ABNER TELLS A LITTLE HISTORY
As he walked home that evening Darry was figuring. Fourteen dollars was
not going far when the sum required, according to the figures Mr.
Quarles had written out, reached the grand total of a hundred and eleven
dollars and thirty-seven cents.
He had had much more than that on board the poor old _Falcon_ when she
went to pieces, the amount of his savings for several years; but there
was no use of his thinking about that.
To whom could he look for assistance?
He had not a friend, save new ones in the village; and even Mr. Keeler
would be apt to decline to lend him money. Times were hard, collections
very slow--he had heard this said many times of late--and to small
merchants the sum of a hundred dollars means much.
Darry thought it best not to say anything just then to Mrs. Peake,
though a little later he must tell her about his visit to the money
lender, and deliver the message Mr. Quarles had sent to her.
He was due to cross the sound on the morrow, and perhaps it would be
best to tell Abner first; he might have been making some arrangement to
get someone else to assume the mortgage, and pay the lawyer off.
So Darry tried to assume a cheerfulness he was far from feeling.
Long he lay awake that night, thinking and trying to lay out some plan
of action that might promise results.
In the morning Darry visited his traps.
Only one victim rewarded his labor, and this added to his gloom.
He finished all his various chores, and they were many, for he had taken
numerous duties upon his shoulders in order to spare Abner's wife.
As before, it was nearly the middle of the afternoon before he could get
away.
Mr. Keeler loaded him down with packages intended for the
station-keeper; indeed Darry had to make two trips between the store and
his boat before he had all his cargo aboard.
The weather was what a sailor would call "dirty"; that is, it gave
promise of turning into more or less of a storm, and wise mariners would
be keeping a weather eye out for a safe and snug harbor.
Darry had no fear. He believed he knew that bay like a book now, and
since he had tinkered with the boat and placed it in fair condition he
thought it could stand any sea that might meet him in his passage to and
fro between the mainland and the stretch of sand acting as a buffer to
the ocean tides.
It was a dead calm when he started, and he was compelled to use the
oars; but by the time he reached the middle a breeze sprang up, and
quick to take advantage of his opportunity he spread his bit of a sail,
and went flying along like a frightened gull.
Abner was always glad to see him, and taking advantage of the first
chance to get the life saver alone, Darry told of his recent experience
with the loan shark.
The other looked very downcast; indeed, Darry could not remember having
ever seen him appear so disheartened.
"It means trouble for the poor ole woman, Darry. If I kin only muster up
enough courage to ask some o' the folks to help me out p'raps we kin
pull through; but the best o' friends pull back wen money is spoken of.
They all got ther own burdens to kerry. I know I war a fool to ever do
it; but Jenny got on my nerves yuh see, an' promised to give it back.
An' thet shark, Quarles, it does him a lot o' good to know he kin push
me down a peg," he said, with a heavy sigh.
"I seemed to get the notion that he didn't love you very much, Mr.
Peake," remarked Darry.
"I thort he'd forgot all about it, but now I know he ain't, the skunk!
He holds it agin me, and hes all these years. I reckon he jest hugged
hisself wen I kim to him an' asked that loan. It war jest like playin'
into his hands. Yuh see, lad, him an' me was rivals onct on a time."
Darry pricked up his ears.
Here was a touch of romance, something one would hardly expect to find
in connection with so ordinary looking a man as Abner Peake.
"You mean that he wanted Nancy--that is Mrs. Peake, to marry him?" he
asked.
"Thet's jest it, son. I reckon he'd a got her, too, fur I didn't hold a
candle to Darius wen it kim to looks or larnin', but yuh see thet's whar
chanct stepped in an' guv me a shove."
"Something happened then?"
"Nancy fell overboard off a boat we was all on. Darius, he didn't know
how to swim and all he could do was to yell and wave his arms."
"And you went overboard after her?"
"I reckon I did. They sed as how I was in the water nigh about as quick
as Nancy herself. She was a carryin' on high, like she was chokin', when
I got to her, but I had her out in a jiffy. Arter thet she kinder took
to me, an' Darius he got the mitten."
"Now I understand why he feels that way toward you," said Darry, wisely.
"They was some things I never did understand 'bout that thing. Nancy,
she was allers the best gal swimmer in the village, but she did act like
she was drownin' that day. Some sed as how they thort she tumbled over
apurpose jest to hev some fun, an' see which o' her beaux'd drap in
arter her the quickest," and the surfman smiled at the thought.
"And you won out. I guess Mr. Quarles has never forgiven you for that.
But what can be done to beat him at his game now? Isn't there any way?"
"We got a week to try, an' as I git off before the end o' the time I'll
see if anything kin be did. P'rhaps Keeler might help me out, though I
did hear him say he was mighty hard up jest now. It was nice in yuh
tryin' to do wot yuh did, boy. I knowed I wasn't makin' no mistake when
I sized yuh up as the right sorter lad to take leetle Joey's place."
The life saver put an arm affectionately across the shoulders of his
companion, and Darry never felt prouder in his life than when he
realized that he had "made good" with this simple surfman who had been
so kind to him at their first meeting.
"I only wish I had been able to do what I wanted to. It it had been any
other man but Mr. Quarles I think he would have fixed it up, and I
meant to put aside what I earned this winter, either from trapping or
working for Mr. Singleton, to wipe out all that debt. I will yet, if I
have the chance, and you can get somebody to take over the mortgage," he
said, stoutly.
"Give me time to think, lad. Wen yuh kim acrost another time p'raps I'll
have some plan made up. I'd do nigh anything to save pore Nancy bein'
put outen our leetle home. 'Taint much to look at, but she sets a heap
by it, I reckon. And as soon as I git a chanct I mean to drop outen this
business an' try to make a livin' another way, so I kin be home more.
Fishin' it might be, er somethin' thet way."
That night Darry played for the men, but they could not help noticing
that much of his music was along the sad order.
In the morning the sky was still overcast, and the sound lay in a bank
of half darkness that looked like fog, though the whistling wind seemed
to forbid such a thing.
Abner was a little dubious about letting the boy depart, but Darry
laughed at the idea of any harm befalling him.
He had several things he wished to attend to, and besides, Mrs. Peake
would need him through the day in many ways.
He entered his boat and took up the oars for a hard row, for the wind
was of too deceptive a character to allow him to make use of his sail.
The men of the station had come down to see him off, for by this time
Darry had won his way into the hearts of every rough fellow, and they
looked upon him as a sort of general ward of the crew, pulled out of the
sea at their door and destined for great things.
Not one of them but who believed a bright future awaited Peake's new
boy, and many were the predictions made among them, some even venturing
the assertion that he would be president yet.
So they waved their sou'westers and shouted a merry good-bye to him as
he rowed into the gray blanket of mist that shrouded the sound.