Captain Sam entered the windmill shop about two o'clock one windy
afternoon in the first week of March. He was wearing a heavy fur
overcoat and a motoring cap. He pulled off the coat, threw it over
a pile of boards and sat down.
"Whew!" he exclaimed. "It's blowing hard enough to start the bark
on a log."
Jed looked up.
"Did you say log or dog?" he asked, solemnly.
The captain grinned. "I said log," he answered. "This gale of
wind would blow a dog away, bark and all. Whew! I'm all out of
breath. It's some consider'ble of a drive over from Wapatomac.
Comin' across that stretch of marsh road by West Ostable I didn't
know but the little flivver would turn herself into a flyin'-
machine and go up."
Jed stopped in the middle of the first note of a hymn.
"What in the world sent you autoin' way over to Wapatomac and back
this day?" he asked.
His friend bit the end from a cigar. "Oh, diggin' up the root of
all evil," he said. "I had to collect a note that was due over
there."
"Humph! I don't know much about such things, but I never
mistrusted 'twas necessary for you to go cruisin' like that to
collect notes. Seems consider'ble like sendin' the skipper up town
to buy onions for the cook. Couldn't the--the feller that owed the
money send you a check?"
Captain Sam chuckled. "He could, I cal'late, but he wouldn't," he
observed. "'Twas old Sylvester Sage, up to South Wapatomac, the
'cranberry king' they call him up there. He owns cranberry bogs
from one end of the Cape to the other. You've heard of him, of
course."
Jed rubbed his chin. "Maybe so," he drawled, "but if I have I've
forgot him. The only sage I recollect is the sage tea Mother used
to make me take when I had a cold sometimes. I COULDN'T forget
that."
"Well, everybody but you has heard of old Sylvester. He's the
biggest crank on earth."
"Hum-m. Seems 's if he and I ought to know each other. . . . But
maybe he's a different kind of crank; eh?"
"He's all kinds. One of his notions is that he won't pay bills by
check, if he can possibly help it. He'll travel fifty miles to pay
money for a thing sooner than send a check for it. He had this
note--fourteen hundred dollars 'twas--comin' due at our bank to-day
and he'd sent word if we wanted the cash we must send for it 'cause
his lumbago was too bad for him to travel. I wanted to see him
anyhow, about a little matter of a political appointment up his
way, so I decided to take the car and go myself. Well, I've just
got back and I had a windy v'yage, too. And cold, don't talk!"
"Um . . . yes. . . . Get your money, did you?"
"Yes, I got it. It's in my overcoat pocket now. I thought one
spell I wasn't goin' to get it, for the old feller was mad about
some one of his cranberry buyers failin' up on him and he was as
cross-grained as a scrub oak root. He and I had a regular row over
the matter of politics I went there to see him about 'special. I
told him what he was and he told me where I could go. That's how
we parted. Then I came home."
"Hum. . . . You'd have had a warmer trip if you'd gone where he
sent you, I presume likely. . . . Um. . . . Yes, yes. . . .
'There's a place in this chorus
For you and for me,
And the theme of it ever
And always shall be:
Hallelujah, 'tis do-ne!
I believe. . . .'
Hum! . . . I thought that paint can was full and there ain't
more'n a half pint in it. I must have drunk it in my sleep, I
guess. Do I look green around the mouth, Sam?"
It was just before Captain Sam's departure that he spoke of his
daughter and young Phillips. He mentioned them in a most casual
fashion, as he was putting on his coat to go, but Jed had a feeling
that his friend had stopped at the windmill shop on purpose to
discuss that very subject and that all the detail of his Wapatomac
trip had been in the nature of a subterfuge to conceal this fact.
"Oh," said the captain, with somewhat elaborate carelessness, as he
struggled into the heavy coat, "I don't know as I told you that the
directors voted to raise Charlie's salary. Um-hm, at last
Saturday's meetin' they did it. 'Twas unanimous, too. He's as
smart as a whip, that young chap. We all think a heap of him."
Jed nodded, but made no comment. The captain fidgeted with a
button of his coat. He turned toward the door, stopped, cleared
his throat, hesitated, and then turned back again.
"Jed," he said, "has--has it seemed to you that--that he--that
Charlie was--maybe--comin' to think consider'ble of--of my
daughter--of Maud?"
Jed looked up, caught his eye, and looked down again. Captain Sam
sighed.
"I see," he said. "You don't need to answer. I presume likely the
whole town has been talkin' about it for land knows how long. It's
generally the folks at home that don't notice till the last gun
fires. Of course I knew he was comin' to the house a good deal and
that he and Maud seemed to like each other's society, and all that.
But it never struck me that--that it meant anything serious, you
know--anything--anything--well, you know what I mean, Jed."
"Yes. Yes, Sam, I suppose I do."
"Yes. Well, I--I don't know why it never struck me, either. If
Georgianna--if my wife had been alive, she'd have noticed, I'll
bet, but I didn't. 'Twas only last evenin'; when he came to get
her to go to the pictures, that it came across me, you might say,
like--like a wet, cold rope's end' slappin' me in the face. I give
you my word, Jed, I--I kind of shivered all over. She means--she
means somethin' to me, that little girl and--and--"
He seemed to find it hard to go on. Jed leaned forward.
"I know, Sam, I know," he said. His friend nodded.
"I know you do, Jed," he said. "I don't think there's anybody else
knows so well. I'm glad I've got you to talk to. I cal'late,
though," he added, with a short laugh, "if some folks knew I came
here to--to talk over my private affairs they'd think I was goin'
soft in the head."
Jed smiled, and there was no resentment in the smile.
"They'd locate the softness in t'other head of the two, Sam," he
suggested.
"I don't care where they locate it. I can talk to you about things
I never mention to other folks. Guess it must be because you--you--
well, I don't know, but it's so, anyhow. . . . Well, to go ahead,
after the young folks had gone I sat there alone in the parlor, in
the dark, tryin' to think it out. The housekeeper had gone over to
her brother's, so I had the place to myself. I thought and thought
and the harder I thought the lonesomer the rest of my life began to
look. And yet--and yet I kept tellin' myself how selfish and
foolish that was. I knew 'twas a dead sartinty she'd be gettin'
married some time. You and I have laughed about it and joked about
it time and again. And I've joked about it with her, too. But--
but jokin's one thing and this was another. . . . Whew!"
He drew a hand across his forehead. Jed did not speak. After a
moment the captain went on.
"Well," he said, "when she got home, and after he'd gone, I got
Maud to sit on my knee, same as she's done ever since she was a
little girl, and she and I had a talk. I kind of led up to the
subject, as you might say, and by and by we--well, we talked it out
pretty straight. She thinks an awful sight of him, Jed. There
ain't any doubt about that, she as much as told me in those words,
and more than told me in other ways. And he's the only one she's
ever cared two straws for, she told me that. And--and--well, I
think she thinks he cares for her that way, too, although of course
she didn't say so. But he hasn't spoken to her yet. I don't know,
but--but it seemed to me, maybe, that he might be waitin' to speak
to me first. I'm his--er--boss, you know, and perhaps he may feel
a little--little under obligations to me in a business way and that
might make it harder for him to speak. Don't it seem to you maybe
that might be it, Jed?"
Poor Jed hesitated. Then he stammered that he shouldn't be
surprised. Captain Sam sighed.
"Well," he said, "if that's it, it does him credit, anyhow. I
ain't goin' to be selfish in this thing, Jed. If she's goin' to
have a husband--and she is, of course--I cal'late I'd rather 'twas
Charlie than anybody else I've ever run across. He's smart and
he'll climb pretty high, I cal'late. Our little single-sticked
bankin' craft ain't goin' to be big enough for him to sail in very
long. I can see that already. He'll be navigatin' a clipper one
of these days. Well, that's the way I'd want it. I'm pretty
ambitious for that girl of mine and I shouldn't be satisfied short
of a top-notcher. And he's a GOOD feller, Jed; a straight, clean,
honest and above-board young chap. That's the best of it, after
all, ain't it?"
Jed's reply was almost a groan, but his friend did not notice. He
put on his overcoat and turned to go.
"So, there you are," he said. "I had to talk to somebody, had to
get it off my chest, and, as I just said, it seems to be easier to
talk such things to you than anybody else. Now if any of the town
gas engines--Gab Bearse or anybody else--comes cruisin' in here
heavin' overboard questions about how I like the notion of Maud and
Charlie takin' up with each other, you can tell 'em I'm tickled to
death. That won't be all lie, neither. I can't say I'm happy,
exactly, but Maud is and I'm goin' to make-believe be, for her
sake. So long."
He went out. Jed put his elbows on the workbench and covered his
face with his hands. He was still in that position when Ruth
Armstrong came in. He rose hastily, but she motioned him to sit
again.
"Jed," she said, "Captain Hunniwell was just here with you; I saw
him go. Tell me, what was he talking about?"
Jed was confused. "Why--why, Mrs. Ruth," he stammered, "he was
just talkin' about--about a note he'd been collectin', and--and
such."
"Wasn't he speaking of his daughter--and--and my brother?"
This time Jed actually gasped. Ruth drew a long breath. "I knew
it," she said.
"But--but, for mercy sakes, HOW did you know? Did he--?"
"No, he didn't see me at all. I was watching him from the window.
But I saw his face and--" with a sudden gesture of desperation,
"Oh, it wasn't that at all, Jed. It was my guilty conscience, I
guess. I've been expecting him to speak to you--or me--have been
dreading it every day--and now somehow I knew he had spoken. I
KNEW it. What did he say, Jed?"
Jed told the substance of what Captain Sam had said. She listened.
When he finished her eyes were wet.
"Oh, it is dreadful," she moaned. "I--I was so hoping she might
not care for Charlie. But she does--of course she does. She
couldn't help it," with a sudden odd little flash of loyalty.
Jed rubbed his chin in desperation.
"And--and Charlie?" he asked, anxiously. "Does he--"
"Yes, yes, I'm sure he does. He has never told me so, never in so
many words, but I can see. I know him better than any one else in
the world and I can see. I saw first, I think, on Thanksgiving
Day; at least that is when I first began to suspect--to fear."
Jed nodded. "When they was at the piano together that time and Sam
said somethin' about their bein' a fine-lookin' couple?" he said.
"Why, yes, that was it. Are you a mind reader, Jed?"
"No-o, I guess not. But I saw you lookin' kind of surprised and--
er--well, scared for a minute. I was feelin' the same way just
then, so it didn't need any mind reader to guess what had scared
you."
"I see. But, oh, Jed, it is dreadful! What SHALL we do? What
will become of us all? And now, when I--I had just begun to be
happy, really happy."
She caught her breath in a sob. Jed instinctively stretched out
his hand.
"But there," she went on, hurriedly wiping her eyes, "I mustn't do
this. This is no time for me to think of myself. Jed, this
mustn't go any further. He must not ask her to marry him; he must
not think of such a thing."
Jed sadly shook his head. "I'm afraid you're right," he said.
"Not as things are now he surely mustn't. But--but, Mrs. Ruth--"
"Oh, don't!" impatiently. "Don't use that silly 'Mrs.' any longer.
Aren't you the--the best friend I have in the world? Do call me
Ruth."
If she had been looking at his face just then she might have seen--
things. But she was not looking. There was an interval of silence
before he spoke.
"Well, then--er--Ruth--" he faltered.
"That's right. Go on."
"I was just goin' to ask you if you thought Charlie was cal'latin'
to ask her. I ain't so sure that he is."
He told of Charles' recent visit to the windmill shop and the young
man's query concerning the making of a decision. She listened
anxiously.
"But don't you think that means that he was wondering whether or
not he should ask her?" she said.
"No. That is, I don't think it's sartin sure it means that. I
rather had the notion it might mean he was figgerin' whether or not
to go straight to Sam and make a clean breast of it."
"You mean tell--tell everything?"
"Yes, all about the--the business at Middleford. I do honestly
believe that's what the boy's got on his mind to do. It ain't very
surprisin' that he backs and fills some before that mind's made up.
See what it might mean to him: it might mean the loss of his
prospects here and his place in the bank and, more'n everything
else, losin' Maud. It's some decision to make. If I had to make
it I-- Well, I don't know."
She put her hand to her eyes. "The POOR boy," she said, under her
breath. "But, Jed, DO you think that is the decision he referred
to? And why hasn't he said a word to me, his own sister, about it?
I'm sure he loves me."
"Sartin he does, and that's just it, as I see it. It ain't his own
hopes and prospects alone that are all wrapped up in this thing,
it's yours--and Babbie's. He's troubled about what'll happen to
you. That's why he hasn't asked your advice, I believe."
They were both silent for a moment. Then she said, pleadingly,
"Oh, Jed, it is up to you and me, isn't it? What shall we do?"
It was the "we" in this sentence which thrilled. If she had bade
him put his neck in front of the handsaw just then Jed would have
obeyed, and smilingly have pulled the lever which set the machine
in motion. But the question, nevertheless, was a staggerer.
"W-e-e-ll," he admitted, "I--I hardly know what to say, I will give
in. To be right down honest--and the Lord knows I hate to say it--
it wouldn't do for a minute to let those two young folks get
engaged--to say nothin' of gettin' married--with this thing between
'em. It wouldn't be fair to her, nor to Sam--no, nor to him or
you, either. You see that, don't you?" he begged. "You know I
don't say it for any reason but just--just for the best interests
of all hands. You know that, don't you--Ruth?"
"Of course, of course. But what then?"
"I don't really know what then. Seems to me the very first thing
would be for you to speak to him, put the question right up to him,
same as he's been puttin' it to himself all this time. Get him to
talk it over with you. And then--well, then--"
"Yes?"
"Oh, I don't know! I declare I don't."
"Suppose he tells me he means to marry her in spite of everything?
Suppose he won't listen to me at all?"
That possibility had been in Jed's mind from the beginning, but he
refused to consider it.
"He will listen," he declared, stoutly. "He always has, hasn't he?"
"Yes, yes, I suppose he has. He listened to me when I persuaded
him that coming here and hiding all--all that happened was the
right thing to do. And now see what has come of it! And it is all
my fault. Oh, I have been so selfish!"
"Sshh! sshh! You ain't; you couldn't be if you tried. And,
besides, I was as much to blame as you. I agreed that 'twas the
best thing to do."
"Oh," reproachfully, "how can you say that? You know you were
opposed to it always. You only say it because you think it will
comfort me. It isn't true."
"Eh? Now--now, don't talk so. Please don't. If you keep on
talkin' that way I'll do somethin' desperate, start to make a
johnny cake out of sawdust, same as I did yesterday mornin', or
somethin' else crazy."
"Jed!"
"It's true, that about the johnny cake. I came pretty nigh doin'
that very thing. I bought a five-pound bag of corn meal yesterday
and fetched it home from the store all done up in a nice neat
bundle. Comin' through the shop here I had it under my arm, and--
hum--er--well, to anybody else it couldn't have happened, but,
bein' Jed Shavin's Winslow, I was luggin' the thing with the top of
the bag underneath. I got about abreast of the lathe there when
the string came off and in less'n two thirds of a shake all I had
under my arm was the bag; the meal was on the floor--what wasn't in
my coat pocket and stuck to my clothes and so on. I fetched the
water bucket and started to salvage what I could of the cargo.
Pretty soon I had, as nigh as I could reckon it, about fourteen
pound out of the five scooped up and in the bucket. I begun to
think the miracle of loaves and fishes was comin' to pass again. I
was some shy on fish, but I was makin' up on loaves. Then I sort
of looked matters over and found what I had in the bucket was about
one pound of meal to seven of sawdust. Then I gave it up. Seemed
to me the stuff might be more fillin' than nourishin'."
Ruth smiled faintly. Then she shook her head.
"Oh, Jed," she said, "you're as transparent as a windowpane. Thank
you, though. If anything could cheer me up and help me to forget I
think you could."
Jed looked repentant. "I'd no business to tell you all that
rigamarole," he said. "I'm sorry. I'm always doin' the wrong
thing, seems so. But," he added, earnestly, "I don't want you to
worry too much about your brother--er--Ruth. It's goin' to come
out all right, I know it. God won't let it come out any other
way."
She had never heard him speak in just that way before and she
looked at him in surprise.
"And yet God permits many things that seem entirely wrong to us
humans," she said.
"I know. Things like the Kaiser, for instance. Well, never mind;
this one's goin' to come out all right. I feel it in my bones.
And," with a return of his whimsical drawl, "I may be short on
brains, but a blind man could see they never skimped me when they
passed out the bones."
She looked at him a moment. Then, suddenly leaning forward, she
put her hand upon his big red one as it lay upon the bench.
"Jed," she said, earnestly, "what should I do without you? You are
my one present help in time of trouble. I wonder if you know what
you have come to mean to me."
It was an impulsive speech, made from the heart, and without
thought of phrasing or that any meaning other than that intended
could be read into it. A moment later, and without waiting for an
answer, she hurried from the shop.
"I must go," she said. "I shall think over your advice, Jed, and I
will let you know what I decide to do. Thank you ever and ever so
much."
Jed scarcely heard her. After she had gone, he sat perfectly still
by the bench for a long period, gazing absently at the bare wall of
the shop and thinking strange thoughts. After a time he rose and,
walking into the little sitting-room, sat down beside the ugly
little oak writing table he had bought at a second-hand sale and
opened the upper drawer.
Weeks before, Ruth, yielding to Babbie's urgent appeal, had
accompanied the latter to the studio of the local photographer and
there they had been photographed, together, and separately. The
results, although not artistic triumphs, being most inexpensive,
had been rather successful as likenesses. Babbie had come trotting
in to show Jed the proofs. A day or so later he found one of the
said proofs on the shop floor where the little girl had dropped it.
It happened to be a photograph of Ruth, sitting alone.
And then Jed Winslow did what was perhaps the first dishonest thing
he had ever done. He put that proof in the drawer of the oak
writing table and said nothing of his having found it. Later he
made a wooden frame for it and covered it with glass. It faded and
turned black as all proofs do, but still Jed kept it in the drawer
and often, very often, opened that drawer and looked at it. Now he
looked at it for a long, long time and when he rose to go back to
the shop there was in his mind, along with the dream that had been
there for days and weeks, for the first time the faintest dawning
of a hope. Ruth's impulsive speech, hastily and unthinkingly made,
was repeating itself over and over in his brain. "I wonder if you
know what you have come to mean to me?" What had he come to mean
to her?
An hour later, as he sat at his bench, Captain Hunniwell came
banging in once more. But this time the captain looked troubled.
"Jed," he asked, anxiously, "have you found anything here since I
went out?"
Jed looked up.
"Eh?" he asked, absently. "Found? What have you found, Sam?"
"I? I haven't found anything. I've lost four hundred dollars,
though. You haven't found it, have you?"
Still Jed did not appear to comprehend. He had been wandering the
rose-bordered paths of fairyland and was not eager to come back to
earth.
"Eh?" he drawled. "You've--what?"
His friend's peppery temper broke loose.
"For thunder sakes wake up!" he roared. "I tell you I've lost four
hundred dollars of the fourteen hundred I told you I collected from
Sylvester Sage over to Wapatomac this mornin'. I had three
packages of bills, two of five hundred dollars each and one of four
hundred. The two five hundred packages were in the inside pocket
of my overcoat where I put 'em. But the four hundred one's gone.
What I want to know is, did it drop out when I took off my coat
here in the shop? Do you get that through your head, finally?"
It had gotten through. Jed now looked as troubled as his friend.
He rose hastily and went over to the pile of boards upon which
Captain Sam had thrown his coat upon entering the shop on his
previous visit that day. Together they searched, painstakingly and
at length. The captain was the first to give up.
"'Tain't here," he snapped. "I didn't think 'twas. Where in time
is it? That's what I want to know."
Jed rubbed his chin.
"Are you sure you had it when you left Wapatomac?" he asked.
"Sure? No, I ain't sure of anything. But I'd have sworn I did.
The money was on the table along with my hat and gloves. I picked
it up and shoved it in my overcoat pocket. And that was a darned
careless place to put it, too," he added, testily. "I'd have given
any feller that worked for me the devil for doin' such a thing."
Jed nodded, sympathetically. "But you might have left it there to
Sylvester's," he said. "Have you thought of telephonin' to find
out?"
"Have I thought? Tut, tut, tut! Do you think I've got a head like
a six-year-old young-one--or you? Course I've thought--and
'phoned, too. But it didn't do me any good. Sylvester's house is
shut up and the old man's gone to Boston, so the postmaster told me
when I 'phoned and asked him. Won't be back for a couple of days,
anyhow. I remember he told me he was goin'!"
"Sho, sho! that's too bad."
"Bad enough, but I don't think it makes any real difference. I
swear I had that money when I left Sage's. I came in here and then
I went straight to the bank."
"And after you got there?"
"Oh, when I got there I found no less than three men, not countin'
old Mrs. Emmeline Bartlett, in my room waitin' to see me. Nellie
Hall--my typewriter, you know--she knew where I'd been and what a
crank old Sage is and she says: 'Did you get the money, Cap'n?'
And I says: 'Yes, it's in my overcoat pocket this minute.' Then I
hurried in to 'tend to the folks that was waitin' for me. 'Twas an
hour later afore I went to my coat to get the cash. Then, as I
say, all I could find was the two five hundred packages. The four
hundred one was gone."
"Sho, sho! Tut, tut, tut! Where did you put the coat when you
took it off?"
"On the hook in the clothes closet where I always put it."
"Hum-m! And--er--when you told Nellie about it did you speak
loud?"
"Loud? No louder'n I ever do."
"Well--er--that ain't a--er--whisper, Sam, exactly."
"Don't make any difference. There wasn't anybody outside the
railin' that minute to hear if I'd bellered like a bull of Bashan.
There was nobody in the bank, I tell you, except the three men and
old Aunt Emmeline and they were waitin' in my private room. And
except for Nellie and Eddie Ellis, the messenger, and Charlie
Phillips, there wan't a soul around, as it happened. The money
hasn't been stolen; I lost it somewheres--but where? Well, I can't
stop here any longer. I'm goin' back to the bank to have another
hunt."
He banged out again. Fortunately he did not look at his friend's
face before he went. For that face had a singular expression upon
it. Jed sat heavily down in the chair by the bench. A vivid
recollection of a recent remark made in that very shop had suddenly
come to him. Charlie Phillips had made it in answer to a question
of his own. Charlie had declared that he would do almost anything
to get five hundred dollars.