GOOD-NIGHT IN THE FO’CASTLE
The silence was broken a little later by merry voices on the stairway.
For several nights the girls had been gathering in May Nell’s room.
Billy knew “things were doing” there by the sounds; the tap, tap of the
tack hammer, added to much chatter and rustling. Now May Nell caught
him by the hand and pulled him across the hall. A strange pungent
fragrance like burning spice, yet not familiar, met them at the door.
And inside, the dark hangings full of lurking shadows gave the room a
foreign air.
The Queen of Sheba in gypsy dress, and her harum-scarum train buzzing
with gossip and exclamation, flocked in. Bess looked magnificent in a
mass of draperies that included every Oriental thing to be found in
several families.
“Jiminy whiz! Your royal splendor dazzles me!” Billy chaffed.
“I’m the Royal Egyptian Fortune Teller!” Bess announced, in a deep
voice. “This is my desert tent. I shall reveal the past, present, and
future to those only whom my favor shall designate. Slaves, the lamps!”
Clarence and Harry, much wrapped in white about the head, but with bare
little white arms and bare little brown legs, came in solemnly and
placed some red lanterns on the table. Bess posed in a chair decorated
for the occasion, arranged her draperies, pulled nearer the “incense
lamp,” which was her father’s Turkish cigar lighter, laid out her
cards, and bent over them in grave silence.
Her absorption hypnotized the others to wondering stillness. In
a moment her attitude and intensity had transported them to the
mysterious East, and put upon them the spell of ancient superstitions.
At last she looked up and pointed a startling finger at May Nell. “Mary
Ellen Smith, my familiars, who guard the portals of futurity, declare
that you shall be the first honored. Minions, depart! Slaves, guard the
door!”
Jean and the twins, Charley, George and some others, rattled down the
stairs; while Clarence and Harry stood rigid, with wooden scymitars
drawn, one on each side of the door.
Billy hesitated a minute. The dim room, the wicked-looking red lights,
Bess so stern and mysterious,--this might frighten the little girl. He
ought to wait.
“Avaunt, hesitating noddy! The angel child is quite safe!” Bess waved
an arm, partly bare and brown in spots.
“Yes, go away, Billy; I’m not afraid.” May Nell laughed happily. Her
quick mind was delighted with the masquerading.
Yet it was a very quiet little child that crept down to the others a
few minutes later; when asked of her fortune she burst into tears.
Mrs. Bennett came in and tried to learn the trouble; but it was some
time before May Nell could be induced to tell.
“She said, the Queen of Sheba did, that I’d be in danger, and some one
would save me. And I’d have a s’prise, and a hus--husband, and fi-five
c-chil-- children!” She wailed again and hid her face on Mrs. Bennett’s
shoulder.
“Golly! There’s nothing skewgee about that fortune,” Billy commented,
encouragingly.
“Oh, yes; yes, there is, Billy.” May Nell lifted a teary face. “Five
children! If it had been two, or perhaps I could possibly bring up
three; but f-five, o-o-oh!” she wailed again, heedless of the laughter
around her.
Several others were summoned and returned with remarkable reports. At
last two high-pitched little voices called in concert down the stair:
“The Royal Seeress will rend the veil of futurity for William Bennett.”
“That’s you, papa,” Clarence piped, as an anxious post warning.
Artful Bess! Billy had treated it all as a huge joke; but now May
Nell’s depression, the unfamiliar sound of his right name, the dim room
with its shadows and half-suffocating odors,--all conspired to send a
sober Billy into the circle of lurid light that came from the two lamps
gleaming on either side of dark Bess like angry eyes.
A few minutes later the entire Egyptian fortune-telling outfit came
down stairs at Billy’s heels. The hubbub was a riot of fun, and no one
noticed that Billy said nothing about the revelations of destiny made
to him; though later Jean recalled that in the zig-zag journey around
the park that was Billy’s evening exercise, he spoke very little to the
chatterers with him, even forgot to “jolly.”
That night when Mrs. Bennett went into the Fo’castle there was an
unusual note in Billy’s voice.
“Stop and chin with me just a little, won’t you, marmsey?”
“And what’s the ‘chinning’ to be about?” she questioned, sitting on the
bedside; “the fortune?”
Billy looked at her wonderingly for an instant. “You guess everything
that troubles a fellow, don’t you? How do you do it?” He sighed deeply.
“Was it as bad as that?” She smiled, and smoothed back the thick,
tumbled hair.
“Worse! She said soon I’d have to be very brave--that ain’t bad--but
I’m goin’ to be--to be a minister--a preacher!” The last word came with
a woe-begone vehemence that made his mother laugh.
“Why do you think that’s so dreadful?”
“O mother,” he began, excitedly, and stopped. Only lately had he
called her “mother” in his serious moments, and the name gave her pain
as well as pleasure, for it was one more announcement of the coming man.
“Mother,” he resumed, “I know I must freeze to some sort of business,
and that mighty soon, too. But a preacher--why, he can’t be like
anybody. He never has any fun.”
“Do you think fun the first business of the world?”
“Oh, no,” he sighed; “I suppose duty is the first business; but duty
is such a narrow, knock-you-down little word.” His voice was tense and
hard.
Mrs. Bennett continued her gentle, even strokes; bent and kissed him
softly before replying. “Duty looks narrow only when it opposes
inclination, my child. Selfish people hate duty; but those who live
the longest and best lives could tell you that every victory duty wins
brings an ever-increasing joy.”
“O mother, how can there be joy if life is all work and never any fun?”
He took her hand and pressed it against his cheek.
“There’s a little secret about work; with grown-ups it is often their
play; and they like it.”
“Do you _like_ to work?” His tone was insistent; and he lifted his
head and looked hard at her, as if to challenge the tiniest bit of
insincerity that might be lurking back of the words. “_Like_ to work?”
he repeated with added emphasis.
“Billy, I don’t think you could possibly have been happier on your
birthday than I was; yet I was so tired that night that I could not
sleep. The work of that day was play to me.”
Billy threw both arms around her and hugged her.
“And there are many times when the duty itself is disagreeable, yet
doing it brings a finer joy than shirking it ever could bring.”
“Then I’ll be a--a preacher if I ought to. But gee! it’s rocky!”
“O Billy,” his mother laughed, “you need not decide to-night. Besides,
it was all Bess’s nonsense. I can’t quite imagine my heedless boy in a
pulpit.”
Billy thought he detected a touch of resigned disappointment in her
words, and looked up with a sudden wonder widening his eyes, making
them shine even in the dim light of the shaded lamp. “Do you want me to
preach, mamma?”
“Not unless you wish to so much that you will not do anything else,
Billy. The world needs preachers of the right kind sadly; and the right
kind take up the calling reverently, though they know it will bring
them small worldly return and much toil.”
The boy was very still for a little, but burst out presently: “I’m
going to work, mother; as soon as school closes I’ll start.”
He felt his mother start. “You’re too young for hard work, Billy; you
do enough as it is.”
“Yes, when you and sister turn gray getting it out of me. No, I’m
going to do real work that will earn money; and I’m going to take this
never-get-enough grub-basket of mine to a table where my own hands have
earned the grub.”
“Billy! My--boy!” Mrs. Bennett bent over him; and he felt a tear where
her cheek touched his.
“Feel that muscle,” he said a moment later; bending his arm, and
pressing her fingers to it. “That’s got to grow by a broom or hoe,
something besides football!”
His words had a new ring, and his mother was wise enough to respect the
young independence in them. “What brought you to this decision, Billy?”
“You remember that story about a man who died for love of a girl
because he knew he ought not to marry her? I thought that sort kind of
noble, but you said there was nobler. Do you remember?”
“No; I can’t recall what I said.”
“You said, ‘Death is easy. It is much braver to live without the love
one craves, to do one’s duty each day, and smile as the world goes by.
That’s the finest love I know,’ you said.”
“Well?” she questioned.
“I couldn’t understand it then. Now I do. My own sister is that bravest
of lovers.” His words rang with pride as well as love.
“Why, Billy, what has happened to make you think so?”
“Last night I heard something on the Q. T. I didn’t mean to, but I’m
glad I did. I was in the pantry chuckin’ some bread an’ butter under my
solar plexus when I heard Mr. Wright tell sister in the sitting-room--I
guess some door was open a crack--that his law business was growing a
little. I didn’t hear the next words, but there was ‘please’ in italics
in his voice. But sister said, an’ I heard her plain enough, ‘No, Hal,
not till I’ve saved enough to take Billy through school.’ ‘I’ll help--’
Mr. Wright got as far as that when this guy waked up,--knew he’d snuck
information not intended for him. So I made a noise; I scatted the
cat--no cat there--slammed the door, and kicked up a racket generally
so’s they’d know I was there.”
Mrs. Bennett smiled. She thought they could have had no trouble in
locating Billy.
“Then I went in an’ spoke to ’em ’s though I hadn’t heard a word, and
hustled off to bed. I thought ’most all night, and decided that sister
shan’t wait a day longer for me to grow up. I’m going to hustle for
myself, so she can get married.”
“Billy, my little, little boy!” She lifted the tousled head and pressed
her cheek close against his.
“I’m going to work as soon ’s school’s out; it’s for you and May Nell,
too, you know.”
“But your school, my child! You must be educated; you--”
“Yes, yes, marmsey; but there’s night shops where a fellow can gobble
education by the hunk, you know, and--” He paused. Even his own mother
didn’t know the pang in his heart when he thought of Jean and Jimmy,
and the others, going on together through the high school, perhaps the
university.
Mrs. Bennett rose and tucked him in snugly. “Let us drop it till school
closes, Billy. Then we’ll talk it over.”
“All but finding the job, mother. Jobs don’t hunt boys; and mine’s
going to be waiting for me when the school house door shuts: that is,
if I can persuade any man in the town or county that he needs a boy my
size.”
Mrs. Bennett bade him good-night, and left him to the stars and the
quiet night. Her heart was still sore for the little boy of the past,
yet a strange joy came to her; the thoughtful, observant, earnest man
had heralded his coming. She should be very proud of him.