TONY PASSES
The birds, after a dawning chorus of vehement, almost theatric joy,
made their first short flights from cover to cover among the elms.
The rim of eastern hills had grown incandescent, till like a coal of
fire snapping a tight cord, the sun burned through the horizon, and
drove thin vapors slowly across the river. They rolled back, parting
for a phantom Exodus. The breath of the sea mingled sharply with cool
fresh-water smells alongshore, and in the fields with the fairy spice
of dying strawberry leaves. It was that bright weather which comes once
in a man’s life; and Miles, his boots soaked in dew, spattered to the
knee with white and yellow petals, came wading home through tall grass.
Ella was rattling about her stove, alone in the kitchen.
“Don’t track that gurry in here,” she commanded, glancing sourly.
“What’s the odds,” he laughed, “a morning like this? It’s all clean.”
She turned on him sharply, but in the same instant checking her reply,
gave him a suspicious, discountenancing stare.
“Leapin’ the fields, hey?” She slammed the iron door with something
like a grunt.
Miles sat down on the doorstep, as if to clean his boots, but in
reality to give his thoughts a breathing-space, survey the new kingdoms
which they had coursed, and take the height and depth of their
discovery. Not over the hills, or past the dazzling limit of the bay,
but here in these four walls lived his happiness. The old plans, long
disregarded and summer-fallow, now lay entirely barren. He had meant to
go away, to run about in the world, and for no purpose, except to seek
in new combinations what he might all the time have left buried here.
Here in this house the past grief, the present transport, alike had
found their man. And what greed could harry more out of life? Nowhere
else, here; in wonder he turned to look indoors upon that homely and
amazing theatre.
Instead, he saw Ella standing over him in the doorway. The strangeness
of her look at once laid hold of him; for the round, freckled face was
no longer whimsical, but sad, earnest, even a little pale.
She was the first to speak.
“Don’t you be mad,” she began. “Don’t be mad with me, will ye, for
what I’m goin’ to say?”
“Why, Ella,” he laughed, “of course not. What’s the matter?”
“Lots.” She nodded, grave and threatening. “Lots the matter. I be’n a
foolish, cross-eyed old woman: that’s the first. Set up for a smart
contriver, and ’ain’t the brains o’ Larrabee’s calf. Oh, meddlin’ with
people! It’s dangerous, I tell ye, Miles, it’s dangerous! Ye mean well,
all along, and stir things round so clever (ye think), and then some
mornin’ wake up to see you’ve upsot all--hurrah’s nest, everything on
top, an’ nothin’ to hand!”
She made a clumsy, derisive gesture, and spoke on, hurriedly, a tinge
of red rising in her cheeks.
“Funny I’d use that sailor-talk I learnt from him. But there! Might’s
well say it: he was in my mind.” She looked away from Miles, and down
upon the river, where the topsails of a schooner, slate gray, glided
above the fir-points. “When ain’t he there? Though I guess you never
heard me talk o’ him before. Ben Constantine, that was--Seems no more’n
last week I see his tops’ls go down same as hers now. And I never--I
ain’t ever spoke of it sence. That’s how I know. And that’s how I say
it’s dangerous.”
Her eyes returned to him wearily, and yet with such depth and fire as
he had not known they could contain.
“What did I promise?” she cried, in reproach. “What else did I promise
your gran’father, that last day, but jest to take his place and see
you steered the course? And look at me, how I let all slide, so
long--because you and me and Anna has lived happy here! ’Tain’t a world
to be happy in, but to git ahead. And the Lord forgive me for sayin’
that, if it should be a lie!”
He could only stare at her, astounded by this flame from ashes, this
grief, perplexity, and passionate conviction.
“So you must go. When I see that light to your eyes this mornin’, and
on your face--Oh, I know it still, these many years--Come, go, before
she ’pears to be somethin’ dropped down out the skies right beside ye!
But anyhow, ’fore that poor child thinks the same o’ you. If ye don’t,
what’s ahead for her? Oh, it takes me to know what!”
Miles held up a restraining hand.
“Too late, Ella,” he declared soberly. “She seems that already, and--I
told her.”
The woman dropped her arms as in defeat.
“Be good to us all!” she groaned. “It’s my fault.”
“I couldn’t help it,” he began weakly.
“Help it!” she snapped, with an instant change of temper. “I should
hope not! Help human natur’? Who are you, to talk that way? Gunpowder’s
gunpowder: it goes bang in the best settin’-room or out in the street.
But this time ’twas my fault.”
“No,” said a voice behind them, “it was mine.”
They turned like conspirators taken in the fact, and with a mixed
dismay; for the girl stood by the kitchen table, not only tranquil as
a judge, but white as a victim. Her bearing was unchanged, her voice
level; she had never seemed more beautiful, more necessary; and yet the
very friendship in her eyes struck him like a blow.
“The other door was open,” she said, with the same mortal calmness. “At
first I didn’t know you meant me. It’s my fault, Ella. But it’s easy to
set right. I’ll go this morning.”
They both cried out against her.
“Go! Hark the nonsense!” Ella tried cheerfully to bluster. “We was jest
talkin’! Go where?”
“It doesn’t matter where,” she answered steadily. “The main thing is to
go. I did wrong to stay at all, but--I didn’t understand.”
With a face as pale as her own, Miles stood grasping the door frame.
He had been raised above the world, to see the lighted prospect of
felicity; and now his pinnacle was knocked from under.
“Anna,” he ventured, moving heavily across the threshold. “Anna,
don’t--”
“I didn’t understand.” Her lips trembled slightly, but she met him
still with that intolerable friendliness. “The less we say now,
the--the better every way.”
All three stood at a loss, without speaking. There seemed no outlet
to their distress. The fire fluttering in the stove mocked them with
small, pleasant, household sounds.
Other sounds went unheeded. They heard a runner come pounding down the
hill, saw him flash past the window, and might never have turned to
look, had he not bounded in headlong at the door. Tony, his black hair
tousled as by a gale, his face fire-red and shining with sweat, caught
breath enough to laugh. The brown butt of a pistol stuck out from the
flap of his shirt.
“Miles, old mate, I need you!” he panted. They had not met since the
quarrel, yet here he stood, catching up their old relation as handily
as though he had but stepped outdoors a moment ago. “Run up to Alward’s
and fetch the boat, will you? I’m in a mess.” Catching sight of the two
women, he nodded cheerfully. “Hallo! No time for shore manners. I’m in
a mess. Come outside a jiffy.”
Miles followed him into the sunlight. Below the step Tony turned his
back upon the door, and spoke in a rapid undertone.
“I must get across that river. Savee?” His breath still came hard,
his face shone bright, like that of a man inspired by danger; and he
watched the hill above, with little side glances, cool and shrewd.
“Abe’s done it this time--killed a man. On the spree. Poor ass named
Furfey. Finish!”
In the same breath his indifference vanished. He looked Miles square in
the eye, full force.
“We’ve had our ins and outs,” he urged, “but you can’t think I’m up to
that, now! Can you?”
It was impossible to deny the man’s earnestness.
“All right, then,” he cried heartily. “If you believe me, I don’t
care! But _they_ won’t! That teamster found it, and Abe’s got away
clear. Half Kilmarnock’s hanging about Alward’s; other half out chasing
me, pitchfork and blunderbuss. Get the boat, will you? I doubled and
slipped ’em, up there in the woods--”
In the act of nodding toward the hill, he paused and listened.
“Oh, did I, though?” he drawled satirically; then laughing like a
schoolboy, he shook his fist at the landscape, whirled about, and
darted into the house.
A squad of men bobbed into sight above the crest, and came running
heavily down. The first was Old-Hab; the last--fat, cautious, and far
behind--was Quinn the postmaster. They swarmed about Miles at the door,
all seven or eight, like men who had their fill of running; but their
eyes were sharpened, their tongues loosed, with the excitement of a
lifetime; and their firearms, though of a quaint variety, were solid
and efficacious.
Of the many questions, Old-Hab’s rose loudest.
“Where’s the murd’rer?” he shouted, grounding a “Zulu” fowling-piece.
“Which way’d he run, Mile?”
“What murderer?” said Miles, giving Tony all benefits.
“Why,” began Habakkuk, “the black man with the teeth--this Ital--”
But his followers sent up a roar.
“There he goes! There he goes!”
The whole posse swept on down the hill. Below, halfway to the
evergreens, Tony was racing in full view. He cleared the rough hillside
in flying bounds, nimble as a goat. By slipping through the house he
had gained such a screen for his start, that now, with fifty yards to
spare, he dove headfirst into the cedars, and disappeared.
Habakkuk’s men plunged after--Miles among the foremost--and, lashing
each other with springy branches as they fought through, swung up
river along the shore. The sailor thundered across the gully bridge,
clattered over the quarter-deck, and passed at once out of earshot.
Running their hardest, they caught neither sight nor sound. Then
suddenly, from the shore below, a man hallooed. The roar of a gun
shattered the early morning stillness, echoed along rocks and river.
Miles and the others breasted the lower bushes on the headland, in time
to see, against the white side of the stunted obelisk ahead, a flying
figure spring up, wrench open the door, slip through, and slam it shut.
Round the next bend they nearly fell over a man stooping in the path.
He rose--a young giant with a shock of sun-bleached hair, who grinned
foolishly at Habakkuk.
“Nigh winged ’im, pa,” he chuckled. “Thought I hed, but don’t see no
blood.”
“Ye brimston’ w’elp!” cried his father bitterly. “Who wants to see
any?”
“W’elp, hey?” retorted Lazy-Hab, serene as an ox. “Who else was
a-watchin’ the shore? He woulden’ ’a’ run inland. Stood to reason.” He
blew the smoke from his gun-barrel, and added proudly: “All is, ’twas
me doubled ’im. We got ’im now, tighter ’n pitch.”
As they drew near, no sound came from the little tower. The sailor
had gained, at least, the high advantage of being neither heard nor
seen. Halting, the men waited in uneasy silence,--so uneasy, that they
began to scatter behind firs and boulders. Old-Hab stood in the open,
negligently, but with a face more weazened than ever.
“Inside there!” he called, in a doubtful tone. “The’ ’s been fogo
enough, fer one mornin’. Master fogo. Better come out and make it no
worse. We don’t hanker fer no more shootin’.”
“More you’ll get, if you try to rush me.” Tony’s voice rang hollow
within the walls. “I’m better at it, too, than that young red-headed
savage, there.” He paused. “I tell you. There’s just one way out o’
this nonsense. Send Miles Bissant in here. I can trust him. We’ll
splice things up. Fair play, now, and flag o’ truce, mind you! Him
alone, or I’ll--”
“That’s fair,” said Miles, and stepped forward.
Old-Hab clutched his arm.
“It’s a trick!” he whispered. “Don’t ye go, Mile. It’s a trick! He
might--ye may git hurt--”
“Somebody may, anyhow,” Miles answered, pulling free. “Keep your men
back.” He walked to the foot of the lighthouse, and called, “Here you
are, Tony.”
The door swung barely enough to let him squeeze through, and slammed at
once. In the gloom, he heard the lock click, and Tony laugh quietly.
“Lucky I forgot to give up my key! Got yours with you?”
Miles fumbled in his pockets. “No,” he answered.
“Good boy! Great!” The sailor swore joyfully under his breath. “They
haven’t caught me yet! Come topside where I can see you.”
They climbed the stairs, and, blinking at the sudden daylight glare in
the lamp-room, sat face to face on opposite edges of the trap-door.
Tony laid his pistol at his thigh, leaned back against a coil of rope,
and swung his feet comfortably in the lower darkness.
“It’s bad pidgin,” he said, frowning. “Bad. Only some revenue skunk,
but then! What business has a dead man to look so beastly respectable,
all at once? Damn it!” Heaving his shoulders, he laughed scornfully.
“Abe was getting ready to sell me out. The price, I fancy, was where
they disagreed.”
He spat down the stairway, in disgust.
“Funny,” he continued after a pause; “you’re the only person _would_
believe me. It’s just Abe’s word against mine, and he’s got clear.
If they catch me--Humph! Finish!” He patted the coil of rope, and
dropped head on shoulder, in a shocking pantomime. “But you’re the one
I expected to founder on, not Abe. Ever since you sighted old Quong
that night--you remember? The Chinaman: he bought for me. And yet here
you sit, the one man to believe me!”--He leaned across, clapped Miles
on the shoulder, and shook him gently. His face lighted, very grave
and simple. “Lied to you so much, I don’t--Anyhow, God bless you, old
Sober-sides!”
He leaned back again, laughed as though ashamed, and swung his feet
vigorously.
“Opium was our game,” he said. “Tidy consignment stowed across the
river. If I could once get over, and see Graves, the rest is all
greased ways. I’d have made it, too, but that young red-head” (he
raised a tattered shirt-sleeve) “nearly blew my arm off. We’ve seen
enough of that. But we’ll see worse, unless you do what I ask you.
They’re fools, but no cowards; that’s what I figure on--Just one way;
do it, and all’s right and tight, every man Jack, safe and sound. Will
you?”
“What is it?” said Miles. “I came up here to make terms.”
“So you did,” laughed Florio. “And here’s mine. You slip down, quiet
as you can; unlock the door, quiet as you can; leave the key in the
lock, and wait on the stairs till I signal you to come topside again.
I promise not to lay a finger on one of ’em. Solemn!” Seeing Miles
hesitate, he scrambled to his feet briskly. “Take or leave it, that’s
my ultimatum. They’ve got me in a clove hitch. Lies with you, now, to
fetch us all out alive.”
Slowly, far from satisfied, Miles swung down through the floor. He had
already sunk into the darkness, when Tony called,--
“Steady a bit.”
He saw the man’s head and shoulder, sharp in the lighted square above;
saw a great arm thrust down; and felt his own hand gripped with a
surprising warmth.
“About that girl,” growled Tony. “I hope you know that she’s a wonder.
You made me damned mad, because--Well, I’m getting old, maybe. I really
did--She did fetch me. You that’s young! Tell her that, some day.”
He let go, and drew back out of sight. Miles, in astonishment, groped
his way down to the door. A few light, scurrying sounds came from
above; the turning key squeaked faintly; then all the hollow shaft was
filled with silence.
He saw neither purpose nor sense in their agreement, which, the longer
he waited, the less he liked. Tony’s afterthought, moreover, stuck
oddly in his memory, like words at parting. He had begun to wonder
what signal the sailor would give, when, sudden and deafening in that
confinement, a pistol-shot rang overhead.
[Illustration]