It was not settled that evening. Martha declared she must have at least
a few hours in which to think it over and Galusha, of course, agreed.
“It won't take too long,” she said. “Naturally, you want to know so that
you can make your plans.”
Galusha smiled. “Please take as much time as you need, Miss Phipps,” he
urged. “If you permit me to remain here while you are--ah--endeavoring
to reach a decision I shall be quite satisfied, really. In that case,
you know, I should be willing to wait for the decision until spring.
Dear me, yes--even until summer.”
Martha laughed and declared she should decide long before that. “I think
breakfast time to-morrow will settle it,” she added.
It did. After breakfast she informed him that he might stay if he
wished.
“Though WHY you want to I can't understand,” she said. “And of course it
is part of the agreement that you'll feel free to give it up and go any
time you wish; as soon as you begin to get tired of the place and us, I
mean.”
He beamed satisfaction. “I shall not be the one to tire first,” he
declared. Then he added, earnestly, “Of course, Miss Phipps, you will
be perfectly frank and tell me at once if you change YOUR mind. And if I
should become a--ah--well, a sort of nuisance, be irregular at meals, or
noisy or--What is it? I beg your pardon?”
She had laughed outright. She was still smiling when she apologized.
“Please excuse me for laughin', Mr. Bangs,” she said, “but don't you
think yourself that that is funny? The idea of your bein' noisy, I
mean.”
He stroked his chin.
“We-ll,” he admitted, “perhaps it is. But sometimes I am quite
boisterous, really I am. I remember once, years ago, I was in an old
cemetery in New Hampshire and I suddenly discovered an inscription which
pleased me VERY much. MOST quaint and unusual it was--dear me, yes. And
quite unconsciously I burst into a shout--a cheer, as one may say. The
old sexton was quite scandalized and warned me not to do it again. He
said it would disturb people. I don't know whom he meant, there were no
living people to be disturbed.”
The question of terms was the cause of a supplementary discussion. Mr.
Bangs insisted upon continuing the three dollars a day rate and Miss
Martha declared he should do nothing of the kind.
“That three dollars a day was just a temporary thing,” she said. “I
said it just because I was sure you would go over to Elmer Rogers' if I
didn't. Elmer Rogers is a robber and always was. Father used to say he
was the forty-first member of the Forty Thieves and that they didn't
boil him because he wasn't enough account to waste hot oil on.”
“But--ah--it seems to me that if the Rogers' House board is worth three
dollars a day yours should be worth five at least.”
“Maybe so, but I never heard anybody but Elmer say his board was worth
one dollar, let alone three.”
They compromised on a daily rate of two and a half per day, which each
declared to be ridiculous.
Thus Galusha Cabot Bangs became no longer a transitory but a regular
boarder and lodger at the Phipps' place. The fact became known to Miss
Primrose Cash that forenoon, to the driver of the grocer's cart one hour
later, and to all of East Wellmouth before bedtime. It was news and, in
October in East Wellmouth, one item of local news is a rare and blessed
dispensation.
Before another day had passed the news item had been embellished. Mr.
Bangs visited the general store of Erastus Beebe to purchase headgear
to replace the brown derby. Erastus happened to be busy at the
moment--there were two customers in his store at the same time, an event
most unusual--so Galusha's wants were supplied by no less a person than
Mr. Horatio Pulcifer.
Raish's greeting was condescendingly genial.
“Well, well!” he exclaimed, pumping the little man's arm up and down
with one hand and thumping his shrinking shoulder blades with the other.
“If it ain't the perfessor himself! How are you this mornin', Mr. Bangs?
Right up and comin, eh?”
Galusha would have withdrawn his hand from the Pulcifer clutch if
withdrawal had been possible. It being quite impossible, he murmured
that he was--“ah--quite well” and, conscious that the eyes of Mr. Beebe
and his two customers were fixed upon him, fixed his own gaze upon Mr.
Pulcifer's assortment of watch charms and shivered with embarrassment.
“Ain't it funny, now?” queried Raish, addressing the world in general.
“Ain't it funny how things happen? When I fetched you over in my car
t'other night didn't I say I hoped you and me'd meet again? That's what
I said. And now we've met twice since. Once in the old boneyard and now
here, eh? And they tell me you like East Wellmouth so much you're goin'
to stick around for a spell. Good business! Say, I'll be sellin' you a
piece of Wellmouth property one of these days to settle down on. That's
the kind of talk, eh, Perfessor? Haw, haw, haw!”
He pounded the Bangs' shoulder blades once more. Mr. Beebe and his two
customers echoed the Pulcifer laugh. Galusha smiled painfully--as the
man in the operating chair smiles at the dentist's jokes.
“I--I--excuse me,” he faltered, turning to the grinning Erastus, “can
I--That is, have you a--ah--hat or--or cap or something I might buy?”
Before the proprietor of the general store could answer, Mr. Pulcifer
answered for him. Again the hand descended upon the Bangs' shoulder.
“Haw, haw!” roared Raish, joyfully. “I get you, Mr. Bangs. The old lid
blew out to sea and we've got to get a new one. Say, that was funny,
wasn't it; that hat goin' that way? I don't know's I ever laughed more
in my life. One minute she was jumpin' along amongst them gravestones
like a hoptoad with wings, and then--Zing! Fsst! away she went a half
mile or so down into the breakers. Haw, haw, haw! And to see your face!
Why--”
Galusha interrupted.
“PLEASE don't do that,” he said, nervously.
“Hey? Do what?”
“Ah--slap my back. I'd rather you wouldn't, if you don't mind.
And--oh--I should like to see a--a cap or something.”
The last sentence was addressed to Mr. Beebe, who cleared his throat
importantly.
“Jest a minute, jest a minute,” said Erastus. “Soon's I get through
waitin' on these customers I'll 'tend to you. Jest a minute. Yeast cake,
did you say, Mrs. Blount?”
“Ohh, pardon me,” faltered Galusha. “I'll wait, of course.”
“Wait?” It was Mr. Pulcifer who spoke. “You don't have to wait. I know
Ras's stock as well as he does, pretty nigh. I'LL show you a cap, Mr.
Bangs.”
“Oh--oh, I couldn't think of troubling you, really I couldn't.”
“No trouble at all. What's a little trouble amongst neighbors, eh? And
that's what we are now--neighbors, eh? Sure, Mike! You and me are goin'
to see a lot of each other from now on. There! There's a good, stylish
cap, if I do say it. Try it on? What's your size, Perfessor?”
Five minutes later Galusha descended the steps of the Beebe store,
wearing a cloth cap which was, to say the very least, out of the
ordinary. Its material was a fuzzy frieze of nondescript colors, a shade
of dingy yellow predominating, and its shape was weird and umbrellalike.
With it upon his head little Galusha resembled a walking toadstool--an
unhealthy, late-in-the-season toadstool.
The quartet in the Beebe store watched his departure from the windows.
All were hugely amused, but one, Mr. Pulcifer, was hilarious.
“Haw, haw, haw!” roared Raish. “Look at him! Don't he look like a
bullfrog under a lily pad? Eh? Don't he now? Haw, haw, haw!”
Erastus Beebe joined in the laugh, but he shook his head.
“I've had that cap in stock,” he said, “since--well, since George
Cahoon's son used to come down drummin' for that Boston hat store, and
he quit much as eight year ago, anyhow. How did he ever come to pick
THAT cap out, Raish?”
Mr. Pulcifer regarded the questioner with scornful superiority.
“Pick it out!” he repeated. “He never picked it out, I picked it out for
him. You don't know the first principles of sellin', Ras. If you had me
to help around here you wouldn't have so many stickers in your stock.”
Beebe, gazing after the retreating figure of Mr. Bangs, sniffed.
“If I had your brass, Raish,” he observed, calmly, “I'd sell it to the
junk man and get rich. Well, maybe I won't have so many stickers, as
you call 'em, if that little critter comes here often. What's the matter
with him; soft in the head?”
“Isn't this his hat--the one he wore when he came in here?” queried Mrs.
Jubal Doane, one of the two customers.
Mr. Beebe picked it up. “Guess so,” he replied. “Humph! I've seen that
hat often enough, too. Used to belong to Cap'n Jim Phipps, that hat did.
Seen him wear it a hundred times.”
Mrs. Becky Blount, the other customer, elevated the tip of a long nose.
“Well,” she observed, “if Martha Phipps is lendin' him her pa's hats SO
early, I must say--”
She did not say what it was she must say, but she had said quite enough.
Martha herself said something when her boarder appeared beneath his new
headgear. When he removed it, upon entering the dining room, she took it
from his hand.
“Is THIS the cap you just bought, Mr. Bangs?” she asked.
“Yes,” said Galusha, meekly. “Do you like it?”
She regarded the fuzzy yellow thing with a curious expression.
“Do you?” she asked.
The reply was astonishingly prompt and emphatic.
“I loathe it,” said Galusha.
She transferred the stare from the cap to its owner's face.
“You do!” she cried. “Then why in the world did you buy it?”
Mr. Bangs squirmed slightly. “He said I ought to,” he answered.
“Who said so?”
“That man--that Mr. Pulcifer. Mr.--ah--Deedee--Beebe, I mean--was busy,
and Mr. Pulcifer insisted on showing me the caps. I didn't like this one
at all, but he talked so much that--that I couldn't stay and hear him
any longer. He makes me very nervous,” he added, apologetically. “I
suppose it is my fault, but--ah--he does, you know.”
“And do you mean to say that you took this--this outrage because Raish
Pulcifer talked you into it?”
Galusha smiled sadly. “Well, he--he talked me into it--yes,” he
admitted. “Into the--ah--cap and out of the store. Dear me, yes.”
Miss Martha drew a long breath.
“My heavens and earth!” she exclaimed. “And what did you do with
father's hat, the one you wore down there?”
Her lodger gasped. “Oh, dear, dear!” he exclaimed. “Oh, dear me! I must
have left it in the shop. I'm SO sorry. How could I do such a careless
thing? I'll go for it at once, Miss Phipps.”
He would have gone forthwith, but she stopped him.
“I'm goin' there myself in a little while,” she said. “I've got some
other errands there. And, if you don't mind,” she added, “I'd like to
take this new cap of yours with me. That is, if you can bear to part
with it.”
She went soon afterward and when she returned she had another cap, a
sane, respectable cap, one which was not a “sticker.”
“I took it on myself to change the other one for this, Mr. Bangs,” she
said. “I like it lots better myself. Of course it wasn't my affair at
all and I suppose I ought to beg your pardon.”
He hastened to reassure her.
“Please don't speak so, Miss Phipps,” he begged. “It was very, very kind
of you. And I like this cap VERY much. I do, really.... I ought to have
a guardian, hadn't I?” he added.
It was precisely what she was thinking at the moment and she blushed
guiltily.
“Why, what makes you say that?” she asked.
“Oh, I'm not saying it, not as an original thought, you know; I'm merely
repeating it. Other people always say it, they've said it ever since I
can remember. Thank you very much for the cap, Miss Phipps.”
He was sunnily cheerful and very grateful. There was not the slightest
resentment because of her interference. And yet if she had not
interfered he would have worn the hideous yellow cap and been as
cheerful under that. Pulcifer had imposed upon him and he realized it,
but he deliberately chose being imposed upon rather than listening to
the Pulcifer conversation. He was certainly a queer individual, this
lodger of hers. A learned man evidently, a man apparently at home and
sure of himself in a world long dead, but as helpless as a child in the
practical world of to-day. She liked him, she could not help liking him,
and it irritated her exceedingly to think that men like Raish Pulcifer
and Erastus Beebe should take advantage of his childlike qualities to
swindle him, even if the swindles were but petty.
“They shan't do it,” she told Lulie Hallett, the next morning. “Not if I
can help it, they shan't. Somebody ought to look out for the poor thing,
half sick and with nobody of his own within goodness knows how many
miles. I'll look out for him as well as I can while he's here. My
conscience wouldn't let me do anything else. I suppose if I pick out his
other things the way I picked out that cap the whole of East Wellmouth
will be talkin'; but I can't help it, let 'em.”
For the matter of that, the Beebes and the Blounts and Doanes were
talking already. And within a fortnight Miss Phipps' prophecy was
fulfilled, the whole of East Wellmouth WAS talking of Galusha Bangs.
Some of the talk was malicious and scandalous gossip, of course, but
most of it was fathered by an intense and growing curiosity concerning
the little man. Who was he? What was his real reason for coming to East
Wellmouth to live--in the WINTER time? What made him spend so many hours
in the old cemetery? Was he crazy, as some people declared, or merely
“kind of simple,” which was the opinion of others? Mr. Pulcifer's
humorous summing-up was freely quoted.
“He may not be foolish now,” observed Raish, “but he will be if he lives
very long with that bunch down to the lighthouse. Old Cap'n Jeth
and Zach and Primmie Cash are enough to start anybody countin' their
fingers. My opinion is, if you want to know, that this Bangs feller is
just a little mite cracked on the subject of Egyptians and Indians and
gravestones--probably he's read a lot about 'em and it's sprained his
mind, as you might say. That would account for the big yarns he tells
Prim about Africa and such. As to why he's come here to live, I cal'late
I've got the answer to that. He's poorer'n poverty and it's cheap livin'
down at Martha Phipps's. How do I know he's poor? Cripes t'mighty, look
at his clothes! Don't look much like yours or mine, do they?”
They certainly did not look much like Mr. Pulcifer's. Galusha's
trunk had arrived at last, but the garments in it were as drab and
old-fashioned and “floppy” as those he wore on his arrival. Horatio was
invariably arrayed like a lily of the field--if by that term is meant
a tiger lily. Raish generally finished his appraisal by adding,
patronizingly:
“He's all right, though, old Galushy is. Nothin' harmful about him. See
how easy I get along with him. I shake hands with him and hit him a clip
on the back, and, gosh t'mighty, he thinks I'm his best friend on earth.
He'd do anything for me, that old owl would.”
And, perhaps, because it was given forth with such authority from the
Pulcifer Mount Sinai, the fact that Bangs was very poor and was living
at Gould's Bluffs because of that poverty came to be accepted in East
Wellmouth as a settled fact. So quickly and firmly was it settled that,
a month later, Erastus Beebe, leaning over his counter in conversation
with a Boston traveling salesman, said, as Galusha passed the store:
“Queer-lookin' customer, ain't he? One of our town characters, as you
might say. Pretends he's been all over creation, but the truth is he
lives down here by the lighthouse and is poorer than the last pullet
in Job's coop. Kind of an inventor, or book writer, or some such crazy
thing. Queer how that kind get that way, ain't it?”
“Is that all he does for a living?” asked the salesman.
“Don't do much of that, seems so, nowadays. Spends most of his time
copyin' off tombstone-writin' over in the old Baptist graveyard. Seems
to LIKE to be there, he does. Thunder sakes! a graveyard is the last
place I'd spend MY time in.”
The Bostonian made the obvious retort that it was probably the last
place Mr. Beebe WOULD spend his time in.
Galusha, of course, was not in the least aware of the East Wellmouth
estimate of himself, his fortune and his activities. He would not
have been interested had he known. He was enjoying himself hugely,
was gaining daily in health, strength, and appetite, and was becoming
thoroughly acquainted with Gould's Bluffs, its surroundings, and its
people.
He made many calls at the lighthouse nowadays. These calls were not
especially for the purpose of cultivating Captain Jethro's acquaintance,
although the rugged, bigoted old light keeper afforded an interesting
study in character. The captain's moods varied. Sometimes he talked
freely and interestingly of his experiences at sea and as keeper of the
light. His stories of wrecks and life-saving were well told and Galusha
enjoyed them. He cared less for Jethro's dissertations on investments
and deals and shrewd trades. It was plain that the old man prided
himself upon them, however. On one occasion Mr. Bangs happened to
mention Martha Phipps and hinted at his own fear that his lodging at
the Phipps' home was in the nature of an imposition upon the lady's good
nature. The light keeper shook his shaggy head impatiently.
“No, no, no,” he growled, “'tain't any such thing. Your boardin' there's
a good thing for Martha. She needs the money.”
Galusha was troubled.
“I'm sorry to hear that,” he said. “She is not--ah--not pinched for
means, I hope. Not that that is my business, of course,” he added,
hastily.
Captain Jeth's reply was gruff and rather testy.
“She'll come out all right,” he said, “if she's willin' to do as I do
and wait. I know I'll come out right. Julia told me so, herself.”
Galusha had forgotten, momentarily.
“Julia?” he repeated.
“My WIFE.”
“Oh--oh, yes, yes, of course.”
In these conversations Bangs learned to steer the talk as far as
possible from the subjects of life beyond the grave or of spirit
communications. The slightest touch here and the captain was off,
his eyes shining beneath his heavy brows, and his face working with
belligerent emotion. A hint of doubt or contradiction and trouble
followed immediately.
“Don't argue with me,” roared Cap'n Jethro. “I KNOW.”
Lulie and Galusha had many chats together. He had liked her at first
sight and soon she came to like him.
“He's as funny and odd as can he,” she told Martha, “and you never can
tell what he may say or do next. But he's awfully nice, just the same.”
Little by little she confided to him her hopes and doubts and fears,
the hopes of her own love story and the doubts and fears concerning her
father.
“He isn't well,” she said, referring to the latter. “He pretends he is,
but he isn't. And all this consulting with mediums and getting messages
and so on is very bad for him, I know it is. Do you believe in it at
all, Mr. Bangs?”
Galusha looked doubtful.
“Well,” he replied, “it would be presumptuous for one like me to say it
is all nonsense. Men like Conan Doyle and Lodge and Doctor Hyslop are
not easy dupes and their opinions are entitled to great respect. But it
seems--ah--well, I am afraid that a majority of the so-called mediums
are frauds.”
“ALL of father's mediums are that kind,” declared Lulie, emphatically.
“I know it. Most of them are frauds for money, but there are some, like
that ridiculous Marietta Hoag, who pretend to go into trances and get
messages just because they like to be the center of a sensation. They
like to have silly people say, 'Isn't it wonderful!' Marietta Hoag's
'control,' as she calls it, is a Chinese girl. She must speak spirit
Chinese, because no Chinese person on earth ever talked such gibberish.
Control! SHE ought to be controlled--by the keeper of an asylum.”
The indignation expressed upon Lulie's pretty face was so intense that
Galusha suspected an especial reason.
“Is--ah--is this Marietta person the medium who--who--” he began.
“Who set father against Nelson? Yes, she is. I'd like to shake her,
mischief-making thing. Father liked Nelson well enough before that, but
he came home from that seance as bitter against him as if the poor boy
had committed murder. Marietta told him that a small dark man was trying
to take away his daughter, or some such silliness. Nelson isn't very
small nor VERY dark, but he was the only male in sight that came near
answering the description. As a matter of fact--”
She hesitated, colored, and looked as if she had said more than she
intended. Galusha, who had not noticed her embarrassment, asked her to
go on.
“Well,” she said, in some confusion, “I was going to say that if it
hadn't been Nelson it would probably have been some one else. You see, I
am father's only child and so--and so--”
“And so he doesn't like the idea of giving you up to some one else.”
“Yes, that's it. But it wouldn't be giving me up. It would be merely
sharing me, that's all. I never shall leave father and I've told him so
ever so many times.... Oh, dear! If you could have known him in the old
days, Mr. Bangs, before he--well, when he was himself, big and strong
and hearty. He used to laugh then; he hardly ever laughs now. He and
Cap'n Jim Phipps--Martha's father--were great friends. You would have
liked Cap'n Jim, Mr. Bangs.”
“Yes, I am sure I should.”
“So am I. Martha is very much like him. She's a dear, isn't she?”
Galusha nodded. “She has been very kind to me,” he said. “Indeed, yes.”
“Oh, she is to every one. She is always just like that. I am very glad
you have decided to board with her this winter, Mr. Bangs. I have an
idea that she has been--well, troubled about something; just what,
of course, I don't know, although I think--but there, I mustn't guess
because it is not my business.”
Galusha expressed a wish that he might become better acquainted with
Nelson Howard.
“I am sure I should like him,” he said. “He seems like a very nice young
man.”
Lulie nodded radiantly.
“Oh, he is,” she cried. “Truly he is, Mr. Bangs. Why, every one says--”
Then, becoming aware of her enthusiasm, she blushed and begged pardon.
“You see, I hear so much against him--from father, I mean--that I
couldn't help acting silly when you praised him. Do forgive me, won't
you, Mr. Bangs?”
He would have forgiven her much more than that.
“I shall make it a point to go over to the South Wellmouth station and
call upon him,” he told her. She thanked him.
“I am hoping that you and Martha and Nelson and I may spend an evening
together pretty soon,” she said. “You see, father--but there, that's
another secret. I'll tell you in a little while, next week, I hope.”
He learned the secret from Martha. On a day in the following week Miss
Phipps informed her lodger that he and she were to have supper at the
light keeper's that evening.
“It's a real sort of party,” declared Martha. “Small but select, as they
used to say in books when I was a girl. There will be four of us, you
and I and Nelson Howard and Lulie.”
Galusha was surprised.
“Nelson Howard!” he repeated. “Why, dear me, I thought--I understood
that Mr. Howard was persona non grata to Captain Hallett.”
Martha nodded. “Well, if that means what I suppose it does, he is,” she
replied. “If Cap'n Jeth knew Nelson was goin' to eat supper in his house
he'd go without eatin' himself to stop it. But, you see, he doesn't
know. Jethro is goin' spiritualizin' to-night. Marietta Hoag and Ophelia
Beebe and their crowd of rattleheads have dug up a brand new medium who
is visitin' over in Trumet and they've made up a party to go there and
hold a seance. When they told Cap'n Jeth, of course nothin' would do but
he must go, too. So, WHILE he is gone Nelson is comin' over to supper.
It's deceivin' the old man, in one way, of course, but it isn't doin'
him a bit of harm. And it does give the young folks a pleasant time, and
I think they deserve it. Lulie has been as kind and forbearin' with her
father as a daughter could be, and Nelson has been more patient than the
average young fellow, by a good deal.”
Late that afternoon two automobiles laden with humanity, male and
female, drove past the Phipps' gate, and Primmie, from the window,
announced that it was “Marietta and 'Phelia and the rest of 'em. My
savin' soul, ain't they talkin' though! Cal'late the sperits 'll have
busy times this evenin', don't you, Miss Martha?” A few minutes later
she proclaimed that Cap'n Jeth had just climbed aboard and that the
autos were coming back.
“See! See, Mr. Bangs!” she cried, pointing. “There's Cap'n Jeth, settin'
between Marietta and 'Phelia Beebe. There's the three of 'em on the back
seat. Cap'n Jeth's the one with the whiskers.”
At six o'clock Martha and her lodger walked over to the Hallett house.
Miss Phipps was dressed in her best gown and looked the personification
of trim, comfortable New England femininity. Galusha was garbed in the
suit he wore the evening of his arrival, but it had been newly sponged
and pressed.
“It looks lots better,” observed Martha, inspecting him as they walked
along. “It wouldn't have, though, if Primmie had finished the job. I was
so busy that I let her start on it, but when I saw what a mess she was
makin' I had to drop everything else and do it myself.”
Galusha looked puzzled.
“Yes?” he said, politely. “Oh, yes, yes. Yes, indeed.”
She shook her head.
“I do believe you don't know what I'm talkin' about,” she said. “Now, do
you?”
“Why--ah--why, Miss Phipps, I confess I--I--”
“Well, I declare! I never saw a person like you in my life. Didn't you
notice ANY difference in that suit of clothes?”
Mr. Bangs, looking downward, suddenly became aware of his immaculate
appearance. He was very much upset.
“I--I don't know what you must think of me,” he stammered. “I have
been--that is, I was thinking of other things and I--Dear me! Oh, dear!
I am VERY grateful to you. But you shouldn't take so much trouble.”
“It wasn't any trouble. The suit was hangin' in your closet and I
noticed how wrinkled and out of shape it was. And the stains on the
trousers--my!”
“Yes--ah--yes. I wore it over at the cemetery the other day and
I--ah--imagine I must have gotten down on my knees to examine the
tombstones.”
“I guess likely. It looked as if you might have crawled from here to the
cemetery and back. Now don't say any more, Mr. Bangs. It was no trouble
at all. I always used to take care of father's clothes. He used to say I
kept him all taut and shipshape.”
Lulie met them at the door.
“Where is Primmie?” she asked.
“She'll be over pretty soon,” replied Martha. “I knew you wouldn't need
her yet to help with the supper and the longer she stays away the more
talk there will be for the rest of us. She is to eat in the kitchen,
Lulie, remember that. I WON'T have her chatterin' all through our meal.”
“She and Zacheus are to eat together,” replied Lulie. “It is all
settled. Now if Nelson will only come. He is going to get away just as
soon as the down train leaves.”
He arrived soon afterward, having bicycled over from South Wellmouth.
Primmie arrived also and bursts of her energetic conversation,
punctuated by grumblings in Mr. Bloomer's bass, drifted in from the
kitchen. Supper was a happy meal. Young Howard, questioned by Martha and
Lulie--the latter evidently anxious to “show off” her lover--told of his
experiences aboard one of Uncle Sam's transports and the narrow escape
from a German submarine. Galusha, decoyed by Miss Phipps, was led into
Egypt and discoursed concerning that marvelous country. Lulie laughed
and chatted and was engagingly charming and vivacious. Martha was her
own cheerful self and the worried look disappeared, for the time, from
her face.
After supper was over, the ladies helped Primmie clear the table while
the men sat in the sitting room and smoked. The sitting room of the
light keeper's home was even more nautical than that at the Phipps'
place. There was no less than six framed paintings of ships and
schooners on the walls, and mantel and what-not bore salt-water curios
of many kinds handed down by generations of seafaring Halletts--whales'
teeth, little ships in bottles, idols from the South Sea islands, bead
and bone necklaces, Eskimo lance-heads and goodness knows what. And
below the windows, at the foot of the bluff on the ocean side, the great
waves pounded and muttered and growled, while high above the chimneys of
the little house Gould's Bluffs light thrust its flashing spear of flame
deep into the breast of the black night.
It was almost half past eight when Martha Phipps, whose seat was near
the front window of the sitting room, held up a warning hand.
“Listen!” she cried. “Isn't that an automobile comin'?”
It undoubtedly was. Apparently more than one motor car was approaching
along the sandy road leading from the village to the lighthouse.
“Who in the world is it?” asked Martha, drawing aside the window shade
and trying to peer out. “Lulie, you don't think it can be--”
Lulie looked troubled, but she shook her head.
“No, it can't be,” she declared. “The seance was to be away over in
Trumet and it is sure to last hours. They couldn't have gone as far as
that and--”
She was interrupted. From the dining room came the sound of rushing
feet. Primmie burst into the room. She was wildly excited.
“My Lord of Isrul, Miss Martha!” she cried. “It's them come back. It is,
it is, it is!”
“Who? Who, Primmie?” demanded Miss Phipps. “Stop flappin' your
wings--arms, I mean. Who's come back?”
“The sperit folks. All hands of 'em, Marietta and 'Phelia Beebe and Abe
Hardin' and Cap'n Jeth and all. And--and they're comin' in here--and
here's Nelson right where Cap'n Jeth can catch him. Oh, my savin' soul!”
From behind her agitated shoulder peered the countenance of Mr. Bloomer.
“She's right, Lulie,” observed Zach, with calm emphasis. “The whole crew
of ghost seiners is back here in port again, Cap'n Jeth and all. Better
beat for open water, hadn't you, Nelse, eh? Be the divil to pay if you
don't.... Godfreys, yes!”