in a confusion of green hills and woodlands, which form a pleasant and prosperous farming country.
From Shrub Oak, the turnpike leads directly down Fall's Hill with precipitous steepness, across the old bridge, and through a sand hill, with a wall of white sand thirty feet high on either side, directly into Chewstown, on the opposite hill.
This cluster of houses took its name from some old Indian, forgotten by his tribe, who lived and died in a hut somewhere in the neighborhood, and at this day is probably forgotten in a town where a change of time- honored names seems to be a political fashion. At any rate, it was called Chewstown then, and a smart, active little village it was. For it had two crossroad taverns, a great, barnlike Presbyterian meeting-house, and a dashing, new Academy, which boasted of a pretentious little cupola with a bell in it, mounted on the high- est point of land that side of the river, and contrast- ing itself saucily with the spire of the church on the op- posite bank. Any number of roads crossed and recrossed over the hill at Chewstown. There was the Derby road, running along the banks of the river ; the New Haven road, cutting through the sand banks in a parallel line, and crossroads from the farming districts intersecting them both. The fact is, Fall's Hill had a little more than its share of the aristocracy. Chewstown made up for that, by broader commercial opportunities. The taverns were always in a flourishing condition, and a
96 THE HOUSE IN THE PINE WOODS.
blacksmith's shop, that looked like a foundry, brought the farmers from far and near to get their horses and oxen shod. Besides, there was a country store on the corner, and three white cottages with basements, built in a line like city houses, and the farmers on that side of the river were often heard to say that Chewstown could pull an even yoke with Fall's Hill any time of day, if they had not got a steeple to their meeting-house.
In this village, Captain Mason had left his wife and child, and here, also, Thrasher, the mate, was born. Down in the outskirts of the pine woods, on the Fall's Hill side of the Naugatuc, a river road ran along the curving base of the hill, and wound seaward with the stream. On this road, between the bridge and Castle Rock, there was but one house, a low, white cottage, with peach trees behind it, and lilac bushes in front. A great tulip tree sheltered the low roof, and behind the garden rolled the green billows of the pine woods. It was a lonely, but very beautiful spot, such as a man like Mason would be likely to select as a home for his beloved ones.
Here, in fact, this good man had left his wife and only child, the latter a charming little golden-haired creature of four years old, when he sailed for St. Domingo in the brig Floyd, which we know to have been left disabled and drifting on the ocean. The vessel had been absent six weeks beyond its time, and no intelligence had yet reached her owners or that anxious woman, regarding her fate. This voyage had been Mason's first experience as captain ; his little savings had been invested in a private venture, out of which he hoped to provide some- thing— beforehand, to use his own words — for his wife and little one.
KATHARINE ALLEN'S VISIT. 97
Mrs. Mason was both sad and anxious — sad from the gloom of hope deferred, and anxious because the little provision made for her support had melted away, leaving her almost in want. She was sitting in her neat parlor, with one of the little girl's garments in her hands, sigh- ing heavily with each drawing of the thread, when a knock sounded at the door
She stopped, with the needle half through her work, and listened. Of course, he would never have paused to knock at his own door, but then, the very thought of this wild possibility suspended her breath.
Again the knock sounded, and the young wife called out with her usual hospitable voice,
" Come in."
The door opened, and a female entered, wrapped in a dark red cloak — the hood of which she put modestly back, revealing as fair a face as you often look upon in an entire lifetime.
CHAPTER XI.
KATHARINE ALLEN'S VISIT TO THE WHITE COTTAGE.
" OH, Katharine Allen, is that you ?" said Mrs. Mason, with a touch of disappointment in her voice, which the girl noticed with a pang. . j
" Yes, Mrs. Mason, I had got through my day's work, and so ran down once more to see if — if you had heard any thing yet."
" Yes, I thought so — it must be a comfort to have some one to run to — I haven't a living soul I" said Mrs. 6
98 KATHARINE ALLEN'S VISIT.
Mason, a little petulantly, for Katharine had been at the house more than once to ask these same questions, and the young wife always shrank from acknowledging that she had no good news. This feeling became more and more painful as the time wore on, and her own heart grew faint with apprehension.
"Not a word? Haven't you heard any thing?" fal- tered the young girl, sinking into a chair, and turning her great blue eyes on Mrs. Mason, with an intensity of suffering that startled the unhappy woman into a momentary forgetfulness of her own anxieties.
" No, Katharine, not one word. It breaks my heart to own it, but not a breath of news has reached me since the brig sailed."
" And she ought to have been in weeks ago ! What can be the matter, Mrs. Mason ? tell me, oh do tell me, if you have the least idea I"
" I can only guess like yourself, Kate. The ocean is a treacherous thing to trust those you love with. The storm of a single night may have made little Rose an orphan."
The poor woman began to cry as she said this, and calling the little girl to her knee kissed her with mourn- ful tenderness.
" How fond you are of the little girl — it must be a great comfort to have his child looking into your face ! One could endure almost any thing for that!" said Katharine, evidently trembling as she spoke.
"A comfort and a pain, Katharine, for if he never comes back — "
" Oh, don't — don't say that," cried the girl, shivering. "The thought is enough to kill one: words — I could not put that into words "
KATHARINE ALLEN'S VISIT. 99
" I wish you would not take on so," said Mrs. Mason, sharply. " It's bad enough to wait and wait, and — oh dear, oh dear, what will become of us ?"
Here the poor woman burst into a flood of tears, wringing her hands passionately.
" Mother," said little Rose, " are you crying because pa hasn't come back with my pretty dress ?"
The mother could not answer for her sobs ; as for Kate Allen, she sat looking at them with cold tears dropping down her white cheeks, as if she longed to fall upon her knees and ask them to pity her a little.
" What do you cry for, Katjr Allen ?" said the child, rather jealous that any other one should weep but her mother. " You have not got no pa, nor no husband out to sea."
" Oh, God help me ! God forgive me ! I haven't, J. haven't," sobbed the beautiful girl, rocking to and fro on her chair.
Mrs. Mason checked her tears and looked on wonder- ingly. This strange outburst of grief almost irritated her, for, like her child, she rather craved a monopoly of suffering. All at once a wild apprehension seized upon her. What if Kate had heard — what if she knew that the brig had gone down with every soul on board, and had no strength to speak it out ! Frightened by this new dread she started up and stood over the weeping girl.
"Tell me — tell me all you have heard," she almost shrieked. " If you don't want to see me drop dead at your feet, before the face of my child, speak out !"
Katharine looked up ; amazement checked her tears, and the pupils of her beautiful eyes dilated.
" I have nothing to say, Mrs. Mason ; I have not heard a syllable, how could I ?"
100 KATHARINE ALLEN'S VISIT.
" And are you so very sorry for us ?"
" Does it make you angry, because I can't keep back the tears ? Oh, it seems as if I could die, if any one would feel for me."
" Why, Katharine, what is your trouble ?"
" Nothing — nothing — I'm not in trouble."
Mrs. Mason began to look serious, an old suspicion flashed across her mind. She was not a woman of much natural refinement, and the innate vanity of her nature more than compassion spoke out in her next words.
" Katharine, speak out — is it about Nelson Thrasher you are taking on so ?"
The blood rushed over that white face like a sudden sunset, then the poor girl grew pale again, and purplish shadows came out under her eyes, leaving them, oh, how zjournful.
" You need not look so frightened, Kate — there's no harm in it if you do love him, only you haven't got my spirit, that's all."
" What ! — what do you mean, Mrs. Mason?"
" What do I mean ? why nothing worth mentioning." A peculiar curve of the handsome lip, as Mrs. Mason said this, made the young girl shiver from head to foot.
" Yes, but you have a meaning when you speak of my not having a spirit. Oh, tell me what it is I"
" Why nothing, Kate, only I thought you would have more pride than to take up with another woman's leav- ings."
"Another woman's leavings!" repeated Kate, all aghast ; " another woman's leavings 1"
" That was what I observed," answered Mrs. Mason, with a slight toss of the head. " Boasting isn't in my
KATHARINE ALLEN'S VISIT. 101
line, or I could point out a certain person who gave Nelse Thrasher his walking papers more than once, as if I would condescend to him, when his superior stood hat in hand."
" You — you — was it so ? when, when ?"
" Really, Miss Allen, you take away one's breath ; of course it was before I married John Mason, as if there could be a choice."
The poor girl was thunderstruck — that beautiful face drooped slowly to her bosom, and she seemed to be shrinking into a shadow. At last, she lifted her head with a wan smile.
" That was four long years ago, more than four years ago," she cried — " Four years ago."
" Well, what of that ; four years does not destroy the truth."
"I don't believe it," said Katharine, very quietly, "there's some mistake."
" Mistake ! what does the girl mean ? as if I didn't know when a man persecutes me with his love. Makes me a point blank offer, and goes off to sea in despair when I marry his superior. Mistake, indeed !"
" No," persisted the girl, " I don't believe it ; no wo- man could refuse him if he once offered. No woman on earth ; it isn't in nature."
" Indeed, you have a mighty high opinion of Nelse Thrasher, as if he was fit to be mentioned in the same day with Captain Mason. I wonder at your daring to say these things to me."
Katharine did not hear her ; she was searching the past, urged and goaded in her memory by keen pangs of distrust.
"Besides," she exclaimed, "he has been home since , and never come near you, not even as a friend."
102 KATHARINE ALLEN'S VISIT.
" I'd like to see him have the impudence," was the angry rejoinder.
Katharine seemed bewildered a moment, and then clasped her hands in passionate despair. " What's the use — oh, what's the use of saying this ! It's terrible, and they both in the deep, deep sea."
Here Mrs. Mason's vanity broke down, and her true womanliness asserted itself.
"God forgive us for quarreling about them," she said, really penitent. " If they only come back, I shall be as glad for your sake as you will be for mine. Don't mind what I said, Katy, it isn't worth remembering. Tell me now, are you really engaged to Thrasher ?"
"Yes." This little word came faltering through lips as cold and white as snow.
"And you never told of it ?"
" What did I say — engaged ! No, we are not engaged. How could I tell you so 1"
" Well, well, there's no harm in it if you are. God Bend the Floyd and all hands safely back."
Those large eyes were lifted — oh ! how pleadingly — to heaven, and then Katharine began to gather her cloak more closely around her.
"You're not going !" said Mrs. Mason, ashamed of her unwomanly outbreak. " Just take off your cloak, and have a cup of tea. Rose and I haven't had ours yet ; I fell to thinking over my work, and forgot it."
" No," said Katharine, more quietly, " I must go now; mother will be anxious to hear. You forget, Mrs. Ma- soa, that my half-brother is on board the brig."
" Well, true enough, my head was so full of that fel- low, Thrasher, that I forgot that it might be some other person you were crying about. It's hard, waiting and
KATHARINE ALLEN'S VISIT. 103
waiting in this way ; but we must have patience, I sup- pose."
" I'll go now," said the girl, rising.
Little Rose, with the sweet instinct of childhood, came up to where the young girl stood, and lifted up her arms for a kiss.
Katharine bent down, with a flutter of the heart, and left a kiss on the little rosebud of a mouth, but her lips quivered, and the child grew sad under the mournful caress.
When Katharine Allen was gone, Mrs. Mason sat down to her work again. She was a vain, self-sufficient woman, but not in reality an unkind one. The distress which she had just witnessed left her in low spirits. She was naturally of a hopeful disposition, and, in truth, was quite incapable of the deep feeling which had dis- turbed her in Katharine. Something would turn up and set all things right, she was sure of that ; contrary winds, heavy freight — there was some such reason why the brig did not come to port ; what was the use of fretting while these chances remained. As these con- soling thoughts passed through her mind, she plied her needle with increasing diligence. Rose must have her new frock embroidered before her father came home. A few more leaves in the vine that enriched the skirt, and it would be completed. Mrs. Mason was almost out of bread, or any thing from which bread is made, but she was a woman to cover unsuitable garments with useless embroidery, rather than turn her hand to any thing by which her necessities could be supplied. She would rather have seen little Rose hungry a thousand times than ill dressed.
104 HOME PROM SEA.
CHAPTER XII.
HOME FROM SEA.
WHILE Mrs. Mason sat plying her needle, little Rose wandered about the room, wondering what made pretty Katharine Allen so very sorrowful, but keeping the thoughts to herself. In the stillness, she heard a step on the gravel walk outside the house. Then a white lilac bush near the window was disturbed, and she saw a man's face close to the glass. The child would have cried out, but the tongue clove to her mouth, and she stood transfixed with fear. She saw the door softly opened, and a strange man step to the threshold. Then her voice broke forth, and pointing her finger at the stranger, she cried out :
" Mother, mother ! it's somebody from the sea !" Mrs. Mason dropped both hands in her lap, and gazed breath- lessly on the man. Every tint of color left her hand- some face ; she tried to speak, but could not. The man was so pale and so wild of countenance that she might well have been stricken with deadly fear.
" Nelson Thrasher," she faltered at last.
He took a step into the room, but did not speak.
"Nelson Thrasher!" she almost shrieked. " If you are a living soul, speak. Where is my husband ?"
The man recoiled a step, and well he might. The question came on him so suddenly, it might have startled the boldest man on earth. It absolutely seemed to ter- rify him. He stood a moment staring at her, then answered in a low, hoarse voice :
HOME FKOM SEA. 105
" I come to tell you about him."
The little girl caught the meaning of his words, rose up and seizing his hand between both her dimpled palms cried out :
" He comes to tell about pa! Oh, please sir, where is he ? Why don't he come home ?"
Thrasher looked down in her face, and met the glance of those eyes — her father's eyes. He instantly shook her hands off as if they had been vipers, and with a ges- ture which seemed to cast aside some terrible feeling, threw himself on a chair.
" My husband 1" said Mrs. Mason. " Tell me, is he coming? — is he well?"
"Your husband, John Mason, is dead 1"
" Dead ! dead 1" The poor woman grew faint under the suddenness of this solemn announcement, and drop- ped helplessly into her chair.
Thrasher sprang up, and stretching out his arms, re- ceived her head on his bosom.
Little Rose stood in silent fear, watching them. After a moment she went close to Thrasher, and pulled at his coat.
" Let me hold mother — I don't want you there."
Thrasher pushed her away with one hand. The wo- man lay as if she were dead against his heart, which beat with iron heaviness, like the trip-hammer of a foundry.
Again the child pulled at his skirts. She was crying now.
" What is dead ? I say, man, what is dead ? I want to know !"
" See!" answered Thrasher, lifting the woman's white face from his bosom. " See !"
106 HOME FROM SEA.
" And is that it ?" whispered the child, through her hushed tears. " Mother ! mother !"
The shock and suddenness of Thrasher's tidings had overcome Mrs. Mason, but she was not entirely uncon- scious. When the child called out in her sweet, pa- thetic voice, she staggered from Thrasher's hold, and falling back into her chair, held out both arms for Rose. The little thing sprang to her lap with a cry of joy, and instantly covered the troubled face with kisses.
" Now," she said, turning her face toward Thrasher ; " now tell me about him, my dear, dear pa."
" Send the child a way, while I tell you," said Thrasher.
Rose clung to her mother's neck.
" No," said Mrs. Mason, " she must learn all some- time, and I am stronger with her near."
There was a moment's silence, then Mrs. Mason said very faintly,
" Was the ship lost ?"
" Almost — but it was not then it happened. We were on shore at Port au Prince. The blacks had risen, and a horrid murder of the white inhabitants was going on. Mason would go on shore. I warned him, but it was of no use. One night, when the massacre was at the highest, he took all hands except one or two, and left the ship. The negroes were hard at work, murdering and burning like demons. He would venture among them. It was dangerous — I told him so. Well he came back at last with a woman and little boy."
" A woman I"
" Yes, a beautiful woman, one of the handsomest you ever saw."
"Indeed!"
" He had saved her from a swarm of blacks, who had
HOME FROM SEA. 107
brought her and her son out for a carouse, under the palm trees. The boy was brought on board, but they carried the lady off to one of the little islands in the harbor. Mason, "with some of the men, went down the ship's side at night, and rowed off with her. After that Mason was never at rest, always going off on private expeditions. I did not like it, so one night, when he was determined to go, I insisted on taking a turn on shore mj'self. To own the truth, I had a little curiosity to see the house where the lady had lived, and to be cer- tain that she was not there still. Well, he consented, and I went.
" It was a splendid house ; covered an acre of ground. Such rooms, such gardens — I never saw any thing like it. The house was so large that we could not tell if it was inhabited or not, but while we were wandering around, a great noise in the lower rooms alarmed us ; we hurried through the long halls down to the under- ground cellars.
" The negroes had been there before us. Every thing was in confusion ; we waded ankle deep in red wine. The cellar was half full of negroes who had been wallow- ing there, and were now fierce with drunkenness. There was not much light, for the negroes dropped their torches, one by one, and the lees of the wine put them out. How your husband came there, I do not know. He rcust have followed us in one of the small boats. Certain it is, when I was half down the steps his face was the first I saw ; he was struggling for his life — A dozen sooty rascals were tearing at him. I gave the cry and sprang down, cutlass in hand, but before I reached him it was all over."
" And they killed him ? Oh, father of mercies, they killed him, and you saw it ?"
108 HOME FROM SB A.
"I have told you all."
The child had been growing pale as she listened, not that she quite understood, but because of the deadly whiteness which settled on her mother's face, and the hoarse voice of the man who was speaking. Mrs. Ma- son sat still. The shock of this wild story left her dumb. Thrasher cast anxious glances on her face, but if the child looked at him his eyes fell. At last, the woman found the power of speech :
" He sent no word — he died without thinking of us!"
" I cannot tell what his thoughts were, or any thing except that we found him fighting, and saw him fall."
" And who else saw him ?"
" No one. My men went into another section of the cellar. The wine was good, and they were in no hurry to follow me."
" But some one saw him after — you did not leave the dead body of my husband to be trampled on by a band of negroes ?"
"We could not help it — the blacks were ten to one."
" But did no one see him but yourself?" Did no one try to help him ?"
"Yes, one man."
"And who was he ?"
"A fellow by the name of Rice."
" What ! Katharine Allen's half brother?"
Thrasher turned paler than he had done before that evening. " Her brother — I did not know that," he mut- tered, uneasily.
Mrs. Mason did not heed this ; the conviction of her great loss grew more and more distinct to her mind ; all the desolation that must follow the cruel news of that
HOME FROM SEA. 109
evening crowded upon her. She folded the little girl close to her heart, and began to weep over her in bitter grief.
"Are you sure that Rice is connected with Katharine Allen ?" asked Thrasher, taking advantage of a pause in her sobs.
" Old Mrs. Allen was married twice," she answered, impatiently, for grief made her restive. " He was her only son by the first husband. Tell me where he is ; I want to see him. I want to know every word and look of my poor, poor husband. Where can Rice be found?"
" I don't know ; he kept with the ship. I came di- rectly home, fearing to let any less friendly person tell you the sad news."
" You were very kind," sobbed the poor woman, "very kind ; I shall never forget it."
" I always wished to be kind to you, Ellen," was the almost tender reply.
" I know it, I know it ; but he always stood between me and any other man."
Thrasher arose, and would have approached Mrs. Ma- son ; but Rose clung to her neck with one arm and waved him away with the other.
" She is my mother — you shan't touch my mother !" she cried, flashing angry glances at him through her tears. Thrasher looked upon the child with mingled hate and fear. It was wonderful how much power those deep blue eyes, sparkling with a thousand childish emo- tions, possessed over the strong man. There was some- thing spirituelle in her loveliness that impressed him, as if an angel had been reading the record of his life, and rebuked him with those violet eyes.
Thrasher arose hesitating, and almost timidly; he
110 HOME FROM SEA.
stood expecting Mrs. Mason to notice the movement ; but she was occupied with her grief, and did not observe him.
" Mother," said little Rose, smiling through her tears, " look up, mother ; the man who makes you cry is going away."
Mrs. Mason wiped her eyes, and strove to appear interested.
" Hush, Rose, hush, he has been very kind to come with this sorrowful news."
" Yes, mother, he's going right off, so don't cry any more."
Mrs. Mason reached forth her hand ; she was a tall, fine woman, with bright eyes, that tears only softened ; these eyes full of touching sorrow were lifted to his. All that was good in the man's nature arose in response to this look. His hand trembled as it grasped hers. He could have fallen on his knees and wept over it, so great was the power of love in a nature that had little else to soften it. But the eyes of the child followed his movements vigilantly, and he dropped the mother's hand with a deeply drawn breath.
" Give the gentleman a kiss, my little Rose," whis- pered the mother, touched by his humble demeanor.
Rose turned her face squarely upon him and lifted her eyes. He met their clear glance and dared not kiss her.
" Good-by," he said, standing before them uneasily.
" Good-by," answered Rose, eagerly.
" When you are better — when you are a little recon- ciled, Ellen, may I come again ?"
" No, no," shouted Rose, waving her hand, " no, no, no " <*
THE WAY-SIDE MEETING. Ill
" Be still, Rose, this is naughty. Remember he was your father's friend."
Rose hid her face and b^gan to cry. Thrasher took the mother's hand again, dropped it, and went away, softened and almost remorseful.
CHAPTER XIII.
THE WAY-SIDE MEETING.
A FOOTPATH intersected the highway some few rods below Mrs. Mason's cottage, and ran off among the hills that lay behind Castle Rock. At this point, Thrasher paused. He had only reached town that day, and his first visit had been to the white cottage. Now, he thought of his parents, who lived on a farm among those hills, and of another person whose home he must pass in going there.
" I must see her, of course," he said, mentally ; " but not at once. I have no heart for another scene. But the old folks — that will be all joy — no rebukes or entreaties ever came from that quarter. They will be hurt, too, if I sleep at a tavern, and the homestead so near."
With these affectionate thoughts urging him forward, he turned up the foot path and walked slowly on, won- dering at the tender feelings that rose and swelled in his heart as he drew near the family home.
You would not have believed that the man who walked so quietly along the greensward with the moonlight on his face, could have been the same person who stood on
112 THE WAY-SIDE MEETING.
the deck of that brig and superintended the number of lashes that should be dealt on the back of a human being. Once or twice, as his glance fell on some familiar object, a sweet brier bush, perhaps, or a cluster of tall mulleins that had grown by the footpath since he was a child, his eyes would fill with tears. There was something holy and homelike in the stillness that made a child of this cruel man.
The footpath led Thrasher into the Bungy road. He had mounted one hill and was descending into the valley which lay between it and another, when he saw some dark object sitting on a pine stump, from which he had gathered moss years before. His step was smothered on the sward, and the night wind, which made a rustling sound among the leaves of a neighboring wood, rendered his approach inaudible.
It was a woman shrouded in a cloak, but the light was so clear that he could see the outlines of her person, though her face was bent down and hoik limbs were drawn together as if she suffered from cold or sorrow.
Thrasher's heart told him at once who the woman was, and the knowledge made a coward of him. He hesitated, turned to go back, but resumed his course again, ashamed of so much weakness. The woman's face was bent down, her hands were locked around her knees, and he could hear the swell of her sobs as she rocked to and fro, as if the motion gave relief to some great pain.
Thrasher stood close by the unhappy creature, but she was lost in grief and did not look up.
"Katharine!"
She started to her feet with a cry that haunted his memory years after, and stood before him, shaking in all her limbs. Why did she not fling her arms about his
THE WAY-SIDE MEETING. 113
neck as she had done at parting ? Why did she shrink and gather the cloak so timidly around her ? Did the shadow of some great wrong fall upon her with its sundering power?"
" Katharine, you know me, but don't seem glad that I have come."
" Not glad — oh, my heart is dumb with joy ! I thought . — I feared that you were dead, Nelson, and the idea was driving me crazy. I was trying to pray when you came up."
She stole timidly toward him and held out her hand.
''Is it real — are you alive and here ? Oh how good you are, coming to our house the first moment to see me, for I know well enough you did want to see me — while I was doubting if you would care about me after being away so long, and wondering what I should do. You are not changed, Nelson ; you love me yet as well • — better than ever."
There was something in the girl's manner that Thrasher did not understand. She seemed frightened, and shrunk from approaching him. This was so unlike the childlike affection with which she had hitherto met him, that he stood looking upon her in surprise, mingled with a little irritation.
''Why, Katharine, what is the matter? You are so changed — it may be the moonlight, but your face seems thinner and less rosy.'
She turned her eyes upon him with a wan smile, but did not answer at once.
"You have changed, perhaps, and found some one you like better."
There was something in his tones that stung her ; a hopeful questioning as if he wished rather than dreaded t
11-i THE WAY-SIDE MEETING.
this change. She looked at him reproachfully, and her blue eyes floated in tears.
" Oh, Nelson !"
The words were uttered in a very low voice, but in their quietness lay deep pathos. She moved close to his side and laid one hand on his shoulder, waiting: for
7 O
him to return the caress. He placed his arm lightly, and it seemed half reluctantly, about her waist. She felt the chill at her heart.
" You are changed 1" she said, in a loud, clear voice, that sounded to his ear like a challenge. " You come here not to meet, but to abandon me."
Thrasher tightened his arm around her.
" Is this the way I abandon you ?" he said.
She withdrew herself quietly from his arms, and fix- ing her eyes on his face gave him a long, sorrowful look.
The moonlight lay full on his features. His dark e}Tes looked into hers ; a smile, half mocking, half pleasant, hung on his lip. He was a tall, handsome man, and the moonlight refined his face into remarkable beauty.
" Are you trying me, Nelson ?" she said, half return- ing the smile. " Don't — don't — I have trouble enough without that."
" Trouble — was there ever a girl of your age without it, I wonder ? Come, take my arm, and as we walk along you shall tell me what great misfortune sent you here crying and rocking yourself like an old woman turned out of doors."
Katharine tried to laugh and took his arm, leaning on it with that half caressing, half dependent grace which a woman who loves from her soul assumes unconsciously. Formerly, when her arm touched his, he had, at a time like this, taken the willing hands in his clasp, but
THE WAY-SIDE MEETING. 115
the touch of Ellen Mason's fingers thrilled his nerves even yet, and Katharine's hand drooped helplessly over his arm.
" Now tell me what this great, great trouble is ?" he said, walking forward.
" Wait until we get into the shadow of the woods, and I will," she replied, in a low, choked voice.
They walked on in dead silence, entered the shadow of the wood, paused in the darkest spot, and talked earnestly together. When they came in the moonlight again, Thrasher looked pale and angry. He walked fast, sometimes forcing her on beyond her strength, and cutting up the silk weed and nmlleins in his path with fierce dashes of his walking-stick. Katharine made no resistance, for a cold, dead silence, which shut out all joy, had fallen on her.
They came to a little brown house, under the shelter of a hill, and half covered with morning-glories — a pretty, rustic place in which Katharine lived alone with her mother. A board fence ran along the front yard, hedging in some lilac bushes and a huge snowball bush. A flower bed ran along each side of the walk, from the gate to the door. All this looked pretty and cool, in its night dew, and Thrasher recognized the fa- miliar objects with something like a pang.
Katharine withdrew her arm from his at the gate ; she tried to speak, and ask him to go in, for a light shone through one of the windows, and the old lady was evi- dently waiting for Katharine to come home before she went to bed ; her lips trembled, but refused to utter the invitation ; he read it in her eyes, however, and shook his head.
" Not to-night — another time we will talk this over."
116 THE OLD HOME.
They parted with these words, and Thrasher walked on at a more rapid pace than he had yet used. Katha- rine watched him mournfully as he disappeared, then, with a deep sigh, she entered the house.
CHAPTER XIV.
THE OLD HOME AND THE OLD PEOPLE.
A LITTLE way over the hill from Mrs. Allen's dwelling, stood a low, red farm house which covered a good deal of ground, and possessed many pleasant surroundings, such as marked the more thrifty class of farmers in those days. Rows of stiff, Lombardy poplars stood in lines before the house, looking more like mammoth um- brellas, verdant in color, and shut up for the season, than any thing else. Tall, cinnamon roses clambered up the front, while a whole forest of lilac and snowball bushes cast their shadows on the rich sward of the door yard. At the back was a fine apple orchard which filled the air all around with the delicate perfume of its blos- soms in the spring-time, and gave out a rich, fruity odor in the autumn. A well sweep pencilled its slender shadow along the plantain leaves that grew rank at the back door, and beyond that, the distant outlines of a cider-mill could be imperfectly seen through the orchard boughs.
Every thing seemed natural to the stern man, as he drew near the homestead. He could not remember a time when the old place did not look thrifty and com-
THE OLD HOME. 117
fortable, as it appeared then. A few dry branches bristled here and there among the poplars, speaking of progressive age, like gray hairs in the head of a strong man, but they were scarcely perceptible in the moon- light, and Thrasher could see no change since the years of his boyhood.
The family sitting room was back of the house, and through the windows a gleam of light shot along the grass. Thrasher passed through the yard, and, pausing beneath the window, looked in. The paper blind was partly rolled up, and he thus commanded a view of the entire room.
Two old people sat together on the hearth, where a few embers lay smouldering. A round, cherry wood stand stood between them, from which towered a mas- sive brass candlestick, supporting the only light that burned in the room.
The old lady was knitting. What a sweet, benign ex- pression slept on her face ! How softly the white hair was folded under her cap 1 The pure, healthy bloom on her cheek was something wonderful. It made you in love with the beauty of old age.
The old man was reading aloud ; the great family bible lay open before him, and his deep, reverential voice could be distinctly heard through the imperfectly closed window. As Thrasher looked, the old man removed the spectacles from his eyes, and laid them on the page he had been reading, while he listened smilingly to some observation that his wife had made, but which, with her lower and softer tones, Thrasher had lost.
" How many times have we read this chapter together, Eunice — so many that neither you nor I can remember them ; but every reading brings out something new —
118 THE OLD HOME.
something more holy than we ever found before. Isn't that your experience ?"
"Yes," answered the old lady, taking a seauistitch with serene precision as she spoke. " It seems to me, husband, that one never learns really what is in the Bible till old age comes on. When we were young, I can remember being so tired when the morning chapter was read, and full of other thoughts, that I am sorry to remember now. That is the reason I always had so much charity for our Nelson. Poor child, he never could sit still through a whole chapter — boy or man !"
"I'm afraid," answered the old man, with a heavy sigh. "I'm a 'most afraid, Eunice, that we neglected to perform our whole duty to the boy at the start. He was such a bright child, that we wandered off into ambition and worldly pride where he was concerned. Now, that we are getting old, and a'most as good as childless, this idea troubles me more than a little. Maybe, if you and I had been a little more strict with the boy, he'd have got over them roving notions, and stayed at home."
"I don't know," said the old lady, putting on her glasses to loop up a stitch, while a shade of trouble came to her face. " It seems to me as if nothing would ever have kept Nelson on the farm. He was too high strung for that. But what then? Every body isn't of the same idea, you know ; and if the education we gave our son helped to unsettle him for our way of life, it fitted him for another. Remember, he went out first mate this time."
" He's a brave boy, any way," said the old man, kin- dling with the subject ; " and if the season of grace has not reached his soul yet, we must only pray the more earnestly."
THE OLD HOME. 119
" Yes," whispered the mother. " Pray without ceas- ing, and in every thing give thanks !"
" If we did not kneel to the throne of grace in his be- half so often as we might have done in our younger days, we must make up for it now, for our son will some day make a shining light in the house of the righteous," continued the father. " I feel it. I know it, Eunice."
The old lady sighed.
"I'm afraid that even now I pray that he may come back to his home, before I think of his eternal salvation, for that wish is always uppermost with me."
The old man smiled reprovingly, and shook his head.
"Ah, Eunice !"
" I can't help it," sighed the mother, confessing her weakness, with a deprecating smile. " He is my only child — all the precious, earthly blessing we have. I can't help being proud and fond of him."
" How could you, when I, a strong man — one that the brethren sometimes look up to, as all the church mem- bers will admit — can't keep back the pride of having a sou like that. There's no denying it. Nelson is a young man that must put a temptation of pride into his pa- rents' path. It seems to me as if I were a stronger man and you a handsomer woman for having a son like him."
" So honorable, so handsome, "murmured the old lady.
" So strong and energetic," responded the father.
"Ah, if he would but come onee more to see his old father and mother."
The old lady bent over her knitting, and pretended to search for a false stitch, but it was only to conceal the tears that swelled tenderly into her eyes.
Thrasher could bear no more. The man loved his pa- rents, and those soft tears in his mother's eyes brought
120 THE OLD HOME.
moisture to his own. How innocent and childlike the old people were, in comparison with him. Satan, when looking over the flow'ry walls of Paradise, must have felt as he did, listening to that household conversation.
The old man took up his glasses again, and began to read. The mother kept on with her work, listening, with meek faith, to the holy words that fell from her hus- band's lips. All at once she started, dropped the knit- ting in her lap, and listened.
" It is his step !"
The old man raised his face from the Bible, and lis- tened, also.
" Yes, Eunice, it is 1"
The door opened, and their son stood on the threshold — a strong, handsome fellow, such as the father had de- scribed him. There was no outcry of joy, no wordy demonstrations ; but a tender gladness possessed the old people. The mother kissed him, almost timidly. There was something that awed her tenderness in this powerful young man, though he did tremble in her gentle embrace.
" My son, you are welcome home — oh, my son !"
There was something hearty and patriarchal in this welcome of the father. The noble old Christian that forgave his prodigal son must have spoken much after the same fashion.
They shook hands — the father and son — with a firm, lingering clasp, while the mother looked on, smiling through her tears. With your genuine J^ew England housemother, hospitality is always the servitor of affec- tion. The night dew lay heavily on her son's garments. He looked pale and tired. The mother's heart rose piti- fully in her bosom ; she insisted upon raking open the
THE OLD HOME. 121
fire, and getting a warm cup of tea ; even went so far as to offer a cider-brandy sling, with toasted crackers float- ing on the top.
Thrasher yielded himself to her tender care. It was wonderful how submissive and grateful that strong- willed man had become under womanly influences. He declined tea, but accepted the glass of smoking drink which the mother prepared. Soon the old man took a tumbler, also, and praised it greatly ; for religious men and elders of the church, in those times, thought it no sin to make themselves comfortable with a glass of hot drink before bedtime, never dreaming that their limited indulgence might lead to excess in the coming genera- tion— excess which even legal enactments have failed to remedy. Having no fear and no conscientious scruples on the subject, the old man enjoyed his glass, and filled that of his son more than once ; for, somehow, the color would not come genially to the young man's face, and after the first glow of his reception had passed off, he seemed depressed, almost gloomy.
The old lady took her seat again on the patchwork cushion of blue and red cloth which Thrasher could re- member from his childhood, and attempted to resume her knitting ; but the plump little hands trembled so much that she gave it up, and drawing back into the shadow, had a sweet, motherly cry all to herself. It was pleasant to hear those two voices blending together in their talk. It was heaven to know that the whole family sat on one hearth again. She could not be thankful enough. What had she done to merit so much happi- ness at the hands of the Lord.
This pious tinder-current of feelings mingled with the conversation as it went on between the two men, leaping
122 THE OLD HOME.
rapidly from subject to subject, as always happens when members of one family have been long separated. While the mother was wrapped in dreamy thanksgivings, the old man, not less grateful or affectionate, fell to ques- tioning his son about his voyage, the fate of the ship, and the terrible scenes which had been enacted at St. Domingo, while she lay in the harbor of Port au Prince.
Thrasher went into the thrilling details. He was naturally eloquent, and the intense interest manifested by his parents, made his pictures as graphic as the re- ality ; but another person might have remarked, though his parents did not, that he avoided mentioning either his own share or that of Captain Mason in these exciting events.
" But how long did this last, Nelson ? Was the brig kept in harbor all the time ? Some of the neighbors began to fear that she was lost ; but your mother and I hoped and prayed, didn't we, mother ?"
The mother smiled on her son, answering :
" Nelson always knows that we hope and pray when he is upon the great deep."
" But where is the brig now ; at her port ?" questioned the father, after a brief pause.
" No, we were compelled to abandon her ; one of the most terrible storms I ever faced on sea or land, took us unprepared. It swept us clean from stem to stern. Another hour and we should have gone down like a handful of drift wood — for days and days we floated on the ocean, no sails, our masts gone, nothing to rig new ones with. The men were discouraged, some of them threatening mutiny ; for a negro and a little boy that came on board at Port au Prince, the only creatures that I know of who escaped the massacre, were missing just
9
THE OLD HOME. 123
after the storm, and the fellows would believe that I had something to do with it, so they sulked and threatened until I began to fear for my life. Nothing but our own great peril prevented them rising.
" At last, the brig sprang a leak, and what with work- ing at the pumps night and day? hard commons and no drink — for I staved the casks in — they had plenty to do without turning on me. It was enough to put down any rebellion to hear the water rushing and gurgling into the hold, faster, a great deal, than all hands could pump it out. SOj while working for their own lives, they for- got to take mine."
" Thank God for this great deliverance," said the old man, solemnly.
The son paused an instant, and then went on.
" The water gained on us ; we worked desperately, but the brig sunk lower, and lower, till we had scarcely a hope left."
" Then," whispered the mother " you thought of us, my son."
" Of his God," said the old man, devoutly ; " he prayed to God and so found safety."
Thrasher was no hypocrite ; he remembered how dif- ferent the scene had proved to any thing his parents imagined, and felt rebuked by their simplicity.
" Yes, mother, I did think of you both with an ach- ing heart. As for prayers, we sailors have little time for them. But I was telling you of our condition ; it was forlorn enough. The men gave out and refused to work. Persuasions went for nothing — threats were of no use. They were tired out and wanted to die. You have no idea, father, how reckless such men are."
" No, sou ; I couldn't imagine it."
124: THE OLD HOME.
"At last, when all was given up, and we had nothing to do but die, a sail hove in sight."
" Thanks be to God 1" ejaculated the old man, lifting his clasped hands, while tears stole softly down the mother's cheek.
" ' Sail 0 !' That was1 a shout which filled us with new life. We tore off our jackets, we searched for fragments of the old sails, our voices rose in wild, hoarse shouts, that sounded awfully along the waters. At first, she did not see us, but seemed steering another way. Our de- spair broke forth in one mighty shriek I It reached them — we could see a commotion on the deck. Breath- less with expectation, grouped together like so many ghosts, we watched her slacken sail, and bear down upon us. Then the strongest man among us burst into tears 1 That moment I shall never, never forget !"
"Not while there is a merciful God to thank!" said the father, shaking the tears from his cheek as a lion flings dew-drops from his mane. Low sobs broke from the darkened portion of the room. During her son's narration the good mother had sunk unconsciously to her knees, and lay prostrate before her God, trembling with thankfulness.
Thrasher went on :
" We took to the friendly vessel, all but three persons. They would not leave the wreck. No persuasion could move them. It was a terrible thing, but the ship sailed away, leaving them to their fate !"
" And who were these men, my boy ?"
"Rice, old Mr. Allen's son."
" God help the poor woman."
" With the negro and boy I told you of. They had taken the boat and put out to sea alone — after drifting
BREAKFAST IN THE HOMESTEAD. 125
fire or six days hither and yon, they were taken up by the vessel that afterward saved us. They saw the wreck and came to her in the first boat. When Rice refused to abandon the brig they sat down by his side, and so we were compelled to leave them."
"And is this all ? — did yon never hear of them again ?" inquired the mother, rising to her feet.
"No; we never heard of them after that. They di-ifted off with the wreck, and what became of them no one can tell. "
" This will be sorrowful news for our neighbor. Hus- band, I wish some other person than our son had brought it."
Thrasher arose hastily.
" Good night, mother. Shall I sleep in the old room ?"
His voice shook, and he seemed greatly disturbed.
" Yes, yes, my son. You are tired out. Go up to your old room."
CHAHTER XV.
BREAKFAST IN THE OLD HOMESTEAD.
NELSON THRASHER could not sleep under his father's roof. The neat, high posted bed, with its blue and white coverlet that he had slept under in boyhood, was so familiar that it seemed to reproach him in its homeliness for the great change that had fallen on himself. The little looking-glass over the cherry-wood dressing stand, flashed upon him like a human eye angry and fierce at the intrusion of a guilty man where an innocent boy had
126 BREAKFAST IN THE HOMESTEAD.
slept. As his foot touched the rag carpet, worn smooth by his light tread, years ago, the breath paused on his lips, and the stern face softened into sadness so deep, that his worst enemy might have pitied him.
That instant the old man's voice rose solemnly through the stillness of the night. From the depths of his heart, he was thanking God that his son had returned. Every word of that prayer rose to the son, rebuking him to the soul. He fell upon his knees, unconsciously occupying the very spot on which his first prayer had been learned from his mother's lips. Bitter repentance swept over him for the minute, and covering his face with both hands, he cried like a child.
But such feelings could not hold that stern nature long. When the old man ceased, Thrasher shook the tears from his eyes, and stood up, turning his face away from the glass, hating that it should reflect the workings of which he was even then ashamed. It was useless ; the familiar things around him were full of associations that would make themselves felt. He put out the can- dle, and got into bed, his eyes filling in the darkness as he lifted the coverlet.
Still he could not sleep. The dear old objects were all shut out, but the home feeling was too strong. For that one hour he was almost a good man.
As he lay in the darkness, a soft tread came on the Btairs, and the door of his room swung open. He knew all about it. The footsteps were his mother's. How often he had heard them, in childhood, coming up, be- cause the kind woman fancied that he might be afraid, or ill, or that the coverlet had slipped from over him. Just as of old, she glided through the door and close to the bed. He feigned sleep, that she might not guess
BREAKFAST IN THE HOMESTEAD. 127
how much he had been acting like a child. She stood beside him, full of motherly tenderness, yearning for a few last words before she went to rest ; but with gentle self-command, waiting for some sign that he was awake. When she found that his eyes were closed and his breath came evenly, she bent down and kissed him on the fore- head more than once, whispering his name to herself, as she had done a thousand times over his cradle.
Still he did not move ; the kiss stole like an angel's whisper through his heart. For the moment, it sancti- fied him, even in his own eyes. This did not appear to awake him, and the mother could attempt no more. Still she lingered, settled his pillow, delicatety as a bird smoothes the plumage of its young, and tucked up the bed, blessing him the while. It was not chilly, but the action put her in mind of old times, and she loved it.
At last that gentle mother glided out of the room, and he drew a deep breath, longing to call her back, confess how far he had gone astray, and become as a little child again.
The night wore on, and he had not slept a moment. Many thoughts came crowding over the holy ones that possessed him, and finally overpowered them. He thought of Mrs. Mason — his first, his only love — for this truth he confessed to himself over and over again, in the stillness of that night, when the difficulties of his position crowded close upon him. He thought of Kath- arine Allen, not with solicitude, such as the poor crea- ture's fate should have inspired, but bitterly, harshly, for she was a stumbling-block in his way, an object al- most of dislike. Though a cruel man, Thrasher was not recklessly so to women — thoughts of his mother always kept him from that. Still, he almost cursed Katharine
128 BREAKFAST IN THE HOMESTEAD.
in the struggles of that night, for she stood between him and the great desire of his life — John Mason's widow. But for her, he could make a brief wooing, settle down by his old parents, and without temptations to evil courses, become a man of power, for he possessed that which enabled him to accomplish almost every thing, an unlimited control of wealth. But with this young crea- ture in the way, what could he do but plunge into schemes that brought sin and peril with them, such as he shrunk from encountering. Abandon his father and mother — go off to some unknown country with the wo- man of his love — cast off all duties — leave that beautiful girl to die of grief — could he do that ?
Thus the good angels and the evil spirits struggled over that man all night long. In the morning, neither had the mastery. On ship-board, the guardian angel would have been driven forth at once ; but under his father's roof, there was something of heaven which would not let the seraph go.
After daylight the young man fell asleep, weary with thoughts that still left their shadows on his forehead. The mother came up twice to call him, but seeing the weariness in his handsome face, went away, holding her breath, and walking on tiptoe.
At last he came down-stairs, and found the old people, with the table spread and the breakfast dishes standing on the hearth, patiently waiting till he should join them.
It was of no use struggling. Over a breakfast table like that the good angels held control ; nothing worse could hover near those blessed old people upon their own hearth-stone. There every thing spoke of the old time — the round table, covered with bird's-eye linen, homemade, glossy as a snow crust, and as white. The
I BREAKFAST IX THE HOMESTEAD. 129
same sprigged china and quaint teaspoons. The silver teapot — old-fashioned even then — had been brought out for the first time in years, and stood emitting dainty puffs of steam between the andirons. The old lady looked at her son and at the teapot witTi conscious smiles, which said plainly as smiles could speak, " You see that I keep nothing back when my son comes home, not even that 1"
Thrasher smiled as he gathered in this picture. It was the smile of a stern character, and changed his whole face. Rare must be the smile which makes a hu- man heart leap. You never heed perpetual sunshine, but that which flashes through clouds makes itself felt and remembered.
" How much he looks like his father now," thought the mother, while the old man held out his hand, and grasped that of his son with a hearty " good-morning." " Son," said the old lady, as she took up the teapot, with a little flutter, like that of a bird pluming itself, " now that we are all together — the whole family, you know — supposing we sit down at once. Your father usually goes to prayers before breakfast, Nelson, but we'll just put it off till afterward — don't you think so, husband ?"
A strong sense of duty alone kept the old man from saying yes, at once ; but he wasn't to be led into temp- tation by the fond designs of that precious little wo- man, not he ; nor by the fear that his son would rather not. Morning prayers didn't happen to be duties so lightly disposed of, in his estimation. He motioned the old lady to leave the breakfast where it was, on the hearth, and taking the great Bible from its stand, began to read with solemn deliberation. 8
BREAKFAST IN THE HOMESTEAD.
Thrasher liked this ; had his father varied in any thing from the steady goodness of his character, it would have been a sad disappointment to the son ; for such persons are generally the most keen-sighted in de- tecting the 'weakness of good men. Besides, there is something holy in the religious associations of an early home, which no man or woman can see disturbed with- out pain.
I am afraid that the old man, in compunction for a momentary impulse to yield, made his pra}7er a little longer than usual, and dwelt elaborately on that point which asked deliverance from temptation. Certain it is, that according to the habit of the times, he spoke of himself as a hardened sinner, and confessed to short- comings and taints of original depravity that must have made the recording angel — who had set down nothing but good deeds to his account for many a long year — smile in benign patience.
Once, as the good Christian gave signs of prolonging his devotions, the old lady turned softly on her knees and pushed the dish, which contained a choice delicacy for her son, close to the fire ; but she blushed in the act, and covering her face the instant it was accomplished, whispered " amen" at the end of a sonorous sentence in which her husband acknowledged the native depravity of every soul within the created world.
Still Nelson Thrasher was not impatient. Every word of the old man's voice thrilled him through and through. It would have taken something more than that to up- heave the stern selfishness of his character to any pur- pose ; but manj7' a good feeling rose to the surface which, for the time, made him a better man.
They sat down to breakfast at last, and a right hearty
BREAKFAST IN THE HOMESTEAD. 131
New England breakfast it was. The old man talked pleasantly on eArery subject that came up. He possessed a clear, energetic mind, and had read a great deal more than was common to his class. His intelligence was active to seize on any food that presented itself, and his son's adventures by sea and land, were as exciting as a romance ; not that old Mr. Thrasher knew what a ro- mance was, or would have allowed one to enter his door if he had. Indeed, the Pilgrim's Progress had disturbed his rnind a good deal from the fact that it was not an actual, instead of an ideal truth. As a great many con- scientious people condemn the theatre, but fill the boxes of an opera, every night, this old-fashioned Christian listened to his son's spoken romances with infinite zest. They appealed keenly to his imagination, which found little aliment in any book he read, except when it seized upon the grandest of all poetry — that of the Bible.
So the father asked questions, the son answered them pleasantly, and that dear old lady sat smiling upon them both from behind her silver teapot ; convinced from the depths of her heart that she was the happiest and most good-for-nothing old mother that ever di-ew the breath of life, and ought to be ashamed of herself for not deserving all this joy more thoroughly.
After breakfast, Thrasher took his hat, and prepared to go out. The old gentleman, in the innocence of his heart, proposed to accompany him, but Mrs. Thrasher began to nod and signalize him across the table, and he sat down rather bewildered.
" Don't you see," said the old lady, with a sweet, know- ing smile, " Nelson is sure to find his way down to Mrs. Allen's — he must have loved us very much to come by without stopping last night. I shouldn't wonder if that girl kept him at home ?"
132 BREAKFAST IN THE HOMESTEAD.
" You don't say so !" exclaimed the father, in blank astonishment; "well, I never thought of that."
" Why, don't you remember how often he used to go there the time he came home before this, and how he went to York State to see her when she was out there with her uncle that winter, going to school."
" Well, wife, I shouldn't wonder if there was some- thing in it," said the old man, going to the window and looking after his son.
The mother emitted a low, mellow laugh ; she was rather proud of her quicker penetration, and patronized the old gentleman accordingly.
" Why of course there's something in it," she said, nestling herself up to his side, and putting a lock of gray hair back from his temples with her finger. He'll hang round her a little while — go down the hill two or three times a day likely, while we don't seem to know any thing about it — and then think he's surprising us, when he says that he's going to marry Katharine Allen, if we've no objections. Of course we shan't have any — for she's a nice girl and handsome as a picture. Then there'll be a wedding down yonder. You'll buy the wine, and I'll find the cake. Mrs. Allen has got lots of homespun, and Nelson won't want much for a setting out, for this house isn't badly off for furniture, and I've been thinking of a new cherry-tree chest of drawers some time."
The old man laughed pleasantly.
" My wife, you've got them married and to house- keeping before he's crossed the top of the hill."
" But wouldn't it be nice ? She's a smart girl, and might take a great deal of care off me. As for Nelson, if he once took to farming what a hand he would make at it !"
BREAKFAST IN THE HOMESTEAD. 133
"And you believe all this ?"
" Why shouldn't I ? there's nothing unnatural about it, nor wrong either — besides I am sure Katharine likes him."
"Well, wife, any thing that keeps the boy at home will satisfy me. Marriage is an institution of the Lord, and no good man should say a word against it."
" Of course not, for that would be to slander our own youth. See, there is Nelson now, looking down toward Mrs. Allen's house. That's him under the but'nut tree. He's just stepped on the rock — you re- member it. I wonder what he's flirting out his silk handkerchief for ?"
" It's to scare off the crows, I reckon," answered the father, watching the movements of his son with some curiosity, "they're greater pests than ever, this year."
" No," said the old lady, " it's more than that. See, something moves on the other side of the stone wall. It's a woman — she's climbing over. Why don't he help her, I wonder ? Yes, just as I thought, it is Katharine Allen. What do you say to that ?"
" Well," answered the old man, flushing around the temples. " I say it isn't likely the young folks think that we are spying after them. If they want to have a talk by themselves, I'm sure we've no objections. You and I have been but 'nutting together in our lives, haven't we ?"
I am not sure that the old man did not kiss the face that was lifted smilingly to his. There was no one by, and he was so very happy all the morning — who could wonder at it ? The old lady, at any rate, made no ado about the matter, but nestled a little closer to his side, and asked "if he saw Nelson and Katharine yet?"
134 BREAKFAST IX THE HOMESTEAD.
" They are sitting on the rock together, wife, talking, no doubt ; but we must not be watching them. Young folks don't like that, 3rou know."
"Well, only just say that you think there's something in it, and I won't turn my eyes that way again ; though it's a trial for a mother not to look on her son any- where, after he has been away from home so long."
The father himself seemed to feel that it was a hard- ship, for, after walking across the room once or twice, he came back to the window where his wife still remained.
" See, husband, how Katharine jumps up and seems to be wringing her hands. What can ail her ?"
" Maybe Nelson is telling her about leaving her half- brother on the wreck ; that is enough to make the poor girl wring her hands — as for Mrs. Allen, nothing but the grace of God can carry her through this trouble. She hasn't seen her son for years, and was just expecting him home."
" Supposing I go right down and comfort her," whis- pered the good woman, her heart full of tender pity. " Or would she rather be left alone, I wonder?"
" Wait till the first grief goes off; after that, company may do her good."
"Poor girl, how she takes on, while Nelson sits there as if nothing was the matter. No, no, I am wrong ; he's taken hold of her hands. He's talking to her — how kind of him. See, Katharine is quieter already. She sits down again ; I know well enough, if any thing on earth could pacify her, he could. The dear boy !"
A PAINFUL INTERVIEW. 135
CHAPTER XVI.
A PAINFUL INTERVIEW.
TRULY, Catharine Allen had sprung to her feet, and was wringing her hands in wild, bitter grief, at the news of her half-brother's death, for such she considered the account Thrasher gave her. True, she had never seen Rice since she was \ little girl, and he was scarcely known in the neighborhood, as Mrs. Allen had moved to her present home with her second husband, and her son had gone to sea long before that. In her second widowhood, he had sometimes sent her money and warm- hearted letters, written in a great, cramped hand, which no one but a mother could have read. In her retired life, Mrs. Allen, who was a middle-aged woman when Katharine was born, had looked forward to news from her son as the great event of her life. With only her house, a few acres of land, and her pretty daughter's labor to depend on for a livelihood, the twenty and thirty dollars which came to her from this son, at the end of each voyage, was a great help. Without it, the widow and her beautiful daughter must have come to want, especially when sickness was in the house.
Now he was- dead — the brave, generous man, whom Katharine had been taught to love like a father ; and even while Thrasher told his own story, and her loving heart was almost given up to fond credulity, she was not quite satisfied that Rice might not have been saved. To leave him on the wreck even at his own request, seemed to her a terrible cruelty.
V
136 A PAINFUL INTERVIEW.
" He was my brother," she said ; " the only support we had. He was so generous — so good to us both I Oh, Nelson, you should have saved him !"
" How did I know he was your brother, Katharine ? He never told me a word about it ; and if I ever heard the name, it had escaped me."
" But he was a human being ; a mother waited for him, somewhere. You should have remembered that."
" It is useless talking in this way, Katharine," replied Thrasher, striving to pacify her grief. " I could only have saved him by violence. He would not come with us, but stuck to the wreck, under some wild idea that she might yet be taken into port. I could have died with him, but nothing beyond that was possible."
" Oh, my mother I my poor mother ! must I tell her this?" moaned Katharine.
" Perhaps it would have pleased you better had I gone down with him ?"
" You ! — you ! Oh, that would have completed our desolation ! The news would have killed me dead !"
" Then don't attempt to make me out a murderer."
" I haven't— I haven't !"
" Sit down, Katherine. These wild gestures will be seen from the house, and the old people won't know what to make of it. Sit down and compose yourself. This is not the only subject we have to talk about."
" I know it — I know it ; but the thought of carrying the grief to my mother kills me."
" This is childish — I will submit to it no longer," cried Thrasher, beginning to lose patience. " Sit down, I say, and control yourself!" He took hold of her hands, grasping them till they burned with pain, and drew her forcibly to the rock. She looked at him breath- lessly ; the expression of his face frightened her.
A PAINFUL INTERVIEW. 137
" Now that you can be still," he said, sternly, " I have a great deal to say about our conversation last night. Will you try and listen like a rational creature ?"
She was sobbing bitterly, and could only give an as- sent by a motion of the head.
" Well, regarding the senseless event which you make so much of "
" Senseless, Nelson 1" She looked up, as the words left her lips, and gazed at him reproachfully through her tears.
" Yes, senseless I What else could an act like that be considered ? I was a man — and should have known better. What good has it done to be in such desperate haste ?"
" What good ? — what good ? Did we not love each other?"
Something like a sneer came to Thrasher's lip. He longed to tell her the truth. It seemed the surest means of putting her out of the way.
" You don't speak, Nelson. You look strange when I say, ' Did we not love each other?'"
"No- wonder, Katharine — why should you ask the question ? If to make a fool of one's self is a proof of love, you have it 1"
" To make a fool of one's self?" The poor girl turned white to the lips as she repeated these insulting words. " What does this mean, Nelson ?"
" It means that you and I went off, like a couple of dunces, and got married !"
Katharine stopped crying. Surprise, for a moment, kept her mute ; but directly there came into her eyes a proud, almost fierce determination, that Thrasher had never witnessed before.
138 A PAINFUL INTERVIEW.
" Do you mean this ?" she said at last, in a low, clear voice, that made him start.
"Mean what?"
" That you are sorry for having married me."
There was something in her face that startled him — that woman's character had a depth and strength which he had not dreamed of until then. It was not his habit to evade or equivocate much, but now he saw the ne- cessity.
" I haven't said that, and did not mean it, my spar- row-hawk. How could I?"
" Then, what did you say ? — what did you mean ?"
"Nothing, except that it was a great folly — but a very pleasant one — when we got married in that private way. It would have been better to have waited."
" But it was you that urged me."
" To the marriage, but not the secrecy, that was your own doings entirely, Kate. I wanted you to go at once and live with the old folks, while I went this voyage, but you begged and pleaded to stay with your mother, and what could I do but consent. Of course, as my wife, you must have lived with my family, so you preferred secrecy and your mother. It was a foolish arrangement altogether." *,
" My poor mother was so sad and lonely then, I could not bear to leave her ; besides, I did not dare tell her about it while she was in poor health — she would have taken on dreadfully — for somehow "
" Yes, I know she hated me."
" No, not that ; but mother*has strange prejudices.*"
" I should think she had. I have not forgotten her forbidding me the house ; but for that "
" What were you saying, Nelson ? your voice is verv husky."
JEALOUS PANGS. 139
" I was saying that we should not have been led into the weakness of this concealment if she had been more reasonable."
" Well, if it was a weakness or a sin I have suffered for it keenly enough, Nelson. While my mother had those hard feelings I could not tell her. Oh, Nelson, it seemed as if I should die when the time for your return came and we heard nothing of the brig. If you had been lost, what would have become of me ? No one would have believed that I had ever been married, no matter what I had said."
" But you had the certificate ?"
" Yes, but the people here don't understand those things. They're used to a publishment and all that. They never would see the difference between Connecti- cut and York State. Then, if they had sent to my un- cle he knew nothing about it, you remember, and could not have helped me. Besides, I didn't even know where to find the people that stood up with us."
" Why, child, all these fears are nonsense. The cer- tificate is enough."
" But it's all of no consequence now. You are here and we can speak out. It isn't like a poor girl being all alone without knowing any thing of the law."
CHAPTER XVII.
JEALOUS PANGS REGARDING MRS. MASON.
THRASHER sat with his hands clasped over one knee, looking thoughtfully on the ground as she spoke. Kath-
JEALOUS PANGS.
arine had nestled close to his side, and was looking wistfully into his face.
" There isn't any trouble now, Nelson. Mother may be angry for awhile, but it won't be forever."
"I was thinking," said Thrasher, with his eyes reso- lutely fixed on the ground, " I was thinking that, as it had gone so far, we had better put off telling about it till after my next trip."
Katharine turned white, and suddenly shrank away from him. He did not seem to notice it, but went on in the same even voice.
" It will not be long — not more than two or three months at the most."
Katharine held her breath and listened, but sobs were gathering thick and heavy in her bosom.
" Three months ! — three months ! Oh, Nelson !" and now the sobs broke forth with painful violence.
" It may be less than that — I will get the shortest voyage that can be found. But for the shipwreck this might not have been so necessary ; as it is, one must have a little money to go to housekeeping with. You wouldn't have me ask my father for that?"
" No, no. Besides, what would mother do without me just now — with this dreadful news to bear up against?" cried Katharine, hushing her sobs.
" I was sure you would see the whole thing in this sensible way, dear."
Katharine wiped her eyes and made a miserable effort to smile.
" Yes, I suppose it is best. But what if something happens to keep you away longer ? — I should die ! I should die !"
"But nothing can happen. If it should — that is, if I
JEALOUS PANGS. 141
do not come back in three months at the furthest — take your certificate, go up to my mother, show it to her, and tell the old folks to take care of you for my sake ; for after that, you may consider yourself a widow 1"
"A widow?"
" Yes, beyond a doubt ; for if I do not come back in three months, be sure that nothing but death keeps mel"
" Don't ! don't 1" cried the poor wife, lifting her hands as if to ward off a blow.
" Well, well ; there's nothing so dreadful about all this. One would think, by that face, you saw me in the water now, with a stone at my feet."
Again Katharine held up her hands and shut her eyes. The picture was too dreadful.
Spite of himself, Thrasher was touched by this evidence of affection ; he changed his position, and stole his arm around her waist.
" There, now, we have settled all this terrible business, and can talk of brighter things," he said, caressingly. " Have you seen much of the old people since I went away?"
" I had no heart to go there often ; but sometimes I saw your father at the gate. He always stopped if I was there when he rode by ; and when mother was sick, Mrs. Thrasher always came."
" Dear old lady !" said Thrasher, with emotion. " When was she ever away when help could be given ? Tinder all circumstances she will be good to you, wife or widow."
" Don't use that word widow ; it makes me cold."
" Yet it is sometimes a pleasant word," said Thrasher, forgetting her presence in thoughts of another.
"A pleasant word, Nelson ?"
"Pleasant! — did I say so? How strange that one's tongue will make such blunders."
14:2 JEALOUS PANGS.
Katharine was thoughtful for a moment. Something in her husband's manner brought back the feelings she had experienced at Mrs. Mason's house the night before. Yague spasms of jealousy, that culminated in a sharp pang when she remembered that the beautiful woman who had almost taunted her, was a widow now.
" Nelson," she said, awaking from her grief, for there was something of indignation mingled with it now, " last night I was at Mrs. Mason's."
" Indeed ? Have you visited her often ?"
" Only when I went to get news of the ship ; for I don't much like her."
" Indeed ?"
" No ; she hurts one's feelings without meaning it, I dare say. Her haughtinessKeeps every one at a distance."
Thrasher turned his face away, to conceal the proud smile that broke over it. He longed to defend the haughtiness of which Katharine complained — to say that it was the birthright of Ellen's great superiority over all other women. But he checked the impulse and only answered :
" Perhaps it is so. I have seen very little of her since she married that — that — I mean since she married Captain Mason."
" She told me something last night that surprised me."
"What was it?"
" She said that you had loved her before she accepted Captain Mason, and that she refused you."
"Ah, she told you that ; and did her ladyship tell you why she took Mason instead of me?"
" Because you was a third or second mate, I forget which, and he was a captain ; that was the reason she gave — but you speak as if it were true."
JEALOUS PANGS. 143
" Well, when I say that I had never been to sea in my life when John Mason married Ellen Palmer, you'll probably believe this nonsense."
" Then it was not true !" cried Katharine, smiling happily the first time that day.
"When women boast of their conquests, they seldom