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John Gayther's Garden and
the Stories Told Therein
[Illustration: "Are you going to ask me to marry your husband if
you should happen to die?"]
John Gayther's Garden and
the Stories Told Therein
By Frank R. Stockton
_ILLUSTRATED_
Charles Scribner's Sons
New York 1902
Copyright, 1902, by
Charles Scribner's Sons
_Published November, 1902_
THE DEVINNE PRESS
CONTENTS
PAGE
John Gayther's Garden 3
I What I Found in the Sea 9
Told by John Gayther
II The Bushwhacker Nurse 39
Told by the Daughter of the House
III The Lady in the Box 71
Told by John Gayther
IV The Cot and the Rill 109
Told by the Mistress of the House
V The Gilded Idol and the King Conch-shell 155
Told by the Master of the House
VI My Balloon Hunt 201
Told by the Frenchman
VII The Foreign Prince and the Hermit's Daughter 223
Told by Pomona and Jonas
VIII The Conscious Amanda 249
Told by the Daughter of the House
IX My Translatophone 279
Told by the Old Professor
X The Vice-consort 307
Told by the Next Neighbor
XI Blackgum ag'in' Thunder 341
Told by John Gayther
ILLUSTRATIONS
"Are you going to ask me to marry your husband
if you should happen to die?" Frontispiece
FACING PAGE
The gardener began promptly 74
"I made him dig up whole beds of things" 148
The great beast was drawing up his hind legs
and was climbing into the car 214
Miss Amanda listened with the most eager and
overpowering attention 258
And dreamed waking dreams of blessedness 294
"Do you mean," I cried, "that you would make
him a better wife than I do?" 336
"Abner, did you ever hear about the eggs of the
great auk?" 356
JOHN GAYTHER'S GARDEN
JOHN GAYTHER'S GARDEN
The garden did not belong to John Gayther; he merely had charge of it.
At certain busy seasons he had some men to help him in his work, but for
the greater part of the year he preferred doing everything himself.
It was a very fine garden over which John Gayther had charge. It
extended this way and that for long distances. It was difficult to see
how far it did extend, there were so many old-fashioned box hedges;
so many paths overshadowed by venerable grape-arbors; and so many
far-stretching rows of peach, plum, and pear trees. Fruit, bushes, and
vines there were of which the roll need not be called; and flowers grew
everywhere. It was one of the fancies of the Mistress of the House--and
she inherited it from her mother--to have flowers in great abundance, so
that wherever she might walk through the garden she would always find
them.
Often when she found them massed too thickly she would go in among them
and thin them out with apparent recklessness, pulling them up by the
roots and throwing them on the path, where John Gayther would come and
find them and take them away. This heroic action on the part of the
Mistress of the House pleased John very much. He respected the fearless
spirit which did not hesitate to make sacrifices for the greater good,
no matter how many beautiful blossoms she scattered on the garden path.
John Gayther might have thinned out all this superfluous growth himself,
but he knew the Mistress liked to do it, and he left for her gloved
hands many tangled jungles of luxuriant bloom.
The garden was old, and rich, and aristocratic. It acted generously in
the way of fruit, flowers, and vegetables, as if that were something it
was expected to do, an action to which it was obliged by its nobility.
It would be impossible for it to forget that it belonged to a fine old
house and a fine old family.
John Gayther could not boast of lines of long descent, as could the
garden and the family. He was comparatively a new-comer, and had not
lived in that garden more than seven or eight years; but in that time he
had so identified himself with the place, and all who dwelt upon it,
that there were times when a stranger might have supposed him to be the
common ancestor to the whole estate.
John understood well the mysterious problems of the tillable earth, and
he knew, as well as anybody could know, what answers to expect when he
consulted the oracles of nature. He was an elderly man, and the gentle
exercises of the garden were suited to the disposition of his mind and
body. In days gone by he had been a sailor, a soldier, a miner, a
ranchman, and a good many other things besides. In those earlier days,
according to his own account, John had had many surprising adventures
and experiences; but in these later times his memory was by far the
most active and vigorous of all his moving forces. This memory was like
a hazel wand in the hands of a man who is searching for hidden springs
of water. Whenever he wished it to turn and point in any particular
place or direction, it so turned and pointed.
THIS STORY IS TOLD BY
JOHN GAYTHER
AND IS CALLED
WHAT I FOUND IN THE SEA
I
WHAT I FOUND IN THE SEA
It was on a morning in June that John Gayther was hoeing peas, drawing
the fine earth up about their tender little stems as a mother would tuck
the clothes about her little sleeping baby, when, happening to glance
across several beds, and rows of box, he saw approaching the Daughter of
the House. Probably she was looking for him, but he did not think she
had yet seen him. He put down his hoe, feeling, as he did, that this
June morning was getting very warm; and he gathered up an armful of
pea-sticks which were lying near by. With these he made his way toward a
little house almost in the middle of the garden, which was his fortress,
his palace, his studio, or his workshop, as the case might be.
It was a low building with a far-outreaching roof, and under the shade
of this roof, outside of the little building, John liked to do his
rainy-day and very-hot-weather work. From the cool interior came a smell
of dried plants and herbs and bulbs and potted earth.
When John reached this garden-house, the young lady was already there.
She was not tall; her face was very white, but not pale; and her light
hair fluffed itself all about her head, under her wide hat. She wore
gold spectacles which greatly enhanced the effect of her large blue
eyes. John thought she was the prettiest flower which had ever showed
itself in that garden.
"Good morning, John," she said. "I came here to ask you about plants
suitable for goldfishes in a vase. My fishes do not seem to be satisfied
with the knowledge that the plants through which they swim were put
there to purify the water; they are all the time trying to eat them.
Now it strikes me that there ought to be some plants which would be
purifiers and yet good for the poor things to eat."
John put down his bundle of pea-sticks by the side of a small stool.
"Won't you sit down, miss?" pointing to a garden-bench near by, "and I
will see what I can do for you." Then he seated himself upon the stool,
took out his knife, and picked up a pea-stick.
"The best thing for me to do," he said, "is to look over a book I have
which will tell me just the kind of water plants which your goldfish
ought to have. I will do that this evening, and then I will see to it
that you shall have those plants, whatever they may be. I do not pretend
to be much of a water gardener myself, but it's easy for me to find out
what other people know." John now began to trim some of the lower twigs
from a pea-stick.
"Talking about water gardens, miss," he said, "I wish you could have
seen some of the beautiful ones that I have come across!--more beautiful
and lovely than anything on the top of the earth; you may be sure of
that. I was reminded of them the moment you spoke to me about your
goldfish and their plants."
"Where were those gardens?" asked the young lady; "and what were they
like?"
"They were all on the bottom of the sea, in the tropics," said John
Gayther, "where the water is so clear that with a little help you can
see everything just as if it were out in the open air--bushes and vines
and hedges; all sorts of tender waving plants, all made of seaweed and
coral, growing in the white sand; and instead of birds flying about
among their branches there were little fishes of every color:
canary-colored fishes, fishes like robin-redbreasts, and others which
you might have thought were blue jays if they had been up in the air
instead of down in the water."
"Where did you say all this is to be seen?" asked the Daughter of the
House, who loved all lovely things.
"Oh, in a good many places in warm climates," said John. "But, now I
come to think of it, there was one place where I saw more beautiful
sights, more grand and wonderful sights, under the water than I believe
anybody ever saw before! Would you like me to tell you about it?"
"Indeed--I--would!" said she, taking off her hat.
John now began to sharpen the end of his pea-stick. "It was a good many
years ago," said he, "more than twenty--and I was then a seafaring man.
I was on board a brig, cruising in the West Indies, and we were off
Porto Rico, about twenty miles northward, I should say, when we ran into
something in the night,--we never could find out what it was,--and we
stove a big hole in that brig which soon began to let in a good deal
more water than we could pump out. The captain he was a man that knew
all about that part of the world, and he told us all that we must work
as hard as we could at the pumps, and if we could keep her afloat until
he could run her ashore on a little sandy island he knew of not far from
St. Thomas, we might be saved. There was a fresh breeze from the west,
and he thought he could make the island before we sank.
"I was mighty glad to hear him say this, for I had always been nervous
when I was cruising off Porto Rico. Do you know, miss, that those waters
are the very deepest in the whole world?"
"No," said she; "I never heard that."
"Well, they are," said John. "If you should take the very tallest
mountain there is in any part of the earth and put it down north of
Porto Rico, so that the bottom of it shall rest on the bottom of the
sea, the top of that mountain would be sunk clean out of sight, so that
ships could sail over it just as safely as they sail in any part of the
ocean.
"Of course a man would drown just as easily in a couple of fathoms of
water as in this deep place; but it is perfectly horrible to think of
sinking down, down, down into the very deepest water-hole on the face of
the whole earth."
"Didn't you have any boats?" asked the young lady.
"We hadn't any," said John. "We had sold all of them about two months
before to a British merchantman who had lost her boats in a cyclone. One
of the things our captain wanted to get to St. Thomas for was to buy
some more boats. He heard he could get some cheap ones there.
"Well, we pumped and sailed as well as we could, but we hadn't got
anywhere near that sandy island the captain was making for, when, one
morning after breakfast, our brig, which was pretty low in the water by
this time, gave a little hitch and a grind, and stuck fast on something;
and if we hadn't been lively in taking in all sail there would have been
trouble. But the weather was fine, and the sea was smooth, and when we
had time to think about what had happened we were resting on the surface
of the sea, just as quiet and tranquil as if we had been a toy ship in a
shop-window.
"What we had stuck on was a puzzle indeed! As I said before, our captain
knew all about that part of the sea, and, although he knew we were in
shallow soundings, he was certain that there wasn't any shoal or rock
thereabout that we could get stuck on.
"We sounded all around the brig, and found lots of water at the stern,
but not so much forward. We were stuck fast on something, but nobody
could imagine what it was. However, we were not sinking any deeper, and
that was a comfort; and the captain he believed that if we had had boats
we could row to St. Thomas; but we didn't have any boats, so we had to
make the best of it. He put up a flag of distress, and waited till some
craft should come along and take us off.
"The captain and the crew didn't seem to be much troubled about what
had happened, for so long as the sea did not get up they could make
themselves very comfortable as they were. But there were two men on
board who didn't take things easy. They wanted to know what had
happened, and they wanted to know what was likely to happen next. I was
one of these men, and a stock-broker from New York was the other. He was
an awful nervous, fidgety, meddling sort of a man, who was on this
cruise for the benefit of his health, which must have been pretty well
worn out with howling, and yelling, and trying to catch profits like a
lively boy catches flies. He was always poking his nose into all sorts
of things that didn't concern him, and spent about half of his time
trying to talk the captain into selling his brig and putting the money
into Pacific Lard--or it might have been Mexican Balloon stock, as well
as I remember. This man was tingling all over with anxiety to find out
what we had stuck on; but as he could not stick his nose into the water
and find out, and as there was nobody to tell him, he had to keep on
tingling.
"I was just as wild to know what it was the brig was resting on as the
stock-broker was; but I had the advantage of him, for I believed that I
could find out, and, at any rate, I determined to try. Did you ever hear
of a water-glass, miss?"
"No, I never did," said the Daughter of the House, who was listening
with great interest.
"Well, I will try to describe one to you," said John Gayther. "You make
a light box about twenty inches high and a foot square, and with both
ends open. Then you get a pane of glass and fasten it securely in one
end of this box. Then you've got your water-glass--a tall box with a
glass bottom.
"The way that you use it is this: You get in a boat, and put the box in
the water, glass bottom down. Then you lean over and put your head into
the open end, and if you will lay something over the back of your head
as a man does when he is taking photographs, so as to keep out the light
from above, it will be all the better. Then, miss, you'd be perfectly
amazed at what you could see through that glass at the bottom of the
box! Even in northern regions, where the water is heavy and murky, you
can see a good way down; but all about the tropics, where the water is
often so thin and clear that you can see the bottom in some places with
nothing but your naked eyes, it is perfectly amazing what you can see
with a water-glass! It doesn't seem a bit as if you were looking down
into the sea; it is just like gazing about in the upper air. If it isn't
too deep, things on the bottom--fishes swimming about, everything--is
just as plain and distinct as if there wasn't any water under you and
you were just looking down from the top of a house.
"Well, I made up my mind that the only way for me to find out what it
was that was under the brig was to make a water-glass and look down into
the sea; and so I made one, taking care not to let the stock-broker know
anything about it, for I didn't want any of his meddling in my business.
I had to tell the captain, but he said he would keep his mouth shut, for
he didn't like the stock-broker any more than I did.
"Well, miss, I made that water-glass. And when the stock-broker was
taking a nap, for he was clean tired out poking about and asking
questions and trying to find out what he might get out of the business
if he helped to save the brig, the captain and I, with a few men,
quietly let down into the water the aft hatch, one of those big doors
they cover the hatchways with, and when that was resting on the water
it made a very good raft for one man. And I got down on it, with my
water-glass and an oar.
"The first thing I did, of course, was to paddle around the brig to the
place where she had been stove in. She wasn't leaking any more, because
the water inside of her was just as high as the water outside; so, if we
could do anything, this was the time to do it. I looked down into the
water on our starboard bow, and I soon found the place where the brig
had been stove in, probably by some water-logged piece of wreckage. I
located the hole exactly, and I reported to the captain, who was leaning
over the side. Then I paddled around the brig to see if I could find out
what we were resting on.
"When I had sunk my water-glass well into the water, and had got my
head into the top of it, I looked down on a scene which seemed like
fairyland. The corals and water plants of different colors, and the
white glistening sand, and the fishes, big and little, red, yellow,
pink, and blue, swimming about among the branches just as if they had
wings instead of fins, that I told you of just now, were all there; and
the light down under the water seemed so clear and bright that I could
see everything under me that was as big as a pea."
"That must have been an entrancing vision!" said the Daughter of the
House.
"Indeed it was," replied John Gayther. "But, would you believe me, miss?
I didn't look at it for more than half a minute; for when I turned my
water-glass so that I could look under the brig, I could not give a
thought to anything else in the world except the astonishing objects
our brig was resting on.
"At first I could not believe my eyes. I paddled around and around, and
I put down my water-glass, and I stared and I stared, until I felt as if
my eyes were coming out of my head! At last I had to believe what I saw.
There was no use trying to think that my eyes had made a mistake. It was
all just as plain to me as you are now.
"Down in the water, resting on the bottom of this shallow part of the
sea, were two great ships--ships of the olden time, with enormously high
poops, which were the stern part of old-fashioned vessels, built 'way up
high like a four-story house. These two antiquated vessels were lying
side by side and close together, with their tall poops reaching far up
toward the surface of the sea; and right on top of them, resting partly
on one ship and partly on the other, was our brig, just as firmly fixed
as if she had been on the stocks in a shipyard!
"The whole thing was so wonderful that it nearly took away my breath. I
got around to the stern of the brig, and then I stared down at the two
vessels under her until I forgot there was anything else in this whole
world than those two great old-fashioned ships and myself. The more I
looked the more certain I became that no such vessels had floated on the
top of the sea for at least two hundred years. From what I had read
about old-time ships, and from the pictures I had seen of them, I made
up my mind that one of those vessels was an old Spanish galleon; and the
other one looked to me very much as if it were an English-built ship."
"And how did they ever happen to be wrecked there, side by side?" almost
gasped the young lady.
"Oh, they had been fighting," said John. "There could be no mistake
about that. They had been fighting each other to the death, and they had
gone down together, side by side. And there was our brig, two hundred
years afterwards, resting quietly on top of both of them.
"I was still wrapped up, body and soul, in this wonderful discovery,
when I heard a hail from the stern of the brig, and there was that
stock-broker, shouting to me to know what I was looking at. Of course
that put an end to my observations, and I paddled to the side and got on
board.
"'Lend me that box,' said the stock-broker, 'and let me get down on your
raft. What is it you've been looking at, and what did you see in that
box?'
"But he had got hold of the wrong man. 'No, sir,' said I. 'Find a box
for yourself, if you want one.' And I held mine so that he could not see
that the bottom of it was glass. Then the captain came along and told
him not to try to get down on that hatch, for if he did he would topple
into the water and get himself drowned, which would have been certain to
happen, for he could not swim. Then the hatch was hauled on deck, and I
went below with the captain to his cabin to tell him what I had seen.
The stock-broker tried awfully hard to come with us, but we wouldn't let
him.
"When the captain had heard all I had to tell him, he wasn't struck
sentimentally the least bit, as I had been. It did not make any more
difference to him whether those two ships had been down there two
hundred years or two years; but there was another part to the affair
that was very interesting to him.
"'Gayther,' said he, 'it's ten to one that them ships has got treasure
aboard, and what we've got to do is to form a company and go to work and
get it.'
"'And how would you do that?' said I.
"The captain was from Provincetown, Cape Cod, and it didn't take him two
seconds to work out his whole plan.
"'It's this way,' said he. 'The first thing to do is to form a company.
I am president and you can be the other officers. When that is all fixed
we can go to work, and we'll mend that hole in our bow. Now if you know
just where it is, we'll work day and night in that hold, water or no
water, and we'll stop it up. Then we'll pump the brig out, and I believe
she'll float. Then we'll mark this place with a buoy, and we'll sail
away as fast as we can, with our company all formed and everything fixed
and settled. Then we'll come back with the vessels and machines, and
we'll get out that treasure. We'll divide it into three parts. One part
will be mine; one part will be yours; and the other part will go to the
crew.'
"'And how about the stock-broker?' said I. 'Going to let him in the
company?'
"'No, sir,' said the captain, bringing his fist down on the table.
'Whatever else happens, he is to be kept out.'
"This was a very fine plan, but it didn't altogether suit me. I didn't
want to sail away from that spot and perhaps never see those two ships
again. There was no knowing what more I might find out with my
water-glass if that stock-broker could be kept from bothering me.
"I told the captain this, and he looked hard at me and he said: 'It will
take a couple of days to mend that leak and to pump out the brig. If
this fine weather keeps on I think we can do it in that time. And if
while we are working at it you choose to try to find out more about them
two ships, you can do it.'
"'And how can I do it?' said I.
"'If you can go down in a diver's suit you can do it,' said he. 'I don't
know whether you know anything about that business, but if you want to
try, I have got a whole kit on board, air-pump, armor, and everything.
It belongs to a diver that was out with me about a year ago in the Gulf
of Mexico. He had to go North to attend to some business, and he told me
he would let me know when he would come back and get his diving-kit. But
he hasn't come back yet, and the whole business is stowed away here on
board. Do you know anything about going down in a diving-suit?'
"Now I had never done anything in the way of diving, but I had heard a
good deal about it, and I had seen divers at work, and my whole soul was
so jumping and shouting inside of me at the very idea of going down and
searching into the secrets of those two old ships that I told the
captain I was ready to undertake the diving business just the minute he
could get things in shape.
"Well, miss, early the next morning--and I can tell you I didn't sleep
much that night--everything was ready for me to go down, and two of the
crew who had done that sort of thing before were detailed to attend to
the air-pumps and all the other business. The stock-broker he was like a
bee on a window-pane; he was buzzing, and kicking, and bumping his head
trying to find out what we expected to do. But the captain wouldn't tell
him anything; you may be sure I wouldn't; and nobody else knew.
"As soon as we could get things straightened out I was lowered over the
side of the brig, and sunk out of sight into the water. The captain and
all the crew, except the men who were attending to me, then went to work
to mend the hole in the side of the brig. And the last thing I heard as
I went under the water was the stock-broker howling and yelling and
rampaging around the deck.
"As I told you before, miss, I had never been down in a diving-suit; but
I paid the greatest attention to everything I knew, and I got down to
the bottom all right, having a hard time to keep from being scratched to
pieces by the barnacles on the sterns of the big ships.
"I clumped about for a while on the sandy bottom so as to get familiar
with the air-tubes, signal-cords, and all that, and then I signalled to
be hauled up a bit; and, after a good deal of trouble, I got on board
the vessel which I was sure was a Spanish galleon. As I stood on her
upper deck, looking around, I felt as if I was in a world of wonders.
There was water everywhere, of course--in and around and about
everything. But I could see so plainly that I forgot that I was not
moving about in the open air.
"I can't tell you, miss, everything I saw on that great ship, for it
would take too long; but as soon as I could, I set to work to see if I
could find the treasure that I hoped was on board of her. Here and there
about the decks I saw swords and pistols and old cannon, but not a sign
of any of the brave fellows that had fought the ship, for the fish had
eaten them up long ago, bones and all.
"While hunting about, and being careful to keep my air-tube from
fouling, I looked into a cabin with the door open; and you will believe
me, miss, when I tell you that a cold chill ran down my back when I saw
something moving inside, just as if it was a man getting up to see what
I wanted. It turned out to be a big fish, about half my size, and he did
not ask any questions, but just swam through the open door, almost
brushing me, and went his way."
"I wonder you weren't frightened to death!" said the Daughter of the
House.
"It would be hard to kill me with fright," said John Gayther, "and I'll
prove that to you, miss. As I moved on, still looking for the treasure,
I came to the door of another cabin, and this was shut and bolted on the
outside. I had a hatchet with me, and with this I knocked back the bolts
and forced open the door; and there I saw something to make anybody
jump. Sitting on a locker, right in front of the door, was the skeleton
of a man. The room had been shut up so tight that no fish big enough to
eat bones could get in; but the little things that live in the water and
can get through any crack had eaten all of that man except his bones,
his gold buttons, that were lying about on the floor, the golden
embroidery of his uniform, that was still hanging about on his skeleton,
and the iron fetters on his hands and feet. He was most likely a
prisoner of rank who was being taken back to Spain, and he had been shut
up there through all the fight.
"The first thought that came into my mind when I looked at him was that
he might be Columbus, and that the Spaniards had made up the story about
their really getting him back to Spain at the time when he was to be
brought home in irons. But thinking more about it, I knew that this
could not be true, and so I shut the door so as to keep the poor fellow
from any intrusions so long as he might happen to stay there.
"Then I went to work in real earnest to find the treasure, and I tell
you, miss, I did find it."
"What!" exclaimed the Daughter of the House. "You really found the
treasure on that Spanish galleon?"
"Indeed I did," replied John Gayther. "It was in boxes stowed away in a
big room in the stern. I smashed the door, and there were the boxes. I
went to work at one of them with my hatchet; and I had just forced up
one corner of the lid, and had seen that it was filled with big gold
pieces, when I felt a pull on my signal-rope, and knew that they wanted
me to come up. So I put my fingers into the crack and got out a few of
the coins. I could not take a whole box; it would have been too heavy.
And then I went out of that room, and signalled that I was ready to go
up. It was time, I can tell you, miss, for I was getting mighty nervous
and excited, and I needed rest and something to eat.
"When I was safe on the deck of the brig, I found everybody gathered
there, waiting to hear what I had to tell. They had stopped work for
dinner, and that is the reason I had been signalled.
"But I didn't say anything to anybody. As soon as my helmet was
unscrewed and I was out of my diving-suit I went below with the
captain; and although the stock-broker followed us close and nearly
pushed himself into the cabin, we shut the door on him and kept him out.
Then I told the captain everything, and I showed him the three gold
coins, which I had kept all the time tightly clinched in my right hand.
I can tell you the eyes of both of us were wide open when we looked at
those coins. Two of them were dated sixteen hundred and something, and
one of them fifteen hundred. They were big fellows, worth about ten
dollars apiece. The captain took them and locked them up.
"'Now,' said he, 'do you think you will be able to go down again to-day?
If you want to see what's in the other ship you've got to be lively
about it, for I think we can get the brig pumped out in twenty-four
hours; and if a stiff breeze should spring up to-morrow afternoon--and I
am inclined to think it will--we don't want to be caught here. If the
other ship's a treasure-ship,' he went on to say, 'you know it would be
a good deal better for our company; and so it might be well to find
out.'
"I didn't need any spurring to make me go down again, for I was all on
fire to know what was on board the other ship, which I was sure was
English, having had a good opportunity of looking at it while I was down
there.
"So as soon as I had taken a rest and had had my dinner, I went on deck
to get ready for another diving expedition. There was the stock-broker,
watching me like a snake watching a bird. He didn't stamp around and ask
any more questions: he just kept his venomous eye on me as if he would
like to kill me because I knew more than he did. But I didn't concern
myself about him, and down I went, and this time I got myself aboard the
English vessel just as soon as I could.
"It wasn't as interesting as the old Spanish vessel, but still I saw
enough to fill up a book if I had time to tell it. There were more signs
of fighting than there had been on the other ship. Muskets and swords
were scattered about everywhere, and, although she was plainly a
merchant-vessel, she had a lot of the small cannon used in those days.
"I looked about a great deal, and it struck me that she had been a
merchantman trading with the West Indies, but glad enough to fight a
Spanish treasure-ship if she happened to come across one. It was more
than likely that her crew had been a regular set of half-buccaneers,
willing to trade if there was trade, and fight if there was any fighting
on hand. Anyway, the two vessels had had a tough time of it, and each
of them had met her match. I could see the grappling-irons which had
fastened them together. They had blown so many holes in each other's
sides that they had gone to the bottom as peaceably as a pair of twins
holding each other by the hands.
"I worked hard on that English ship, and I went everywhere where I dared
to go, but I couldn't find any signs that she had carried treasure. I
hadn't the least doubt that she was on an outward voyage, and that the
Spaniard was homeward bound.
"At last I got down into the hold, and there I found a great number of
big hogsheads, that were packed in so well under the deck that they had
never moved in all these years. Of course I wanted to know what was in
them, for, although it would not be gold or silver, it might be
something almost as precious if it happened to be spirits of the olden
time.
"After banging and working for some time I got out the bung of one of
these hogsheads, and immediately air began to bubble up, and I could
hear the water running in. It was plain the hogshead was empty, and I
clapped the bung in again as quick as I could. I wasn't accustomed to
sounding barrels or hogsheads under water, but as I knew this was an
empty one I sounded it with my hatchet; and then I went around and got
the same kind of a sound from each of the others that I hammered on.
They were all empty, every blessed one of them.
"Now I was certain that this vessel had been outward bound; she had been
taking out empty hogsheads, and had expected to carry them back full of
West Indian rum, which was a mighty profitable article of commerce in
those days. But she had fallen into temptation, and had gone to the
bottom; and here were her hogsheads just as tight and just as empty as
on the day she set sail from England.
"As I stood looking at the great wall of empty hogsheads in front of me,
wondering if it would not be better to give up searching any more on
this vessel, which evidently had not been laden with anything valuable,
and go again on board the Spanish ship and make some sort of a plan for
fastening lines to those treasure-boxes so that they might be hauled up
on board the brig, I began to feel a sort of trouble with my breath, as
if I might suffocate if I did not get out soon. I knew, of course, that
something was the matter with my air-supply, and I signalled for them to
pump lively. But it was of no use; my supply of fresh air seemed to be
cut off. I began to gasp. I was terribly frightened, you may be sure;
for, with air gone and no answer to my signals, I must perish. I jerked
savagely at my signal-cord to let them know that I wanted to be pulled
up,--it was possible that I might reach the surface before being
suffocated,--but the cord offered no resistance; I pulled it toward me
as I jerked. It had been cut or broken.
"Then I took hold of my air-tube and pulled it. It, too, was unattached
at the other end; it had no connection with the air-pump.
"Breathing with great difficulty, and with my legs trembling under me, a
thought flashed through my mind. As rapidly as possible I drew in the
india-rubber air-tube. Presently I had the loose end of it in my hand.
Then I caught hold of the bung of the hogshead which I had opened and
which was just in front of me, and the instant I pulled it out I thrust
in the end of the air-tube. To my great delight, it fitted tightly in
the bung-hole. And now in an instant I felt as if I was sitting upon the
pinnacles of Paradise. Air, fresh air, came to me through the tube! Not
in abundance, not freely, for there was some water in the tube and there
was a good deal of gurgling. But it was air, fresh air; and every time
an exhaled breath escaped through the valve in my helmet, a little air
from the hogshead came in to take its place.
"I stood for a while, weak with happiness. I did not know what had
happened; I did not care. I could breathe; that was everything in the
world to me.
"By gradually raising the tube a few feet at a time I managed to empty
the water it contained into the hogshead, and then I breathed more
easily. As I did not wish to wait until the air in the hogshead had
been exhausted, I went to work on the bung in the next one, and soon
transferred the end of my tube to that, which would probably last me a
good while, for it was almost entirely free from water.
"Now I began to cogitate and wonder. I pulled in the end of the
signal-cord, and I found it had not been rubbed and torn by barnacles;
the end of it had been clean cut with a knife. I remembered that this
was the case with the air-tube; as I placed it into the bung-hole of the
first hogshead I had noticed how smoothly it had been severed.
"Now I felt a tug at the rope by which I was raised and lowered. I
didn't like this. If I should be pulled up I might be jerked away from
my air-supply and suffocate before I got to the surface. So I took a
turn of the rope around a stick of timber near by, and they might pull
as much as they chose without disturbing me. There I stood, and thought,
and wondered. But, above everything, I could not help feeling all the
time how good that air was! It seemed to go through every part of me. It
was better than wine; it was better than anything I had ever breathed or
tasted. A little while ago I was on the point of perishing. Now before
me there were tiers of hogsheads full of air! If it had not been that I
would be obliged to eat, I might have stayed down there as long as I
pleased.
"I had stayed a long time, and I was at work on the air in a third
hogshead--not having half used up the contents of the other two--before
I really made up my mind as to what had happened. I was sure that there
had been foul play, and I felt quite as sure that the stock-broker was
at the bottom of it. Except that man, there was no one on board the brig
who would wish to do me a harm. The stock-broker he hated me; I had seen
that in his face as plainly as if it had been painted on a sign-board. I
knew something which he did not know; I was trying to get something
which was to be kept a secret from him. If I could be put out of the way
he probably thought he might have some sort of a chance. I could not
fathom the man's mind, but that's the way it looked to me.
"I had been down there a long time, and it must have been getting toward
the end of the afternoon; so I prepared to leave my watery retirement.
I had made a plan, and it worked very well. I placed the end of my
air-tube far into the bung-hole of the hogshead, so that I might not
accidentally pull it out; I loosened myself from the bit of timber; and
then I made my way to the bow of the vessel on which I was. Looking
upward, I found that our brig, which was resting on the tall poops of
the two sunken vessels, was so suspended above me that her fore chains,
which ran under her bowsprit, were almost over my head.
"Now I stood and took some long, deep breaths; then, having made
everything ready, I jerked myself out of that diving-suit in a very few
seconds, and, standing free, I gave a great leap upward, and went
straight to the surface. I am a good swimmer, and with a few strokes I
caught the chains. Stealthily I clambered up, making not the least
noise, and peeped over the rail. There was nobody forward. The whole
ship's company seemed to be crowded aft, where there was a great stir
and confusion. I slipped quietly over the rail and, without being seen
by anybody, made my way into the forecastle. I hurried to my sea-chest.
I took off my wet things and dressed myself in an almost new suit of
shore clothes which I had never worn on the brig. I did not lose any
more time than I could help, but I took unusual care in dressing myself.
I put on a new pair of yellow shoes, and turned up the bottom of my
trousers so as to show my red socks. I had a big felt hat which I had
bought in Mexico, with a little feather in it; and this I put on,
pulling it rakishly over on one side. I put around my neck a long blue
silk cravat with white spots, which I tied in the biggest bow I could
make. Then, feeling that I ought to have something in my hands, I picked
up a capstan-bar, and laying it across my arm after the manner of a
cutlass, I went boldly on deck.
"Making as much noise as possible, and advancing with what you might
call a majestic tread, I strode to the stern of that brig. At first my
approach was not noticed, for there was still a great hubbub, and
everybody seemed to be shouting or swearing or shaking his fist. The
stock-broker stood on one side, and his tongue was going as fast as
anybody's; but I noticed that his hands were tied behind him, and there
was a rope around his neck.
"The captain was the first to see me. He gave me just one look; he
turned pale; and then, with a sort of a scared grunt, down he went on
his knees.
"When the rest of the men laid eyes on me, you never saw such a scared
lot in your life. Their mouths and their eyes went open, and their
swarthy faces were as white as you could wash a dirty sail. Some of
them shook so that their caps fell off, and one or two began to pray.
"As to the stock-broker, he at first seemed greatly startled; but he
recovered himself in a moment. There was nothing superstitious about
him, and he knew well enough that I was no spirit risen from the deep,
but a living man.
"'Ha, ha!' he shouted. 'Here you are, after trying to rob and cheat us,
and making believe to be dead, you water thief!--hiding safe and sound
on deck while such a row is being raised here about your death, and all
sorts of threats being made against me on account of it. Look at him, my
brave men!' said he, turning to the crew; 'look at the fellow who has
been trying to rob us! And he is the man you ought to hang to the
yard-arm!'
"Then he turned again to me. 'You are a fool of a thief, anyway. After
you had gone down under this vessel I found your box with the glass in
the bottom of it. I got down close to the water and I watched you. I saw
you going about in that big sunken ship looking after treasure, and, no
doubt, finding it; filling your pockets with gold and telling nobody. I
didn't want to kill you when I cut your air-tube, as I have told these
good sailors; but I wanted to make you stop stealing and come up, and I
did it. The treasure under this vessel belongs to us all, and you have
no right to make a secret business out of it, and keep it for yourself
and the captain. Now, my good men,' he shouted to the crew, 'there is
the fellow you ought to hang! Look at him, dressed up in fine clothes,
while you thought he was soaked and dead at the bottom of the sea! Hang
him up, I say! Then we'll get the treasure, and we'll divide it among
us fair and even.'
"This was a dangerous moment for me. The men had recovered from their
fright. They saw I was no spirit, and they believed that I had been
trying to deceive and defraud them. A good many of them drew their
knives and came toward me, the stock-broker urging them on. The captain
tried to restrain the men who were near him, but they pushed him aside.
"I now stepped forward; I pulled my great hat still further over my
face; I glared at the men before me; and I brought my capstan-bar with a
tremendous thump upon the deck.
"'Sirrah, varlets!' I roared. 'What mean ye? Stop where ye are, and if
one man of ye comes nearer I'll cleave him to the chine! Caitiffs!
varlets! hounds! dare ye threaten me? Ods-bodikins, I like it well! By
our lady, ye are a merry set of mariners who draw your blades upon a man
who is come upon this deck to tell ye how to fill your pockets with old
gold! Back there, every man of ye, and put up your knives, ere I split
your heads and toss ye into the sea!'
"As I spoke these words my voice and tones were so loud and terrible
that I almost frightened myself. The crew fell back as I advanced a step
or two, and every man of them sheathed his knife. Even the stock-broker
seemed to be overawed by my tremendous voice and my fierce appearance."
"John Gayther," said the Daughter of the House, who had been listening
very eagerly, "what made you talk like that, and strut about, and pound
the deck? That's not like you. I would not have supposed that you ever
could have acted so."
"You will understand it all, miss," said the gardener, "when you
remember that for nearly two hours I had been breathing the atmosphere
of the sixteenth century. That atmosphere was the air which for two
hundred years had been fastened up in those empty hogsheads. I had drawn
it into my lungs; it had gone into my blood, my nerves, my brain. I was
as a man who swash-buckles--a reckless mariner of the olden time. I
longed to take my cutlass in my teeth and board a Spaniard. As I looked
upon the villainous stock-broker before me, I felt as if I could take
him by the throat, plunge down with him to the deck of the Spanish
galleon, and shut him up fast and tight in the room with that manacled
Spaniard who could not have been Columbus. I thrilled with a fierce
longing for combat. It was the air of the sixteenth century which had
permeated my every pore.
"Now I fixed upon the stock-broker a terrible glare and stepped toward
him. 'Money miscreant!' I yelled, 'you it was who tried first to murder
me, and then to turn the hearts of all these good men against me!' I
raised my capstan-bar in the air. 'Aroint thee, fiend!' I yelled. 'Get
thee below; and if anon I see thee I will break thy dastardly skull!'
"At this the stock-broker, frightened nearly out of his wits, and with
his hands still tied and the rope around his neck, made a dive for the
companionway, and disappeared below. I stood up very bold; I threw out
my chest, and gazed around in triumph. The air of the sixteenth century
had saved me! Those men would have no more dared to attack me, as I
stood roaring out my defiance and my threat, than they would have
ventured to give battle to the boldest and the blackest of all bloody
buccaneers.
"I now called the men around me, and I told them all my story. You may
imagine that they opened their eyes and mouths so wide that I thought
some of them would never get them shut again. But the captain--he was
from Provincetown, Cape Cod, and he went straight to business.
"'We've mended the leak,' said he, 'and we'll pump all night, and it may
be to-morrow we shall float free. Then we'll form a company for the
recovery of the treasure on that Spanish galleon. I will take one third
of it; Mr. Gayther shall have one third; and one third shall be divided
among the crew. Then we'll anchor a buoy near this spot and sail away,
to come back again as soon as may be.'
"Everybody agreed to this, and we all went to supper. Early the next
morning a breeze blew very fresh from the southwest; then it increased
to a gale; and before ten o'clock the waves began to run so high that
one of them lifted the brig clean off the sunken ships on which she had
been resting, and we were afloat. In ten seconds more we were lying
broadside to the wind. Then indeed we had to skip around lively, get up
some sails, and put her properly on the wind. Before we had time to draw
an easy breath we were scudding along, far from the spot which we had
intended to mark with an anchored buoy. There was a good deal of water
in the hold, but the brig went merrily on as if glad to get away from
those two old sea spectres of the past with which she had been keeping
such close company.
"Of course it was impossible to beat up against such a wind, and so we
kept on toward St. Thomas. The captain had carefully taken the longitude
and latitude of the spot where we had been stranded on the ancient
ships, and he was sure he could find the place again by sounding in fair
weather.
"Before we reached port, he came on deck with the three gold pieces
which I had brought up from the Spanish galleon. One of these he put
into his own pocket; one he gave to me; and the other he gave to the
crew to be changed into small coin and divided. The stock-broker got
nothing, and I saw him no more on that voyage. I had sworn to break his
head if my eyes ever fell upon him, and he was wise enough to keep out
of my sight."
"And that is all the money you ever got from the galleon?" asked the
Daughter of the House.
"Yes," said John Gayther, "that was all. I have the ancient gold piece
in my room now, and some day I will show it to you.
"As soon as we could do it, we all went with the captain to New York,
and there we organized our company, and sold a lot of stock, and
chartered a good steamer with derricks and everything necessary for
raising sunken treasure. But, although the weather was fair, and we
sounded and sounded day after day at the very point of longitude and
latitude where we had left the two great ships of the olden time, we
never could find them.
"One day, just before we had concluded to give up the search, we saw
another vessel not far away, also sounding. This we afterwards heard
belonged to the stock-broker. He had chartered a steamer, and he had on
board of her a president, a secretary, a treasurer, a board of trustees,
and four derricks. We steamed away and soon left him, and I am very sure
that if his company had ever declared any dividends I should have heard
of it."
"And that is the end of your story, John Gayther?" said the Daughter of
the House, as she rose from her seat.
"Yes, miss; that is the end of it," replied the gardener.
The young lady said no more, but walked away in quiet reflection, while
John Gayther picked up the only pea-stick on which he had been at work
that morning.
THIS STORY IS TOLD BY
THE DAUGHTER OF THE HOUSE
AND IS CALLED
THE BUSHWHACKER NURSE
II
THE BUSHWHACKER NURSE
The Daughter of the House, her fair cheeks a little flushed, walked
rapidly down the broad centre path of the garden, looking for John
Gayther, the gardener. She soon saw him at work in a bed of
tomato-plants.
"John," said she, "I have just finished composing a story, and I came
out to tell it to you before I write it. I want to do this because you
compose stories yourself which in some ways are a good deal like this
of mine. But I can't tell it to you out here in the sun. Isn't there
something you can do in your little house? Haven't you some pea-sticks
to sharpen?"
"Oh, yes, miss," said John Gayther, with great alacrity; "and if you
will go and make yourself comfortable under the shed I will be there in
a few minutes."
It was rather difficult for John Gayther to find any pea-sticks which
had not already been stuck into the ground or which wanted sharpening,
but he succeeded in getting a small armful of them, and with these he
came to where the young lady was seated. He drew up a stool and took out
a big knife.
"Now," said she, gazing through her gold-rimmed spectacles far out into
the sunlit garden, "this is the story of a girl."