THE BRUTE AT BAY
Her own father!... All afternoon as she went about delivering papers,
Rosie's mind kept going over this amazing revelation. Not for an instant
did she question the truth of it. An exuberance of imagination very
often led her mother to embroider fancifully the details of a story, but
surely not this time. This time that scar, that awful scar, was evidence
enough of what had taken place.
To think that Rosie had never even suspected that side of her father's
nature! She shuddered at her own innocence. To her, her father had
always seemed all gentleness and meekness. Gentleness and meekness,
indeed! Why, with that raging lion ramping and tearing about inside of
him he was little better than a wolf in sheep's clothing!
At first Rosie dreaded ever seeing him again. She doubted whether, at
sight of him, she could conceal sufficiently the abhorrence that she
felt. Then she began to want to see him, as one wants to see the animals
in the carnivora building at feeding time. It is a racking experience,
but one likes to go through it. Rosie's final decision was to take one
look at the beast, hear for herself the sound of its roar, then flee it
forever.
A good time to see Jamie O'Brien was after supper, in the cool of the
evening, when he slipped off his shoes, unloosened his suspenders, and
sat him down in the peace and quiet of the back yard. He had a
broken-down old arm-chair, which he knew how to prop against the ancient
little apple-tree and support with a brick at its shortest leg. For
one-half hour every summer evening, when the old chair was properly
braced, and his sock feet were stretched out at ease on a soap-box,
Jamie O'Brien knew comfort, utter and absolute. It was the moment when,
like old King Cole, he called for his pipe.
"Rosie dear, like a good child, will you bring me me pipe and a few
matches?"
Rosie, busied in the kitchen over the supper dishes, always knew just
when this call was coming, and always had her answer ready: "All right,
Dad. Just wait till I dry my hands and I will."
Tonight she gave the usual answer in the usual cheerful tone, for she
felt that it behooved her to meet deceit with deceit if she was to catch
the beast unaware. So she got Jamie his pipe, and later came out again
and perched on the arm of his chair.
"Say, Dad," she began.
She took a peep at him from the corner of her eye. Heaven knows he did
not look fierce. He was a plain, lean, little man, of indeterminate
colouring, with sparse hair, sparser mustache, and faded blue eyes,
that had a patient, far-away look in them. His face was thin and worn,
with lines that betokened years of labour borne steadily and without
complaint. He was a silent man and passed for thoughtful, though
contemplative would better express his cast of mind. He looked at things
and people slowly and quietly, as if considering them carefully before
committing himself. Then, when he spoke, it would be some slight remark,
brief and commonplace.
When Rosie began: "Say Dad," he waited patiently. After several seconds
had elapsed, he turned his head slightly and said: "Well, Rosie?"
He gave her a faint smile, and patted her hand affectionately.
Ordinarily, at this place, Rosie would have slipped an arm about his
neck, but tonight she held back.
"Say, Dad," she opened again, in a coaxing, confidential tone, "did you
have a good run today?"
The world in general supposes, no doubt, that, to a motorman, one day's
run must be much like any other. Rosie knew better.
Jamie very deliberately relit his pipe before answering. Then he said:
"Yes, it was all right, Rosie."
Rosie waited, as she knew from his manner that something more would
finally come. Jamie gazed about thoughtfully, then concluded: "They was
a flat wheel on the rear truck."
Rosie was all sympathy. "Oh, Dad, I'm so sorry! It must ha' been horrid
riding all day on a flat wheel."
Jamie took a puff or two, then announced: "I didn't mind it."
"Well, Dad, did you report it?"
Jamie scratched his head, as if in an effort to remember, and at last
said: "Sure."
After a decent interval, Rosie began again: "Say, Dad, what'd you think
of a man who chased his wife with a hatchet?"
Rosie thought it would be a little indelicate to come right out with
butcher-knife. Hatchet was near enough, anyway. Rosie's idea was that
her father would betray himself by defending the husband. When he did,
she expected to tell him that she knew all. Her imagination did not
carry her beyond this. She was prepared, however, for something
horrible.
Jamie O'Brien turned his head almost quickly. "With a hatchet, did you
say, Rosie?"
"Yes, Dad, with a hatchet."
"That's bad. And is it some one around here that we know?"
"No, it ain't anybody. I was just saying, what would you think of a man
who did that?"
"And it ain't some one we know?"
With a wave of his pipe, Jamie dismissed all hypothetical hatchets, and
returned to the more sensible contemplation of the sky line.
Rosie felt that she was being trifled with. She gazed at her father
meaningly.
"Well, what would you say to a man who chased his wife with a
butcher-knife?"
Again Jamie took an exasperating time to answer, and again his answer
took the form of the question: "Is it some one we know, Rosie?"
Rosie threw discretion to the winds. "I'm sure you ought to know whether
it's some one we know!"
Jamie blinked his eyes slowly and thoughtfully. "I don't seem to place
him, Rosie."
Rosie left him in disgust. Brutality is bad enough, but hypocrisy is
worse. She went as far as the kitchen door, then turned back. She would
give him one more chance.
Again smiling, she put her arms about his neck. "Say, Dad, if you was to
get awful mad at me, what would you do?"
"At you, do you say, Rosie? Well, now, I don't see how any one could get
awful mad at you."
Rosie's patience was about exhausted, but she restrained herself. "But,
Dad, if I was to do something awful bad--steal ten dollars, or run away
from home!"
Jamie looked at Rosie, then at the sky line, then at the soap-box, then
back at Rosie. Surely now a brutal threat was coming.
"Why, Rosie dear, I don't think you'd ever do anything like that!"
Huh! What kind of an answer was that for a father to give his child?
Rosie straightened her back, and without another word departed. She felt
that her worst fears were justified. Any man as difficult to trap as
Jamie O'Brien was a dangerous character.
She nursed her resentment the rest of the evening. Just before she went
to sleep, however, she decided, as a matter of scrupulous justice, to
suspend final judgment until she should have seen for herself that
damning evidence of his brutality, namely, the scar on her poor mother's
right shoulder. Yes, she would find some excuse for seeing it at once.
The next morning, while her mother was preparing to go to market, of
itself the opportunity came.
"Rosie dear," Mrs. O'Brien called down from upstairs, "I need your help.
One of me corset strings is busted."
Rosie found her mother seated at the bureau, half dressed, fanning
herself with a towel. A full expanse of neck and shoulders was exposed,
so that Rosie, busied at her mother's back, was able to scan minutely
all that there was to scan. She looked and looked again, and by patting
her mother affectionately, was able to add the testimony of touch to
that of sight.
In due time her mother departed, and Rosie, left alone, turned to the
mirror and gazed into it several moments without speaking.
"Well!" she said at last. "What do you know about that!"
She shook her head at the round-eyed person in the mirror, and the
round-eyed person nodded back, as deeply impressed with the
inexplicability of things as Rosie herself.