THE HIGH HAND
Sarah Petty possessed the usual district-school training of the Cape
Cod native. It is not wholly ignorance of English that develops the
Cape Cod tang in the speech of the people who dwell on that famous hook
of land.
In part it arises from the association with others who maltreat the
language; and partly it is from a degree of pride in the fact that
the Cape has a distinctive speech of its own. Naturally, sea lore and
seafaring expressions are incorporated in the dialect.
Sarah sat down that evening after the half-stunned Cap'n Jonah had
retired to the "saloon cabin," as he called his new quarters, and
proceeded to write to the Heaths and the Solon and Enoch Pettys the
news that Cap'n Jonah Hand, retired from the Chinese trade, had come
to make his home with his gratified relatives on the Shell Road. The
writer, with due humbleness of phraseology but abundant pride to be
read between the lines, wished the Heath families and the Pettys
to come for a Sunday visit, for the express purpose of becoming
acquainted with the returned wanderer and shining light of the Hand
family.
"Goshamighty, it'll cost a slather of money to feed all them folks an'
to run fires all over the house if we have a cold spell," complained
Orrin. "That extry fire in the front room----"
"You hesh!" commanded Sarah. "Didn't you never hear of throwin' a sprat
to ketch a herrin', an' throwin' a herrin' to ketch a whale?"
"Yes," grumbled Orrin. "But I don't never calc'late to use a whale to
bait for a herrin'. What in tarnation good is it goin' to do us to have
all them folks here to show off your Uncle Jonah to? We'd better keep
him to ourselves."
"You dunderhead!" exclaimed his wife bitterly. "What a punishment for
my sins you be, Orrin Petty! Unless a body gives you chart, compass,
_an'_ all the soundings, you can't weather a p'int. Don't you see 'tis
for our benefit to be good friends with them of your fam'ly that has
got money and position? We hope to have money and position. And I want
they should see Cap'n Jonah Hand, through whom we air goin' to rise in
the world."
"Goshamighty! Woman, you air takin' too much for granted," urged Orrin.
"You leave it to me," said Sarah confidently, licking the flap of the
last envelope and pressing down upon it with determination expressed in
her very attitude. "Uncle Jonah's fortune is just as good as ourn."
Pearl went into the front room when her evening's work was done to
see if Cap'n Jonah wished anything for the night. The old mariner was
sitting in a comfortable chair before the stove dressed in his blue
pilot-cloth suit which he wore only on "state and date occasions,"
as he said himself, and with his feet thrust into a pair of gold
embroidered Chinese heelless slippers.
"Ahoy, my hearty!" hailed Cap'n Jonah, smiling at the girl. "It does me
good to see your pretty face. Come in an' set along o' me a spell."
"I've a book up in my room I want to read, Cap'n Jonah," said Pearl
frankly. "If I don't read before Miz Petty comes up to bed she'll maybe
take my lamp away. She says that if I read at night I'm not fit for
anything the next day."
"Whatever!" snapped the old mariner. "You bring your book in here, if
you want, Pearly. Don't matter what Sarah Petty says. If you want to
read, you read."
"Oh!" gasped Pearl. "I wouldn't dare."
"Ha! There's a change of wind hereabout, my gal," said Cap'n Jonah, his
eyes twinkling. "While it blows fav'rable you'd better take advantage
of it as I have. You're welcome to come in here any time, Pearly. 'Hem!
How air you and that young Helmford gettin' on?"
"Oh! Cap'n Jonah!" cried the girl, startled by the abrupt question.
"Good friends, ain't you two?" queried the old man, watching her face
sharply. "He's a nice feller if he has got a fool job, trainin' fishes."
"He's--he's very nice," stammered Pearl.
"To be sure he is," agreed Cap'n Jonah heartily. "From what I hear he
comes of nice folks, though they ain't rich. Abram Silt knows about
him. He'll make a nice man for some smart gal to marry."
"Oh, Cap'n Jonah!" cried Pearl again, and ran out of the room with
burning cheeks. She did not go near Helmford that evening.
Cap'n Jonah accepted with placid mien the good things the gods gave
him in the matter of improved quarters and better treatment from the
Pettys. He did not know how long he could keep up the masquerade as a
wealthy and successful man; but while Sarah and the others continued
to deceive themselves the old seaman proposed to do or say nothing to
break the charm.
He slept that night as peacefully as he had in the best bedroom
upstairs. With the room kept at a comfortable temperature by the fire
in the base-burner, the captain's rheumatic twinges did not return.
Still, when Sarah herself tapped at his door in the morning and asked
him if he would have his breakfast on a tray, he accepted the offer.
"Might's well take all the benefits of being in sick bay," he said to
Pearl, who brought the tray. "Now some shavin' water, my gal, and I'll
be purty well fixed."
His toilet was completed, and Pearl was redding up the front room
while Cap'n Jonah was sitting around in his best suit in honor of the
new quarters, when he saw from the window a small figure approaching
briskly up the lane.
"Here's Miss Sue," he observed. "She certainly is a spankin' craft. Ha!
She's comin' to our side door."
He went out into the hall as the doctor's sister tapped. Her smiling
face greeted him like a dewy rose.
"I am glad to see you stirring, Cap'n Hand," she said. "Can I see
Pearl?"
"You can, ma'am," agreed Cap'n Jonah, making his bow with a flourish.
"Come right into my cabin, ma'am."
"I want Pearl to help us decorate the chapel with the Christmas greens
when they come next week," Miss Sue said, stepping into the hall.
From kitchenward appeared the apprehensive Sarah, a portentous frown
upon her brow.
"Mornin', Miss Sue," she said harshly. "I don't see how I can spare
Pearly. I expec' comp'ny, and we shall be up to our ears after they go,
cleanin' after 'em."
"You come right in this way, Miss Sue," interrupted Cap'n Jonah.
"Pearl's in my cabin an' she can speak for herself. I reckon, Sarah,
you can spare her for one-two hours; and the child'll like it, I
haven't a doubt."
Sarah, struck with amazement, for once failed to dominate the
situation. She saw Miss Sue enter the front room and herself shut
out by the captain before she could recover her aplomb. Cap'n Jonah
certainly was carrying things with a high hand!
The person who had prophetically suggested that he would be able to do
just this, if the Pettys once believed him wealthy, chanced to approach
the house a few minutes later. It was just twenty-four hours since
Perry Baker had stopped at 'Liphalet Truitt's house with the steel
strong box from the Paulmouth National Bank in his wagon. 'Liphalet was
unable to smother his curiosity longer, and was wishful of talking the
matter over with Cap'n Jonah. Although he had not been present when the
plot was actually laid by Cap'n Jonah and the storekeeper, 'Liphalet
was fully aware of the particulars.
Cap'n Abe, whose influence with the bank officials was considerable,
had arranged for the sending over of the steel chest in the
expressman's care. The "securities" Cap'n Jonah had shown the easily
gulled Tom Petty were for the most part supplied by the same bank
officer who sent the box, and who had amused himself by making a large
collection of such worthless and gaudy papers. Such evidences of the
gullibility and cupidity of human nature often come into the hands of
bankers in perfectly legitimate ways.
'Liphalet desired mightily to know how the conspiracy was coming on.
The ex-steward might be "on the outs" with most of his neighbors; but
his interest in Cap'n Jonah's affairs had not waned. He came smartly up
the lane and started across the yard to ask for his crony at the back
door, when he chanced to see that the shades of the parlor windows were
raised half way.
That in itself was a surprising fact, for it was only mid-week, and
he had not heard that Sarah Petty had company. He looked again more
sharply. Behind the lace curtains he saw Cap'n Jonah in his Sunday best
weaving to and fro comfortably in Sarah Petty's best rocking chair.
"By Hannah!" muttered the ex-steward. "Will wonders never cease--with
doughnuts fried in candle grease? Cap'n Jonah in the _parlor_?"
Then he stopped, struck nerveless in his tracks, by the recognition of
the figure sitting at the other window. Miss Sue!
The doctor's sister sat smiling, chatting most companionably with the
captain. To the angry gaze of Eliphalet Truitt it seemed as though she
was making a deliberate call upon the old sea-dog who had already, and
more than once, expressed his admiration for Susan Ambrose.
Cap'n Jonah had said a share of Miss Sue's reputed fortune would
give him a certain standing in the community that he craved. The
captain was, after all, to use a Shell Road term, "muchly of a man."
'Liphalet's jealous fears made instant capital of the situation.
He had served for Miss Sue more than the allotted seven years Jacob
served for Rachel. And was a comparative stranger, a man who had lived
in the community but a few weeks, to step in and bear away the prize of
the doctor's sister from under Life Truitt's very nose?
Yet with all his rage and sorrow, he could not bring himself to play
the rôle of fortune hunter--even in appearance--by asking Miss Sue to
marry him.
He turned abruptly away, hot rage seething in his heart, and went back
along the way to his lonely cottage. If ever the Christmas spirit--and,
indeed, every other spirit of generosity and joy--was quenched in a
man's soul it was quenched now in that of the apostate Santa Claus of
the Shell Road.