As soon as Mrs. Dobson had told the story of her runaway trip to the
Southington mountains, she peeped into her bedroom to see how her poor
little lad was getting on, and found him asleep. Mrs. Hallock, Kate and
Frank went out from the back door, that they might not awaken him, and
presently Mrs. Dobson saw their carriage roll away. At the same time her
eyes rested on a bit of the blue of the sea. She had not been too busy
amid all her cares to remember that it was the anniversary of her
wedding day. Thirty-seven years ago it was that very morning since she
was married and went down to the harbor to see the _Snow_ start on her
voyage to the West Indies. The very harbor had filled up since then, so
that the _Snow_ could not enter it now even should the unfortunate ship
return; but of this, Mrs. Dobson never thought. She was not conscious
even that she was looking for the long-lost ship, in which her brave,
bright, young husband sailed. She only went up to the window in the
garret because she had acquired the habit of going up there in the
little pauses she gave to herself in her busiest days. The daisies were
whitening the fields along the land; the little island wore a blessed,
happy look of rest and peace, amid the twinkle of light and water all
about it. The Sound was as blue as the sea is in June. The sand cliffs
of Long Island gleamed white across the twenty miles of water.
Beyond the island lay a vessel. A row of poplar trees hid it when first
she looked. She gazed at the boat, thinking almost unconsciously to
herself as it sailed into full view, “Yes, the _Snow_ would look like
that by this time; the sails must be brown and old and torn by the
gales, just as this ship’s sails are.” Looking down upon her own hand as
it lay across the windowledge, she noticed its wrinkles with sharp and
sudden pain. She too, was grown old. Meanwhile the forlorn looking craft
was sailing in toward the harbor’s mouth. It was only a coasting vessel
laden with coal, coming in to discharge its cargo at the coal dock.
Grandmother Dobson watched it until it was half way across the bay; Josh
gave a bark so loud and thrilling that the dreaming old lady awoke to
the present, and hurried down. There was no one about the house, but
Harry was awake and talking.
“I want to tell her all I know about the necklace,” she heard him say.
“Dear me! the poor lad is out of his head, and he hasn’t had the
skullcap yet,” she thought. “My fire has gone down, too! Josh, fetch me
in a stick of wood,” she said.
Now Josh is a real true dog, and he does bring in wood—not one stick
only, but he fills up the wood-box, and always expects to be rewarded at
the end of his toil by an extra nice bit to eat.
Josh started at once for the woodpile and returned with a small stick.
“Now, another!” He obeyed.
Meanwhile Harry kept saying, “I must tell about the necklace. Where is
she? Won’t you please tell me if she is here?”
Fully believing that the boy was talking in delirium, Mrs. Dobson did
not think it worth while to answer.
“She must be deaf,” Harry thought; so, after awhile, he said no more,
but tried with his hand to move the bandage, so that he could look about
a little. The first thing that his eyes rested upon was a lovely cluster
of roses; Kate had left them, but as she thought he could not see, she
had said nothing of them.
“Mrs. Dobson!” called Harry as loud as he could call.
The dear little soul hurried into the room.
“Please, dear Mrs. Dobson, will you put these flowers in some water? I
wish you would let me get up and do it,” pleaded Harry.
“No! no! The doctor says you must not get up to-day, nor to-morrow, and
you must promise me not to try when I am out of the room. If you do I
shall have to put Josh in here and tell him to keep you in bed.”
“Is Josh your son?” innocently asked Harry.
Mrs. Dobson laughed a merry, sunny little laugh.
“No,” she said. “Josh is my dog. He barked a little while ago to tell me
somebody was about. He heard you talking, I suppose. Josh is a wonderful
dog. You may see him if you promise not to move your bandage again until
I tell you you may.”
“I promise,” said Harry, “unless the house takes fire or something else
happens.”
“I don’t see where the delirium went to so suddenly,” Mrs. Dobson
thought.
Harry determined to find out if she would grow deaf should he ask about
the necklace again. He tried it. Instantly she closed the door, bidding
him “go to sleep and not talk any more,” and he, poor fellow, had not
had his promised glimpse of Josh.
Harry shut his eyes, tried to sleep, tried to stop thinking about his
own old home on the shore of the lake, in Michigan, but the more he
tried the more he thought about it. Being weak and hurt, he grew
feverish with thinking, and I am sure I do not know what unfortunate
thing would have happened to him, had Kate Hallock not appeared on the
scene.
She came laden with good things, or rather the carriage was laden, and
she came with it and them. First were two large, hard pillows—Mrs.
Dobson’s pillows were small; after the pillows there came a big basket
overflowing with nice, “comforting things to eat.” Then there were two
summer suits of Frank’s clothing—for either Harry had no change of
garments, or they had been carried away by the “circus folks.”
“I’m going to stay with you to-day,” said Kate to Mrs. Dobson, as the
good woman gave expression to her surprise upon seeing the carriage move
off. “Mamma and I thought maybe you’d like to have me.”
“How kind! I should very much, for now it is time for my bit of dinner
to go on the fire. You may sit in there,” pointing toward the door of
Harry’s room, “but I wouldn’t talk much if I were you, for I believe he
is just the least mite out of his head now and then.”
Kate went in cautiously. The boy did not hear her. He thought he was
alone, for he heard the sound of Mrs. Dobson’s movements in the kitchen.
He sighed two or three times, and moved his left arm uneasily toward his
eyes. At last he said, “Dear me! I wish I hadn’t promised. I do want to
see out a bit, and know where I am.”
“I’m here,” said Kate. “I’ll tell you all about it. Did you see the
house when you were brought into it last night?”
“I didn’t know anything at all from the time I was on the pony until I
heard somebody say, ‘He will need something to eat by-and-by, Mrs.
Dobson,’ and I wondered who Mrs. Dobson was, and who would want
something to eat. Pretty soon I moved a little, and then I began to
understand, for somebody took hold of my arm and said, ‘You mustn’t move
nor try to move, either,’ and then she told me who she was, and how I
had fallen, and been fetched here.”
“You shut your eyes and try to see what I am going to tell you about,”
said Kate. “I often make Frank try, but he can’t do it very well. In the
first place, turn your head that way—so,” turning Harry’s face to the
east; “there is the sea, the Sound—Long Island Sound is its real
name—and it’s about a mile away; then,” turning his face about toward
the north, “running right along past here is a road—no, a lane—Pumpkin
Delight Lane, it is called. Funny, isn’t it? Well, this is the last
house between the village and the sea. It is old, ever so old. The
boards—clapboards I guess—are wrinkled—shrunken I mean—so that they kind
of peal up all around and look as though they’d like to be pulled off.
It’s brown, the house is; never been painted, perhaps; anyway, it’s a
great deal prettier than painters’ brown paint; and there is one chimney
that looks, on the outside, just as though it was right in the middle of
the house. It is a stone chimney, too, and when you get well, Mrs.
Dobson will let you go up the staircase—that’s stone, too—up into her
garret, where you can see way out to sea, ever so far.”
“But who lives here, besides Mrs. Dobson?” interrupted Harry.
“Josh. Mrs. Dobson and just Josh, that’s all. Queer, isn’t it, a woman
and a dog? Mrs. Dobson won’t go away from here to live, either. This was
her father’s house, and her mother lived in it, and all her brothers and
sisters, too; and,” said Kate in a whisper, “her husband, Mr. Dobson,
went away to sea the very morning they were married, and he’s never come
back in all this time; nor anybody who went with him, either. Mother
told Frank and me all about it; and her mother told her, when she was
quite a little girl, and,” breathed Kate, in a lower whisper, “don’t
tell, ever. But Frank and me guess that she thinks he’ll come back
again, and that’s the reason she won’t go away.”
“O, my!” sighed Harry, “that’s worse, ever so much worse, than knowing
that your folks are dead; ’cause then you know they can’t come back any
more, and so you don’t keep looking out all the time.”
Kate wanted very much to ask Harry about his folks, but she thought she
ought not to do it; it might make him feel worse to talk about it; so,
not knowing what else to say to divert him, she said, “Let’s play he
comes back.”
“But he can’t! so many years, you know,” exclaimed Harry, raising
himself energetically from his pillows.
“That makes it better fun, don’t you see?” said Kate; “harder to make
out where he has been all this time—most forty years! Dear me, he must
be very old now.”
“Yes,” said Harry, “and burned black, maybe.”
“How? You don’t suppose the _Snow_ burned up, do you?”
“O, I mean by the sun,” laughed Harry. “Going to the West Indies, did
you say the ship was?”
“Yes,” said Kate, fairly beside herself with excitement. “O, you’re
jolly good help, making believe; ever so much better than Frank.”
“What did the _Snow_ carry? Let us be careful and have things all
right,” urged Harry, interested because Kate was, and anxious to help
her on.
“I’m sure I don’t know. O, molasses and rum, I heard once.”
“O, no! Molasses and rum you mean they were going to fetch back,”
suggested Harry.
“Yes, that was it,” said Kate; “and we’ll play they were going out there
with a shipload of dolls for the little West Indian girls for
Christmas.”
“I’m afraid that won’t do,” said Harry, doubtfully.
“Why not, pray?” said Kate.
“Forty years ago I’m afraid there wasn’t a shipload of dolls in every
one of our States put together.”
“O, never mind! we can play so, if there wasn’t.”
“Well, if it’s going to be all play we’ll go ahead,” said Harry. “The
_Snow_ was loaded with dead dolls and live monkeys, and every monkey had
a doll, and when they got to the West Indies the monkeys all ran away
with the dolls, and so the poor little West Indian girls got none.”
“How ridiculous!” cried Kate, laughing heartily. “Now let me see, the
_Snow_ was going and going, and sailing right on night and day, and day
and night, when it struck a—a snag.”
“What’s that?” cried Harry, with a shout of laughter. “A snag in the
ocean!”
“O, something that boats always hit that sinks them,” said Kate, a
little red in the face. “I know; for my aunt was on a ship that went
against one, and sunk too; ’cause she wrote all about it after she got
home. I know it was a snag, too.”
“But that was on a river, not a sea. A snag is an old tree or something
that gets caught in the mud and is under the water,” corrected Harry.
“O!” said Kate, glad that Harry was blindfolded. “Well, we’ll have
something else, then—a big storm, hills and mountains of running waves,
awful thunder and lightning, and the ship gets struck by lightning—no,
by a big wave, and tumbles all to pieces.”
“And the dolls all spill out and go floating off!” suggested Harry.
“How can you at such an awful time think of making fun?” asked Kate,
“just as the ship had been struck by lightning, too!”
“Thunder—no, a big wave,” interposed Harry. “Don’t you remember ’twas a
big wave that tumbled everything?”
“Yes,” said Kate reflectively, “and Captain Dobson—he’s captain, you
know—stands on the last plank of the _Snow_ (good captains always do
that—the last plank of the ship, remember), and when the ship went down,
the plank floated off with Captain Dobson on it. That’s all right, so
far, isn’t it?” she added inquiringly.
“All right but the monkeys, you forgot and left them to go down with the
ship,” said Harry. “Instead of that they went swimming off, each monkey
with a doll in its arms, and two of them got on the same plank the
Captain was on, and he——”
“No! no!” cried Kate, jumping up from her chair by the window, and in
her eagerness sitting down on the bed, forgetting all about Harry’s
feet. “You musn’t, musn’t say that.”
“Say what, pray?” and Harry tried to draw up his feet, but Kate held
them fast, and did not even know where she was, or what she was doing.
“Why, you were going to make Captain Dobson push the poor monkeys off
the plank, and—”
“No, I was not,” interrupted Harry.
“What then?”
“Really, you frightened it all out of my head. Let me think!”
“O, I know!” joyfully cried Kate, clapping her palms. “There was the
mast—there always is a mast or a smoke-stack, or something to climb.
This is it: the monkeys leaped from the plank to the mast, and ran up to
the top of it and waved the dolls—all dressed in white, you see, with
long, long sashes, that would float a good ways, you know; and somebody
in a boat way off, on—on—the horizon’s edge”—Kate felt proud after
saying “horizon’s edge,” and was greatly mortified at hearing from under
the bedclothes a smothered laugh.
“I should like to know what you are laughing at,” she said, with sudden
gravity, slipping down from the bed, to Harry’s most comfortable relief.
“I didn’t mean to laugh; really and truly I did not,” said Harry, moving
up his bandage the least mite in the world, as he afterward admitted to
Mrs. Dobson. “But how could I help it; it is so like a girl. Now my
mast, if it had floated at all, would have lain down on the water just
like any other big stick; but yours you could make stand up and sail
around, just as easy!”
“O, never mind!” said Kate, immensely relieved on finding out that Harry
was not laughing at her attempt at fine effect, “that’s nothing! all
sorts of impossible things do happen.”
“Doll’s sash ribbons soaked in salt water don’t make very good signals,
anywhere, I don’t believe,” said Harry. “I think we might manage that
part better.”
“But we can’t stop, don’t you see,” said Kate hurriedly, “to be so very
careful about everything. Nobody ever does when there’s a poor fellow on
a last plank, floating on the wide ocean; they just try to get him off
and into a boat as quick as ever they can, and rub him up, and give him
something to eat, and everything, particularly” (Kate couldn’t get over
that word very fast) “when the man is such a dear, good, nice man, like
Captain Dobson.”
Now Josh, hearing the animated voices in Mrs. Dobson’s bedroom, had
opened the door a bit with his nose, without attracting any notice; and
as the dear old lady, her thoughts busy with the past, was carrying a
pail of water into the kitchen, Kate’s last words fell full upon her
ears. She dropped the pail, being too much startled to put it quite in
its place, and with flushed face, tearful eyes, and trembling tones,
appeared to the children, saying, “Tell me quick! don’t wait a bit! is
there any news of Captain Dobson?”
Harry pushed his bandage aside, and said, with sincere sorrow, “No, no!
Mrs. Dobson; not a word. We were only”—he stopped, with an instinctive
feeling that they had been very unfeeling to make-believe on the subject
at all.
Kate took up his sentence bravely. “I’ll tell you all about it, dear
Mrs. Dobson,” throwing her arms about the old lady and urging her to a
seat in a rocking chair. “It was all me, every bit of it; and we were
just trying to make-believe that he got saved when the _Snow_ went
down.”
“Did the _Snow_ go down? Who knows?” she asked, sobbing and crying, and
quite broken down by hearing the fact put into words.
“I’m sorry we said a word,” said Kate, crying with Mrs. Dobson; and,
dropping down upon a footstool, she laid her head in Mrs. Dobson’s lap.
“You will please forgive us, won’t you?” spoke up the boy in the bed.
“Forgive you! Yes, indeed. I’m glad you thought enough about my
poor—about Captain Dobson to talk of him at all, and to-day, too! Why, I
always go down the harbor to-day; it is just thirty-seven years ago
to-day since we were married and the ship went on its voyage.”
“And you will go this afternoon, won’t you?” questioned Kate.
“I mustn’t,” she said simply.
“Why not?”
“Why, I’ve got a little boy of my own to look after to-day, don’t you
see?” she said, suddenly smiling, with an uplifted face.
Kate sprang up and kissed her, saying, with an arch look at Harry, whose
eyes she looked into for the first time, “Why, you can go. I’ll take
care of—the little boy while you are gone.”
“O, my dear child!” cried Mrs. Dobson, as she espied Harry’s eyes, and
caught sight of the ugly wound across his eye-brow, “didn’t you promise
me not to?”
“Unless the house was on fire, or something happened; and something did
happen. I was afraid we had killed you.”
“Kate! Kate! mother says you must come home to dinner right away,” said
Frank, who had suddenly appeared on the scene; “and” (on his own
authority) “you must go this very minute.”