going to run. My thoughts was a mix, as usual in such cases--most of it
hardly thinking at all, and the rest a kind of white-hot wish to damage
something, and a desire to hustle away from there before I got hurt.
Then, too, it had reached the limit about Miss Hitty--I sure wasn't
going to stand hearing her name mishandled by tavern loafers. Yet the
principal cause for my staying was my anxiety to leave. That big,
bellowing Irishman, dragging a half-dozen men to get at me, blood
streaming down his face, and his expression far from agreeable, put a
crimp in my soul, and don't you forget it. But I understood that this
was my first man's-size proposition, and if I didn't take my licking
like a man I never could properly respect myself afterward. So whilst my
legs were pleading, "Come, Willie, let's trot and see mother--it will be
pleasanter," I raked my system for sand and stood pat.
I knew a trick or two about assaulting your fellow-man as well as Mick,
when you come to that. Fighting is really as good an education for
fighting as sparring is, and perhaps a little better. It ain't so much a
question of how you make your props and parries, as how much damage you
inflict upon the party of the second part.
"Let him come!" I says. "What you holding him for, 's if he was a ragin'
lion or something? Let go of him!"
"You skip, you darn fool," says my first friend. "He'll eat you raw."
"Well, it will be my funeral," I says. "If you will see he don't put me
down and gouge my eye out, I'll take him as he comes."
Gouging was a great trick with that gang,--I feared it more than death
itself.
Just at that minute old Eli drove up. "What in tarnation's this?" says
he. When he found out, he tried to make me go home, but all this advice
I didn't want had made me more determined. I got crying mad. "Gol-ding
it all to thunder!" says I, hopping up and down. "You see me fair play
and turn him loose, Eli. I want one more swat at him,--just let me hit
him once more, and I'll go home."
Eli was a tall, round-shouldered man, who looked like a cross between a
prosperous minister and a busted lawyer. He had a consumptive cough, and
an easy, smoothing way with his hands, always sort of apologizing.
Several men had been led astray by these appearances, and picked a
quarrel with Eli. Two weeks in bed was the average for making that
mistake.
He looked at me with his head sideways, pulling his chin whisker.
"Billy," says he, "I hev experienced them sentiments myself. It shell be
as you say." He went to his wagon, and drew out a muzzle-loading pistol
from under the seat. The pistol was loaded with buckshot, and four
fingers of powder to push it, as every one around knew. He walked up to
Mick and put the touch of a cold, gray, Yankee eye on him. "Young man,"
he says, "I ain't for your clawin', chawin', kickin' style of conductin'
a row, so I tell you this: you fight that boy fair, or I'll mix buckshot
with your whisky.--Turn your bullock loose!"
[Illustration: "'You fight that boy fair'"]
The men let go of him, and he come.
Fortunately, I remember every detail of that scrap, clear as crystal. I
led with my left, and Mick countered with his chin. A thunderstorm hit
me in the left ear. Kerbang, kerswot. Scurry-scurry, biff-biff-biff.
Somebody hit somewhere. Somebody with a pain in the neck. No time to
find out who it is. Zip, smash, rip; more pains; streaks of fire on the
horizon; must have run aground. Roar-roar-bump,--ah, bully for you,
Billy! Slam him, Mick! Hit him again, sonny! You got him! Now you got
him! Aaaay-hooray!
Here we go, bumping over the ties. Right over the edge of the
trestle,--bing! C'm' off'n him, you big black whelp, aggh! le' go! Twist
his thumb! Kick the brute! Get up, boy! Roooor swishz.--Where in thunder
did the big black thing come from? Never mind. No time to stop. Lovely
Peter! How she rolls! Who's sick?--Mick, probably. Lightning struck,
that time.... Again ... Mmmmmmearrrrr ... dark ... dark. Raining
ice-water! He's all right! Give him a little air! Somebody crying, "I
did the best I could by him, Eli; g-gu-gug-gol-darn him!" More light.
Daybreak, and here I am again, on the ground, wet to the hide, the
bucket they emptied on me alongside, and Eli holding my head up. And
what's the thing opposite, with one eye swelled shut, and a mouth the
size of a breakfast-roll?--Why, it's Mick!
"Did he lick me, Eli?" says I.
Eli laughed kind of nervous. "Neither you, nor him, nor me, will ever
know," says he. "He's willing to call it a draw."
I staggered to my feet and wabbled to my partner in the dance, holding
out my hand. "Much obliged to you, Mick," says I.
He leaned back and laughed, till I joined, as well as I could, for
crying. He grabbed my hand and shook it. "Yer all right," says he.
"Sorry I am I said a word to ye. An' yer th' h--- of a red-headed bye to
fight. I've enough."
Whilst I was a simple lad, I wasn't a fool. For me to hold that
two-hundred-and-twenty-five-pound rough-and-tumble fighter even, was
impossible. He was ashamed of the whole thing. As soon as his ugly
temper had the edge knocked off it, he took that way of closing the
deal. No bad man at all, old Mick.
"You say that to save my feelings," I said.
"What's that?" says he, rough and hard. "Off with ye!" He wouldn't admit
being decent for a farm. He swung away. Then I got another jar. A voice
called me and I swung around.
V
"ON MY BUREAU WAS A KNIFE--"
My father stood behind me, such a picture it chills me to think of him.
All of his face was chalk-white; his hands shook like palsy. I reckon I
can slide over the next little while. You guess what a crazy-mad man,
who's fed his mind on darkness for years, would be likely to do. I never
raised a hand in defense--took it. At the same time I made my mind up to
end this business, quick and strong. I had enough.
Of course, from father's point of view, something could be said. Had I
been drunk and fighting at the tavern, as my nice, gentlemanly little
friend, Algy Anker, ran and told him, nobody'd blamed him for getting
orry-eyed. But he might have asked me what I had to say--a woman-killer
gets that show. He used me bad enough, so Eli interfered. "I don't care
if I never sell another thing to you," says he; "but, neighbor, you
sha'n't hit thet boy ag'in--no, now! There's no use to squirm--you
sha'n't do it, and that's all. You run along, Bill."
When mother saw me, she cried out. I was a sight, for sure. Ought to
have washed up a bit, and not give her such a shock, but my head was
sizzing like a pin-wheel. Only one idea stuck.
"I'm not hurt much, mother," I says. "I want to speak to you."
Mother was quick-witted and hardy-witted, too. She knew there was no boy
foolishness in this, so she choked down her feelings, got a basin, clean
water, and a towel, and said, "Tell me while I bathe your face."
I told her. It was queer how quiet I felt. I don't know but what it's
always that way, though, when a man has made his mind up tight. We
seemed almost of an age, mother and me, that little while.
She pleaded with me. "Don't leave your home, Will. I have been wrong; I
should have done more; I didn't, thinking things would right themselves;
but now I'll promise to stand between."
"And what will your life be like?" I asked her. I grew old pretty fast,
under pressure.
"Never mind that!" she cried. "My boy, to have you with me--"
"Sh!" I says. "How could I help minding it?"
She was still.
"And worse might come," I went on. "I don't like to say it, yet every
time I couldn't promise to be.... There'd come a day too often ... I'm
strong, and if I should--" She put her hand on my lips.
"Go to your room, Will; and let me think alone for a while," she said.
She caught me and held me close, with never a tear, but a look worse
than an ocean of tears. I couldn't have stood it, if I hadn't known I
was doing the right thing. To a dead certainty, there would be no peace
with me in the house. Any doubts anybody might have had was removed when
father come in. He went straight to mother's room. I heard him shouting;
talking so fast his words were broken; stamping around; quoting
Scripture one minute, crying threats and slaughter the next. It was
pitiful. I hustled, getting things ready; I knew, a little more of
listening, and I'd have nothing but contempt for my father. Then
mother's voice rung out, telling him to leave until he could talk like a
man. Usually, she could force him, when she wished, hers being so much
bigger a mind, but this time the littler soul was beyond itself with
fury. "Don't take that tone with me!" he roared. "I won't stand it! And
as for the lies that boy told you, I'll have them out of his back!"
Their door slammed open, and he fairly ran toward mine. I jumped and
locked it. Mother was close after him. "You shall _not_!" she said.
"Listen to reason! You've done enough harm--Oh!" she cried, in pain. I
thought he hit her.
What I feared boiled up in me. On my bureau was a knife; a big, heavy
knife, that got into my hand somehow. It was me and the devil for that
round. How long I stood with the knife raised, I don't know. Then mother
spoke calmly. "You hurt my arm, holding it so tight," she said. "That
certainly isn't necessary." He had grace enough to beg her pardon.
Finally, she got him to leave. A good job. That day had been a trifle
too much for me, already. I can't see a bare knife since, without a
shudder. Don't like the glint of steel at all. Years after, a flash of
sun on water would bring things back, and I'd have a sickness in the
stomach.
An hour after, mother came in. "Well, my boy, you are right," she says,
as if the very life were out of her.
"Yes," I says, thinking of the knife; "and I'll just slide out quiet,
and no trouble to anybody."
She roused herself. "You will leave in daylight, my son," she says,
"with your mother to say good-by. You have done nothing wrong, and you
sha'n't leave ashamed."
"But, mother, that will make it bad for you," I says.
"I married your father; I brought you into the world," she says. "I know
my duty, and I shall do it, if it costs all our lives, let alone a
little trouble. And, besides," she says, getting up, excited, "no matter
what any one can say, you've been a good--" She broke down, all at once.
The rest of it she cried into my shoulder, whilst I told her about how
I'd be rich and great in no time, and father'd come around all right
after a while, and we'd all be happy, till she felt better. And I
believed it myself so strong, and put it out so clear, that I think I
convinced her. Anyway, they got along all right after I left. That's a
comfort.
So it was arranged. I shouldn't say anything, but keep out of father's
way until she made him yield the point. She laid it out to the old
gentleman clear and straight, Mattie tells me--(Mattie's mother was my
mother's half-sister)--telling him I wasn't drunk, as he could readily
prove, and as for the fighting, if he intended to beat me every time I
defended a woman, why, she'd leave, too. That part of it stuck in
mother's mind; she would not listen when I told her it was only one of
the reasons for the row. And she summed the thing up by saying I was
determined to leave; that it was best all around; and that he must act
like a human being and a father for once. By this time, I reckon he
didn't feel so terrible proud of himself. At least, it was pulled off
easy. I left home, with some small money in my pocket, a trunk of
clothes in Eli's care, and mother and father both waving me good-by in
the road, for the Great World, per Boston, and a schooner trading South,
that belonged to Eli's cousin.
[Illustration: "I left home ... mother and father both waving me good-by
in the road"]
And here's a queer thing. The day I left, Mick went into the tavern and
called for a glass of whisky. He poured out a snorter and balanced it on
the flat of his thumb. "Ladies and gintlemen," says he, "ye here behold
th' koind friend that led Mick Murphy--that's licked the country--to
bang a bit of a bye, after misnamin' a dacent woman." Smash! goes the
glass on the floor. "Tra-la-loo to you!" says Mick, flinging the
barkeep' a half-dollar. "Keep the change," he says. "It's the last cent
I have, and the last you'll get from me."
And that's just what happened, too. He's located about twenty mile over
yonder, with a good factory and somewheres between ninety and nine
thousand Murphys claiming him as their start. And my best friend is old
Mick. He cried when I first went to see him. I reformed him, but it cost
me my home. I never knew, either, till he told me himself, a year ago.
VI
"I'M MARY SMITH"
Plunk, plunk, plunketty-plunk, down the pike, me and Eli, and Dandy Jim,
Eli's black horse.
I'll never tell you how I felt. It was the first I'd ever been away from
home. All the regrets I had was eased by knowing it wouldn't be more
than six months before I'd come back with a gunny-sack full of
hundred-dollar bills, buy Mr. Jasper's place with the pillars in front,
and a railroad, and pervade things in general with a tone of pink and
birds singing.
One thing about being a boy is that you're sure of to-morrow, anyhow.
Well, we slid along behind a free-gaited horse, in an easy wagon, over
good roads, in early New England summer, when every breath of air had a
pretty story to tell. If it hadn't been for the tight vest I had on, I
reckon my heart would have bust my ribs for joyfulness.
Boston scart the life out of me. I had no notion there was that many
folks and horses and buildings in the world. We pulled for the schooner
right away, but none too quick for me. I never liked a crowd. A man
understands he don't amount to much, yet don't like to have the fact
rubbed in.
Cap'n Jesse Conklin owned the boat. He had a mild blue eye, a splendid
line of cuss words, a body as big as mine, and a pair of legs that just
saved him from running aground. When I first saw him I thought he was
standing in a hole. Howsomever, he got around mighty lively on his
little stumps, and he could light his pipe when the _Matilda_, of
Boston, was throwing handsprings. He always opened his eyes wide and
said, "Ha!" like he was perfectly astonished when you spoke to him.
Then, to square things, you was really perfectly astonished when he
spoke to you.
Eli introduced me. "Ha!" says the captain. "So this is one of them
ripperty-splintered and bejiggered young thingermergummeries that runs
away from hum, heh?" I don't wish to be understood as giving the
captain's exact words, although I ain't one of your durn prudes,
neither.
Eli explained.
"Ha!" says the captain. "Is that so? Howjer come by them legs, young
feller? You'll be riggin' a set of stays fur them when we hit the
stream. I've seen shorter and thicker things than them growin' on
trellises."
"Never you mind about his legs, you old bladder-head," says Eli,
cousinly. "You're to take the boy as passenger."
"_I_ am!" says Captain Jesse, jumping back, mad as a bumblebee. "_I_ am;
that's _me_! I don't own this boat nor nothin'! I've got to be told what
I'm to do, I have!"
"Sure!" says Eli, undisturbed.
"Well, all right," says the captain, calm as anything. "What makes you
so hasty, Eli? Does he pay his passage, or work it?"
"He gives you five dollars in hand, and works the rest of it," says Eli.
The cap'n gave a horrible grin, showing a set of teeth like a small
horse.
"And won't he work it!" says he, rubbing his hands together. "Dry
land'll do for him, two weeks out."
"Yaaas," says Eli. "You're a turble person, you are--you'd ought to been
a pirate, Jess."
Cap'n Jesse got mad again--he was more like a little boy than anybody of
his weight I ever see. He come up to Eli and shook his finger under that
hawk-bill of a nose.
"I don't want none of your slack, Eli!" he says. "You've tried me
often"--here he got impressive, talking very slow--"don't you try me
once too much!"
Eli grabbed the hand, stuck the finger in his mouth, and bit it.
"Aaoow!" yells the captain, grabbing his finger. "You quit your
foolin'!"
By this time I was lost entirely. What to make of the proceedings was
beyond guessing. Boylike, I thought men always acted with some big idea
in view, but the next minute Eli and Cap'n Jesse had grabbed holt of one
another and was scuffling and giggling around the deck like a pair of
kids. Captain Jess was stout about the shoulders; he had Eli waving in
the breeze once, but at last Eli gave him a back trip and down they
come. Then up they got; each cut off a hunk of chewing and began to talk
as if they'd acted perfectly reasonable. Seems that's the way they
always come together.
The three of us took a look about the boat. She was an able, fine
three-master, the pride of Jesse's soul; 'most as big as a ship.
Them were the days when most folk built deep and narrer, but Jesse had
ideas of his own when he laid down the lines of the _Matilda_, of
Boston. She looked bluff and heavy in the bows and her bilges turned
hard, but she walked over the water, and don't you forget it. Moreover,
she was the kindest boat in a seaway I ever boarded. Old _Matilda_ girl
would heel just so far; after that the worst draft that ever whistled
wouldn't put her under an inch; she'd part with her sticks first. Handy
boat, a schooner, too; sensible and Yankeefied. Lord! what a
claw-and-messing on board a square-rigger, compared to it! And taking
two men to the schooner's one at that.
The _Matilda_ was fitted for passengers. She had eight nice clean
cabins, and fine quarters for the crew. In most such boats you can't
more 'n stand up, if you stretch between hair and shoe-leather the way I
do, but here there was head-room a-plenty. And Uncle Jesse ate the boys
well, too. Good old craft and good old boy running her. Soon's you
realized that all his spitting and swearing and roaring didn't amount to
no more than a hearty sneeze, you got along with Jesse great, if you was
fit to get along with anybody.
We took aboard four passengers that night, one of 'em being a lady. The
next morning at four we pulled out with the ebb-tide.
Before we got into the open water, I felt such a joy boiling inside me I
had to sing, no matter what the feelings of the rest were. Oh! Oh! The
blue, bright sky; and the blue, crinkly, good-smelling water; the
quantities of fresh air around, and _Matilda_ picking up her white
skirts and skipping for Panama! Neither man nor money will ever give me
a feeling like that again. But then,--ah, then! And there's 'most always
a then,--when the _Matilda_ tried to spear a gull with her bowsprit,
and, shamefaced at the failure above, tried to harpoon some little fishy
with the same weapon,--why, I hope I'll never have a feeling like that
again, neither.
I hung over a bunk like a snarl of rope. Jesse come down and grinned at
me. I couldn't even get mad. "Tell mother I died thinking of her," was
all I could say.
Now that was noble of me. Many a man has cashed his checks not feeling
half so bad; but if any poor soul ever regretted a good deed, I did that
one. That last message to my mother seemed to remain in the memory of
our ship's company, long after I was willing to forget it.
For two solid days I didn't live inside of myself,--mind floated around
in space. After that, I got up, ready for anything in the line of eating
they had on board. Jesse brought me a smoked herring and a cup of
coffee,--the first coffee I ever tasted, mother thinking it wasn't good
for boys. Within ten minutes after my meal, William De La Tour Saunders
belonged to himself once more. Never had a squirm of seasickness since.
For the first week I wasn't quite up to the mark, but Jesse told me to
take a cup of sea-water every morning before breakfast, which tuned me
up in jig-time.
I saw our lady passenger when she come up for air. A girl of about
twenty, supple and balanced as a tight-rope walker; you thought she was
slim when you first looked at her, yet when you looked the second time
you couldn't prove it. What a beautiful thing is a set of muscles that
know their business! Muscles that meet every roll of a boat, or whatever
it is they should meet, without haste and without loss of time,--just
there, when they should be there! Why, to see that girl walk twenty feet
on the schooner's deck was a picture to remember for the rest of your
days. Kid that I was, I noticed there wasn't a line in her makeup that
said, "Look at me." Afterward I learned to shake my head at graceful
ladies, but I feel kindly toward them still, out of memory of that first
girl. My mother moved beautifully, likewise Mattie. They were quiet,
though; restful women; this one was all spring and ginger,--for Heaven's
sake, don't think I mean prancy! Nor that I haven't met a prancy girl or
two who was all right, when I say that,--fat and jolly, yellow-haired
girls, to go with good meals and a romp,--but this My Lady was made of
the stuff Uncle Shakspere wrote. She was clean and sweet as pine-woods
after rain, but full of fire, sense, and foolishness.
I remember thinking, "When this girl turns round she ain't going to be
handsome in the face. With that head of hair, that back, and that walk,
Providence will feel square on the deal." And when she did turn round I
simply spread my hands, mouth, and eyes, and looked at her. I forgot
being aboard ship, I forgot where I was going and why, I forgot who I
was and everything else; all I knew was that a kind of human I never
believed lived was walking toward me.
I caught one glance of her eyes; outside their beauty was fun, kindness,
and a desire to be friends; from that minute one red-headed puppy-dog
found something to live for.
My devotion had nothing to do with the ordinary love-affair. As for
marrying her, no such idea entered my loft. I had no jealousies. All I
wanted was for her to be near me, to be a friend of mine, and that she
might be on hand to approve if I did something surprising. I wanted the
privilege of her hearing me talk about myself; and, for the rest of it,
I could sit and look at her beauty, the same as you or me could sit and
listen to the greatest music. It meant more than just good looks; I
wouldn't go too far if I said it was a kind of religion. And the devil
take my soul if I forget the horse-sense and kindness that girl used in
teaching a foot-loose boy what a different place this world is, from
what he'd been like to think it, without her. A young feller's first
outpourings toward a woman has more effect on him than even his mother's
years of care. He kind of takes mother for granted. The other woman
represents his own endeavors. I played in luck.
We were introduced, bang! When about ten feet away from me she took her
hand from the rail to gather in one end of a shawl. At that minute the
_Matilda_ saw a whale, or something, and shied. We struck the mainmast
together, me trying to hold her up. She said, "Why, how do you do?" I
said I did very well, and was she hurt? She said, not in the least,
thank you, except in her feelings, at being so clumsy. I said, if _she_
was clumsy, why, then, why, then--Now I was a little bashful. Nobody
could be a clodhopper who lived with my mother, and ordinarily I acted
quite like a man when necessary, but this was a little sudden. I
couldn't reach the word I looked for. With one hand braced against the
mainmast, her hair standing in a black cloud about her head, the color
whipped to her cheeks, she gave me a flash from the corner of her eye:
"I'm afraid I lose my compliment," said she.
[Illustration: "The _Matilda_ saw a whale, or something and shied"]
Afterward I learned she had liked me from the first, too, and was afraid
I mightn't turn out well. Lucky for me I didn't try to show off!
"I wouldn't think it a compliment to compare you to anything on earth!"
says I, meaning every word of it.
She laughed out, hearty as a boy. "Royal!" she said, and held out her
hand.
"And the hand is the hand of--?" she asked.
"Bill Saunders," said I, thinking to take off my hat.
"I sound almost as honest as you," said she. "I'm Mary Smith."
It was almost a shock to think she was Mary Smith. Since then it would
be a shock to think of her as Eulalie Rosalinde De Montmorency. She
didn't need it. Plain Mary Smith told of what was beneath her
loveliness,--and, I'm forced to admit, her side-stepping and
buck-jumping, once in a while. Oh, she could cut loose for fair, if
stirred, but you could always remember with perfect faith Mary Smith.