THE DEPARTURE
THE Attorney Burton wrote to Colonel Parker almost immediately upon
his return to England. He said that he had been to see Master Hezekiah
Tipton, “and if I had dropped from the stars instead of walking into
his office,” he wrote, “he could not have been more amazed to see me.”
After that he wrote frequently, keeping Colonel Parker apprised of all
his movements. By January, he had Jack’s affairs so far settled that
there was talk of his returning to England. It was finally arranged
with Hezekiah Tipton that Jack should go to live at Grampton with Sir
Henry Ballister, and a sufficient sum for his maintenance was extorted
from the old man. It was also arranged that he should be given such an
education as befitted his rank in the world.
Finally, March was settled upon as the date of Jack’s departure. During
that month the “Richmond Castle,” a fine, large ship, was to sail for
England. Captain Northam was one in whom Colonel Parker felt every
confidence, and so it was decided that Jack should take passage in that
vessel from Yorktown.
As the time for departure drew nearer and nearer, there was that ever
increasing bustle and confusion of preparation that always culminates
with such a leave-taking. Even on the very last day the two sea-chests
did not seem nearly filled, and there was a mountainous heap of
clothes and personal belongings yet waiting to be packed away in them.
The negro women-servants were hurrying continually up and down stairs
upon this errand and upon that, and there was a ceaseless calling and
countermanding of orders. Madam Parker, leaning over the banister,
and calling:—“Jack! Jack! Where is Jack? Did you see Master Jack,
Chloe?”—“Iss, missy. Him in de office with hes honor.”—“Well, run and
ask him where he put those two lace cravats and the lawn sleeves, for
we can’t find them anywhere.” “Mamma, mamma!” this from Nelly Parker
from the room within, “if that is what you ‘re looking for, I know
where they are; they were put into the little chest. I saw Dinah pack
them there this morning.”
A dozen times Madam Parker would sink down, suddenly relaxed, into a
chair, to say that she was that tired with all this hurry that her feet
ached to the bone, and each time Nelly Parker would say, “Why do you
vex yourself so much, then, mamma? Surely Dinah and Rose and Chloe are
enough to do the packing without your wearing yourself out at it.”
“But, my dear,” Madam Parker would say, with her nervous fussiness, “if
I don’t see to it myself, they will never get it done.”
Then Chloe, Madam Parker’s own maid, came to say that Robin and the
negro man, Cæsar, were waiting to cord the boxes.
“Well, they’ll have to wait,” said Madam Parker, crossly, “for they’re
not ready yet.”
“They might cord the small box, mamma,” said Nelly Parker; “we can pack
everything else in the other.”
Meantime, Jack was sitting with Colonel Parker, who was giving him his
last instructions. “I have them marked down here,” he said, “on this
paper. Keep it carefully by you. Nay; don’t trust it in your pocket
that way. Where’s the pocket-book I gave you yesterday to keep such
things in?”
“I left it up-stairs on the table, sir,” said Jack.
“You should always carry it with you,” said Colonel Parker, “and not
leave it about in that way. Well, put the memoranda into your pocket,
now, but be sure you put it in your pocket-book when you get up-stairs.”
“Yes, sir,” said Jack.
“Here’s a letter to Captain Northam,” said Colonel Parker. “Give it to
him as soon as you go aboard the “Richmond Castle,” and he will extend
very particular care to you. It gives him full instruction as to all
he is to do for you. When you get to Gravesend he will send you up as
far as Broadstairs in a wherry, and there you shall get a hackney coach
to take you to my agent at Snow Hill. Here is a letter to him and a
packet—Ebenezer Bilton, Esquire. This packet of letters you shall use
while you are in London as you need them. You will see by the addresses
who they are for. Here is this large packet to give to your uncle. You
had better put these larger packets into your chests, but carry the
captain’s letter in your pocket-book, so you may give it to him as soon
as you get aboard.”
“Yes, sir,” said Jack.
How singularly dull and blank is the interval of waiting that follows
all rude bustle of preparation—when the boxes have been corded and
carried away down to the landing, and the house has again relapsed
into its former quietude, and yet the time has not quite come to say
farewell. There is something singularly trying in that period of
passive waiting.
It was late that last afternoon at Marlborough, and Jack and Nelly
Parker stood at the window, in the slant of the winter’s day,
looking out down toward the landing. The day before the treacherous
March weather had turned suddenly back to winter again, and it had
snowed nearly all day; now the slush was melting rapidly in the sun.
Everywhere the water was running, trickling, the drops sparkling in the
bright slanting light of the sinking sun. The snow still lingered in
wide white patches here and there in sheltered places of the grass; but
on the pathway and on the steps of the house it had dissolved into a
wet, thin sheet of half-frozen slush. She was very silent as she stood
there looking out toward the river beyond the screen of winter trees.
“I wonder how much you will miss me?” Jack said.
She turned and looked directly at him, but she did not reply in words.
“I shall miss you,” he said. “I can’t tell how much I shall miss you. I
shall be thinking about you all the time.”
“Will you, Jack!”
“Yes, I shall. Will you often think about me?”
“Indeed I shall.” Then she suddenly reached out her hand toward him,
and he took it and held it in his, and she let it remain there. It
seemed to him that he could hardly breathe, and as she stood there,
perfectly still, with her hand in his, he could see her innocent bosom
rising and falling with her own labored heavy breathing.
“Will you miss me?” he said, at last, almost whispering. “Will you,
then, miss me? I’ll miss you—oh, how I shall miss you!”
“Yes, I’ll miss you,” she whispered.
She stood close to him. Her dress and her arm touched him, and he
thrilled and thrilled again and again. It was upon him to say somewhat
of that which so swelled his bosom, but the words hung like lead on his
lips, and his heart beat so strenuously that he could hardly breathe.
She did not withdraw her hand from his as she stood there.
Then suddenly there was the sound of some one coming, and she snatched
her hand away from him. It was Madam Parker. “Why, Jack,” she said,
“I’ve been looking for you everywhere. What are you doing here?” and
she looked from one to the other.
“Doing?” said Jack, stupidly. “I’m not doing anything.” And Nelly
Parker moved away from the window.
“Colonel Parker wants to see you in his room for a minute,” said Madam
Parker. “You’d better go right away.” And if she thought of anything
that had passed, she said nothing concerning it.
Jack did not find a chance to speak to Nelly Parker again that night
until the very last minute before she went away to bed. She seemed to
him to avoid even looking at him. She sat very silently beside her
father, listening to what he said, but saying nothing herself. She went
to bed before the others, the negro waiting-woman standing at the door
holding the candle. Then she gave Jack her hand. Her father and mother
were looking on. “Good-night,” she said; “and ‘twill be good-by.” And
then she raised her eyes, and looked slowly and steadily at him.
Jack held her hand, remembering strongly what had passed that afternoon.
“And will you not wake to see me off in the morning?” he said. He was
still holding her hand.
“Maybe I will.”
“You will—I know you will.”
“Why, Jack, you’ll be off before we’re awake,” said Colonel Parker.
“You’ll have started before seven o’clock.” And then she went away.
Jack was awakened by the rattle of the latch and the echoing footsteps
of some one coming into his room, and the sliding light of a candle
shining across the walls and then down into his face. It was Colonel
Parker’s serving-man, Robin, who had come, bringing a lighted candle
and a jug of hot water. “You must get up, Master Jack,” he said, “’tis
six o’clock.”
[Illustration: “‘THEN I WILL COME,’ SAID HE.”]
Even in the moment of first awakening from sleep into which he had
brokenly drifted the night before, he was conscious of something
portentous looming in the background of the coming day; but he could
not in the first instant seize upon the coming events of his life. Then
it came to him with a flash, and he sprang out of bed upon the cold
floor and into the chill of the dark and wintry room. The time had come
for him to depart.
Robin helped him as he dressed with chattering teeth and numb, cold
fingers. “The boat’s all ready and waiting, Master Jack,” the man
said, “and they’ll start as soon as you’ve eaten your breakfast and go
aboard.”
“’Tis mightily cold this morning, Robin,” Jack said.
“Ay; ’tis a freezing morning, sir,” said the man.
Presently Jack asked, “Is Miss Nelly up yet?”
“Miss Nelly!” said Robin, in very evident surprise. “Why, Master Jack,
she won’t be up for three hours yet.”
“I thought maybe she’d be up to see me off,” Jack said, in a sort of
foolish explanation.
He found a solitary breakfast spread out for him down-stairs by the
light of a cluster of candles, and he sat down and began immediately
to eat, waited on by Robin and a negro man. All the great spaces
were chill and raw with frost of the winter morning. Jack’s fingers
were still stiff with cold, and his breath blew out like a cloud in
the light of the candles. He ate his meal with an ever heavier and
heavier certainty that Nelly Parker would not be awake to see him
off. As the certainty grew upon him there seemed to be something
singularly heartless in such neglect. He would never have so treated
her, and at the thought a sudden anger arose within him against her.
Then it occurred to him with a fading hope that maybe she might be in
the library or drawing-room waiting for him. He finished his scant
breakfast and went thither, out across the hall; but there was no one
there but the negro man making a fire of logs, the smoke rising in
great volumes from the kindled lightwood, part of it coming out into
the room, and filling it with a pungent cloud. The wide, cold spaces
seemed singularly empty and deserted of their accustomed life. As he
stood, lingering, some one came across the hall; it was Robin, and he
was carrying the overcoats. “They’re waiting for you at the landing,
Master Jack,” he said.
Then Jack, with a crumbling away of the heart, knew for a certainty
that he was not to see her again.
Robin held the overcoat for him, and he slipped his arms into it, and
then he went out of the house and down toward the landing. The sun had
not yet risen, and the air of the morning was keen with the cold and
frozen newness of the day. Here and there, where the sodden snow of
yesterday had not all melted away, it had frozen again into slippery
sheets that crunched beneath his tread. He turned and looked back
toward the house. He could see her room; it was closed and dark. Then
he turned again and walked on once more toward the landing, his breath
coming thick and hot in his throat. To think that she would not come to
bid him good-by before he went away!
The boat was waiting for him, and the sailing-master stood upon the
wharf, swinging and slapping his arms. Jack climbed down into it, and
the other followed him. The men shoved it off with a push of their
oars, and then began rowing away toward the schooner, where a light
still hung in the stays, burning pallidly in the increasing daylight.
Then they were aboard.
Jack went down into the cabin, still gray with the early light. Both
his chests were there and his two bundles, and he sat down among them,
overwhelmed. By and by he came up on deck again. They were out and away
in the river now. The sun had just risen, and the red light lit up the
front of the great house, now standing out clear through the leafless
trees. Jack stood holding to the stays, looking out at it, and his eyes
blurred, and for a moment everything was lost to his sight. She had not
come to bid him good-by; that was the bitterest pang of all.