“Did you see that woman in the post office, Barbara?” said Bill.
“You mean the one who was standing over in the corner and staring?”
“Yes. That’s her. Wasn’t she staring, though!”
“I reckon she thought we were a couple of rowdies.”
“Well, we look it.”
“We certainly do, shipmate! But we look like what we are--sailors.”
“I never went to town lookin’ so in all m’ born days.”
“No, but we were just like a couple of sailors, weren’t we, you and I?”
“Yes--but I don’t like t’ go ashore with you, lookin’ so awful.”
“But I like you to, shipmate. It wouldn’t have been fun if you and I
had dressed up. We wouldn’t have been sailors then at all.”
“Ssh, Barbara! That’s her ahead!”
It was--it was, unmistakably, the tall black woman. We strode along
until we caught up with her, which, at such a gait, we did very
shortly. I gave her a brief nod and a smile of recognition as we
passed; otherwise I looked neither to left nor right. The funny part of
all this was that, though I was amazingly conspicuous in my rags and
tatters, with my face a bonfire of sun and sea, and such a crazy sailor
roll, I still wasn’t in the least embarrassed.
♦ _Rencontre_ ♦
So we rolled past until we had gone the whole length of the long bridge
and come back to the _Norman D.’s_ side of the river. We were stopped
by the railroad track, for a long, long freight train had started
across it, going very slowly. There was nothing to do but stop and
wait, and talk as best we could in the terrific din. It was a long
time that we stood there; and, just as we were beginning to think
that the train would never come to an end, we felt someone approaching
slowly and calmly behind us, and I felt a pair of beady eyes fixed on
me--someone staring. I looked around quickly, and there was “her.” Now
the meeting was inevitable. Someone had to say something.
“How do you do?” said she, in a calm voice.
“Hello!” said I, heartily, and “Hello!” said Bill.
Then there was a rather awkward pause.
“I thought you were a little boy,” said she, finally, “until I saw your
pigtails.” She had a curious accent which seemed to be universal among
the Nova Scotians.
“Well, perhaps I do look it,” said I. “We came up on the schooner--just
got in this morning.”
“Are ye from Yankeeland?” said she, looking at me curiously.
“I am,” said I. “From Connecticut.”
“And you say you came up on a schooner?”
“Yes, the _Norman D._”
“Hm! That must have been fun. Did you enjoy it?”
“I’ll say!”
“And you?” she said, turning to Bill. “Are you the captain?”
“No, first mate,” said Bill, heartily enough.
“Mate,” I echoed.
Another pause. Then: “Were you the only girl aboard?”
“Yes, I was, thank Heaven!” said I.
“You were glad not to have anyone else with you?”
“Indeed yes. But, say: don’t you want to walk down with us and see the
_Norman D_? She’s mighty pretty!”
“No, I can’t now.”
“Well, you’ll find her there for quite a long time, if you ever want to
see her.”
“About three weeks,” said Bill.
“Thank you,” said she.
The train had now gone past, and we three stepped along in company.
Before many steps Bill and I passed her. She minced sedately along a
short way, and then, with a final glassy look and a friendly wave of
her hand, she disappeared into a little old house. Bill and I quietly
returned to the schooner and climbed aboard.
* * * * *
♦ _A Resignation_ ♦
There we found quite a state of excitement. The steward was hopping
up and down the deck on one leg and saying: “The old man wants t’
see you, Barbara. You better go aft ’n’ see w’at he wants. I think
the custom-house man is here.” Aft I went, and I had to open up my
hand-baggage, and to show my birth-certificate. The old man, by the
way, had gone for the mail, and had evidently got it during the time
when Bill and I were waiting outside. My certificate was among it.
Out on deck, everyone had letters, and they were reading them to each
other. The mate took his away in a corner and spent a very long time
over them. Then he told me that they were from his wife. “I got seven
letters from her when we was in New Haven,” said he.
And now a sad event was happening in the crew: for Richardson was
resigning. He scrubbed up, put on shore clothes, and finally went aft
to the captain--probably to get his wages. He returned forrard with
beaming contentment.
“I guess we weren’t good enough to you, Dick,” said Roy, mournfully.
“Oh, you fellows were all mighty good to me,” said Richardson, almost
in tears. Then he hopped off and went ashore to catch a train.
How many times I scrambled up and down the rigging, I couldn’t tell.
I didn’t know exactly why I did it, but something was telling me that
it was mighty near my parting with the _Norman D._, and, though I was
likely to climb to other crosstrees in my life, I shouldn’t have much
more chance to swing my legs on those of the schooner which had brought
me to Nova Scotia.
It was Saturday. At last my shipmate returned aboard, and said that
we shouldn’t be able to get a train down until Monday. So we had the
prospect of another day in Bridgewater. We decided to stay at a hotel,
for we were tired of hearing the captain’s complaints about sleeping on
the couch; also, the charm of the schooner was lost when we were not
under way. For the first time during the whole trip, I put on ladylike
clothes, and appeared in the midst of the crew again. They stared like
so many fish. The mate said, in a voice which sounded a little wistful:
“But you didn’t dress up that way when you went ashore this mornin’!”
I hoped his feelings weren’t hurt. I said: “No, I didn’t, because I
thought it would be more fun walking through the streets looking like
born sailors and shipmates.”
“Well, I think I like you better in your good clothes,” said he.
“Oh, NO!” I protested, in frank disappointment.
“Well, perhaps not,” he yielded. “You were all right as a little sailor
boy, anyhow.”
♦ _A Gift without Thanks_ ♦
So we went off ashore. I didn’t realize it at the time, but that was
my last glimpse of Mate Bill as he is and ought to be. The truly last
time I saw him, it was not Mate Bill at all.
We found a good hotel and deposited our luggage. Then we went out for
a walk. We picked the back roads of Bridgewater and headed as much for
open country as we could. The Nova Scotian people are more friendly
than any I have ever seen. Everyone nodded and smiled and said “Good
day!” to us, as though we had lived there all our lives. As we came
out upon a long country road that led out toward a rather high hill,
we passed a house where an old, sweet-looking man was mowing the lawn.
We had been picking and examining the Nova Scotian wildflowers, and
as soon as the old man saw that, he left his lawn-mower where it was
and ran off into the back yard for a moment. When he came back he had
a great bunch of pansies of gorgeous velvety colors, brighter and
glossier than any I have ever seen. He gave them at once to me, saying:
“I see you were lookin’ fer flowers, so I brought you some. You don’t
need to thank me, ’cause I’m so deef I couldn’t hear, anyhow.” We were
touched.
The flowers have an extraordinary brilliance there. Such pansies! And
the columbine! that is the most splendid of all. Almost everyone has
it--great double blossoms, almost as large as tiger lilies, of all the
colors of earth, ranging from dark blue to bright yellow, lavender,
pink. We stopped beside someone’s garden, where a man was down on his
hands and knees weeding a flower-bed. We spoke to him in a friendly way
about his garden. Immediately he got up and picked us a great bunch of
the exquisite columbine, with some pansies. It seems as if the Nova
Scotians make the very best of their short summers, cramming into their
gardens every flower that can possibly find an inch of soil to fasten
its roots in.
* * * * *
The next day, Sunday, we went down to say good-bye to those of the
_Norman D._ In our forgetfulness, we never thought about its being
Sunday until, as we drew very near the schooner and were walking along
on the railroad tracks, we met the crew face to face. We stepped back
amazed. Bill, Bob, Roy, and Irish Bill, all marching along in a body,
all with new dark blue suits, all with newly shined shoes, all in clean
white shirts and ties! Every atom of their charm, their character,
had vanished out of them. Before, they were sailors. Now they were
nothing--nothing at all. Even the mate was considerably less piratical
and delightful.
♦ _Shore-going Togs_ ♦
It threatened rain, and the mate said he had decided not to go ashore
at all, but to return to the schooner with us. “I don’t want to get
my clothes wet,” said he. Care-free Mate Bill worrying about getting
his clothes wet! But the other three were determined to go on to town
to “show off.” We left them, and went to the schooner with the mate.
Even the steward was slightly dressed up. He had on a clean apron,
or a clean blue cotton shirt, or another pair of trousers; he looked
different, somehow. The captain was dressed up like a young boy; and he
looked like a monkey, a positive monkey, in _his_ shore clothes.
It began to rain hard and furiously. We had just time to duck into
the cabin. The three of the crew who had persisted in heading towards
town came running back at full speed and leaped over the side of the
schooner. We had quite a party down there. The mate took our blankets
and rolled them into a beautiful roll, marline-hitching them with
stout cord, and tying them as only a sailor could. Even a professional
mountain-climber could do no better. Then I went with him in to his
bunk, and we had a farewell talk. There was a snapshot on the wall of
his little room--a snapshot of a girl. The mate indicated it, saying to
me:
“You know, my wife, she’s awful funny, and she sends me all sorts o’
things, just to tease me. She sent me that picture while we was down
there in New Haven.”
“Who is she?”
“Oh, she’s a girl I used to go with. I went with her three years. Yes,
I had pretty strong intentions of hookin’ up with that girl!”
“What happened that you didn’t?”
“Well, I met t’ other one. Her father had died, ’n’ she was livin’
there all alone, ’n’ so I went to her instead.”
“Have you seen the other girl since?”
“Yes, a few times. She give me the dickens fer goin’ to the other, ’n’
that was all there was to it.”
Then he talked about his career. He gave a sigh and said: “If I had my
hull life t’ live over, I’d do it powerful diff’rent--that is, if I
knowed as much as I know now.”
“Would you go to sea, mate?”
“Not if I knowed as much as I know now.”
“What do you think you would do?”
“Well, I reckon I’d ’a’ been a barber. That’s a very pleasant little
job. But bein’ a sailor is good in some ways. I keep thinkin’ I’m goin’
t’ resign at th’ next port, but somethin’ about it--I dunno, but I
seem t’ stick. It’s a good, healthy life, out in the open, ’n’ that’s
somethin’.”
* * * * *
♦ _Self-conscious_ ♦
We went back to our hotel for supper, with an agreement that the mate
was to run up that way later, when he went ashore, and that we should
be on the lookout for him about six o’clock. The captain was to come
up, too, to write that note which he had promised so long ago--a
note for identification, stating that we were his passengers on the
schooner, to be handed to any officials who might challenge us in
Boston. We were sitting in the hotel, talking, about six o’clock, and
watching for Bill. Sure enough, we saw him striding along, in company
with Irish Bill. As for the skipper, we didn’t see him. But the two
Bills went straight on, appearing not even to see the place. I darted
out the door like a flash and called out “Hi! Mate!” in a loud and
hearty voice. Several persons turned at the sound of that “Mate!”
I asked him why he hadn’t stopped. He said he thought it was much
too grand a place for the likes of him (he was in his half-sailor,
half-shore clothes, which were at least better than his real shore
clothes). I said that was nonsense, and asked him if he didn’t want
to come in. He agreed briefly, though still feeling a little shy, and
Irish Bill went on walking up the street, alone.
“Where’s Bill going?” I asked.
“I dunno. Bill’s a queer lad, he is.”
Then my shipmate appeared, and the three of us set out for a walk
together. We were discussing the old man and wondering where he was,
when suddenly we met him face to face. “I’ve just been up-town for a
little walk,” said he. We turned and went back toward the hotel. My
shipmate was extremely eager not to let the old man slip between his
fingers and once more dodge writing that note. We went in, and I sat
with Mate Bill while the old man wrote it. I saw him throw it away at
least twice as if dissatisfied.
As for Mate Bill and me, our talk ran on to the jackknife which I had
promised him.
“I’ll send it up to Bridgewater as soon as I get home, mate,” said I.
“That will be fine, Barbara,” said he. “I’ll be awful glad to have
it. But listen, don’t send it to my home _ad_dress, will you?” (He
had given me his home address before.) “Be sure not to send it there,
Barbara,” he went on, very earnestly, “Because, you see, my wife ’d
get the package, ’n’ she’d open it, ’n’ w’at would she find but a
jackknife? ’n’ from ‘Barbara’! She wouldn’t rillize that you was jist a
little shipmate o’ mine. She’d think you was a girl that I’d been goin’
with, ’n’ she’d be jealous, she would. I know how it is, ’cause I got
in trouble with her that way once before. I’d get in wrong with her,
you see, ’n’ I wouldn’t like to have that. So don’t, will you, Barbara?”
♦ _Last Words with Bill_ ♦
“No, I promise you I won’t, mate,” said I, in the same earnest tone.
“I’ll send it right up to Bridgewater, and as soon as I get home, too,
so that it’ll get up here to you before the schooner sails.”
The rest of our conversation was on the same theme--warning me against
sending the knife to his home address--until the end, when a strange
thing happened.
“Was your mother worried ’bout havin’ you come on the schooner?” said
Bill.
“No! Why should she be?”
“Well, I thought, perhaps, you bein’ the on’y woman aboard, she might
git worried. But she didn’t need to, anyhow. I know one that wouldn’t
let you be imposed upon--and that one is--_me_!”
By this time the captain had finished, and it was just when they were
going out the door that Bill said: “Good-bye, shipmate!” and I replied:
“Good-bye, shipmate!”
And that was the last I saw of Bill.
* * * * *
As for the captain’s note, it ran like this: