IN CAP'N ABE'S LIVING-ROOM
Louise came into the store smiling and the dusty, musty old place seemed
actually to brighten in the sunshine of her presence. Her big gray eyes
(they were almost blue when their owner was in an introspective mood) now
sparkled as her glance swept Cap'n Abe's stock-in-trade--the shelves of
fly-specked canned goods and cereal packages, with soap, and starch, and
half a hundred other kitchen goods beyond; the bolts of calico, gingham,
"turkey red," and mill-ends; the piles of visored caps and boxes of
sunbonnets on the counter: the ship-lanterns, coils of rope, boathooks,
tholepins hanging in wreaths; bailers, clam hoes, buckets, and the
thousand and one articles which made the store on the Shell Road a museum
that later was sure to engage the interest of the girl.
Now, however, the clutter of the shop gained but fleeting notice from
Louise. Her gaze almost immediately fastened upon the figure of the
bewhiskered old man, with spectacles and sou'wester both pushed back on
his bald crown, who mildly looked upon her--his smile somehow impressing
Louise Grayling as almost childish, it was so kindly.
Cap'n Joab had dodged through the door after Lawford Tapp. The other
boys from The Beaches followed their leader. Old Washy Gallup and Amiel
Perdue suddenly remembered that it was almost chore time as this radiant
young woman said:
"I wish to see Mr. Abram Silt--Captain Silt. Is he here?"
"I'm him, miss," Cap'n Abe returned politely.
Milt Baker surely would have remained of all the crowd of idlers, gaping
oilily at the visitor across the top of the rusty stove, had not a shrill
feminine voice been heard outside the store,
"Is Milt Baker there? Ain't none o' you men seen him? Land sakes! he's
as hard to hold as the greased pig on Fourth o' July--an' jest 'bout as
useful."
"Milt," said Cap'n Abe suggestively, "I b'lieve I hear Mandy callin' you."
"I'm a-comin'!--I'm a-comin', Mandy!" gurgled Milt, cognizant of the
girl's gay countenance turned upon him.
"What did you want, miss?" asked Cap'n Abe, as the recreant husband of
the militant Mandy stumbled over his own feet getting out of the store.
Louise bubbled over with laughter; she could not help it. Cap'n Abe's
bearded countenance broke slowly into an appreciative grin.
"Yes," he said, "she does have him on a leadin' string. I do admit
Mandy's a card."
The girl, quick-witted as she was bright looking, got his point almost at
once. "You mean she was a Card before she married him?"
"And she's a Card yet," Cap'n Abe said, nodding. "Guess you know a thing
or two, yourself. What can I do for you?"
"You can say: 'Good-evening, Niece Louise,'" laughed the girl, coming
closer to the counter upon which the storekeeper still leaned.
"Land sakes!"
"My mother was a Card. That is how I came to see your joke, Uncle Abram."
"Land sakes!"
"Don't you believe me?"
"I--I ain't got but one niece in the world," mumbled Cap'n Abe.
"An'--an' I never expected to see _her_."
"Louise Grayling, daughter of Professor Ernest Grayling and Miriam
Card--your half-sister's child. See here--and here." She snapped open
her bag, resting it on the counter, and produced an old-fashioned
photograph of her mother, a letter, yellowed by time, that Cap'n Abe had
written Professor Grayling long before, and her own accident policy
identification card which she always carried.
Cap'n Abe stretched forth a hairy hand, and it closed on Lou's as a
sunfish absorbs its prey. The girl's hand to her wrist was completely
lost in the grip; but despite its firmness Cap'n Abe's handclasp was by
no means painful. He released her and, leaning back, smiled benignly.
"Land sakes!" he said again. "I'm glad to see little Mirry's girl. An'
you do favor her a mite. But I guess you take mostly after the
Graylings."
"People say I am like my father."
"An' a mighty nice lookin' man--an' a pleasant--as I remember him," Cap'n
Abe declared.
"Come right in here, into my sittin'-room, Niece Louise, an' lemme take a
look at you. Land sakes!"
He lifted the flap in the counter to let her through. The doorway beyond
gave entrance to a wide hall, or "entry," between the store and the
living-room. The kitchen was in a lean-to at the back. The table in the
big room was already spread with a clean red-and-white checked tablecloth
and set with heavy chinaware for a meal. A huge caster graced the center
of the table, containing glass receptacles for salt, red and black
pepper, catsup, vinegar, and oil. Knives, forks, and spoons for two--all
of utilitarian style--were arranged with mathematical precision beside
each plate.
In one window hung a pot with "creeping Jew" and inchplant, the tendrils
at least a yard long. In the other window was a blowzy-looking canary in
a cage. A corpulent tortoise-shell cat occupied the turkey-red cushion
in one generous rocking chair, There was a couch with a faded patchwork
coverlet, several other chairs, and in a glass-fronted case standing on
the mantlepiece a model of a brigantine in full sail, at least two feet
tall.
"Sit down," said Cap'n Abe heartily. "Drop your dunnage right down
there," as Louise slipped the strap of her bag from her shoulder. "Take
that big rocker. Scat, you, Diddimus! and let the young lady have your
place."
"Oh, don't bother him, Uncle Abram. What a beauty he is," Louise said,
as the tortoise-shell--without otherwise moving--opened one great, yellow
eye.
"He's a lazy good-for-nothing," Cap'n Abe said mildly. "Friends with all
the mice on the place, I swan! But sometimes he's the only human critter
I have to talk to. 'Cept Jerry."
"Jerry?"
"The bird," explained Cap'n Abe, easing himself comfortably into a chair,
his guest being seated, and resting his palms on his knees as he gazed at
her out of his pale blue eyes. "He's a lot of comfort--Jerry. An' he
useter be a great singer. Kinder gittin' old, now, like the rest of us.
"Does seem too bad," went on Cap'n Abe reflectively, "how a bird like him
has got to live in a cage all his endurin' days. Jerry's a
prisoner--like I been. _I_ ain't never had the freedom I wanted,
Miss------?
"Louise, please. Uncle Abram. Lou Grayling," the girl begged, but
smiling.
"Then just you call me Cap'n Abe. I'm sort o' useter that," the
storekeeper said.
"Of course I will. But why haven't you been free?" she asked, reverting
to his previous topic. "Seems to me--down here on the Cape where the sea
breezes blow, and everything is open----"
"Yes, 'twould seem so," Cap'n Abe said, but he said it with hesitation.
"I been some hampered all my life, as ye might say. 'Tis something that
was bred in me. But as for Jerry------
"Jerry was give to me by a lady when he was a young bird. After a while
I got thinkin' a heap about him bein' caged, and one sunshiny day--it was
a marker for days down here on the Cape, an' we have lots on 'em! One
sunshiny day I opened his door and opened the window, and I says: 'Scoot!
The hull world's yourn!'"
"And didn't he go?" asked the girl, watching the rapt face of the old man.
"Did he go? Right out through that window with a song that'd break your
heart to hear, 'twas so sweet. He pitched on the old apple tree
yonder--the August sweet'nin'--and I thought he'd bust his throat
a-tellin' of how glad he was to be free out there in God's sunshine an'
open air."
"He came back, I see," said Louise thoughtfully.
"That's just it!" cried Cap'n Abe, shaking his head till the tarpaulin
fell off and he forgot to pick it up. "That's just it. He come back of
his own self. I didn't try to ketch him. When it grew on toward sundown
an' the air got kinder chill, I didn't hear Jerry singin' no more. I'd
seen him, off'n on, flittin' 'bout the yard all day. When I come in here
to light the hangin'-lamp cal'latin' to make supper, I looked over there
at the window. I'd shut it. There was Jerry on the window sill, humped
all up like an old woman with the tisic."
"The poor thing!" was Lou's sympathetic cry.
"Yes," said Cap'n Abe, nodding. "He warn't no more fit to be let loose
than nothin' 'tall. And I wonder if _I_ be," added the storekeeper.
"I've been caged quite a spell how.
"But now tell me, Niece Louise," he added with latent curiosity, "how did
you find your way here?"
"Father says--'Daddy-professor,' you know is what I call him. He says if
we had not always been traveling when I was not at school, I should have
known you long ago. He thinks very highly of my mother's people."
"I wanter know!"
"He says you are the 'salt of the earth'--that is his very expression."
"Yes. We're pretty average salt, I guess," admitted Cap'n Abe. "I never
seen your father but once or twice. You see, Louise, your mother was a
lot younger'n me an' Am'zon."
"Who?"
"Cap'n Am'zon. Oh! _I_ ain't the only uncle you got," he said, watching
her narrowly. "Cap'n Am'zon Silt----"
"Have I another relative? How jolly!" exclaimed Louise, clasping her
hands.
"Ye-as. Ain't it? Jest," Cap'n Abe said. "Ahem! your father never
spoke of Cap'n Am'zon?".
"I don't believe daddy-prof even knew there was such a person."
"Mebbe not. Mebbe not," Cap'n Abe agreed hastily. "And not to be
wondered at. You see, Am'zon went to sea when he was only jest a boy."
"Did he?"
"Yep. Ran away from home--like most boys done in them days, for their
mothers warn't partial to the sea--and shipped aboard the whaler _South
Sea Belle_. He tied his socks an' shirt an' a book o' navigation he
owned, up in a handkerchief, and slipped out over the shed roof one
night, and away he went." Cap'n Abe told the girl this with that
far-away look on his face that usually heralded one of his tales about
Cap'n Amazon.
"I can remember it clear 'nough. He walked all the way to New Bedford.
We lived at Rocky Head over against Bayport. Twas quite a step to
Bedford. The _South Sea Belle_ was havin' hard time makin' up her crew.
She warn't a new ship. Am'zon was twelve year old an' looked fifteen.
An' he was fifteen 'fore he got back from that v'y'ge. Mebbe I'll tell
ye 'bout it some time--or Cap'n Am'zon will. He's been a deep-bottom
sailor from that day to this."
"And where is he now?" asked Louise.
"Why--mebbe!--he's on his way here. I shouldn't wonder. He might step
in at that door any minute," and Cap'n Abe's finger indicated the store
door.
There was the sound of a footstep entering the store as he spoke. The
storekeeper arose. "I'll jest see who 'tis," he said.
While he was absent Louise laid aside her hat and made a closer
inspection of the room and its furniture. Everything was homely but
comfortable. There was a display of marine art upon the walls. All the
ships were drawn exactly, with the stays, spars, and all rigging in
place, line for line. They all sailed, too, through very blue seas, the
crest of each wave being white with foam.
Flanking the model of the brigantine on the mantle were two fancy shell
pieces--works of art appreciated nowhere but on the coast. The designs
were ornate; but what they could possibly represent Louise was unable to
guess.
She tried to interest the canary by whistling to him and sticking her
pink finger between the wires of his cage. He was ruffled and dull-eyed
like all old birds of his kind, and paid her slight attention. When she
turned to Diddimus she had better success. He rolled on his side, stuck
all his claws out and drew them in again luxuriously, purring meanwhile
like a miniature sawmill.
When Cap'n Abe came back the girl asked:
"Wasn't your customer a young man I saw on the porch as I came in?"
"Yep. Lawford Tapp. Said he forgot some matches and a length o'
ropeyarn. I reckon you went to that young man's head. And his top
hamper ain't none too secure, Niece Louise."
"Oh, did I?" laughed the girl, understanding perfectly. "How nice."
"Nice? That's how ye take it. Lawford Tapp ain't a fav'rite o' mine."
"But he seemed very accommodating to-day when I asked him how to reach
your store."
"So you met him up town?"
"Yes, Uncle Abe."
"He's perlite enough," scolded the storekeeper. "But I don't jest fancy
the cut of his jib. Wanted to know if you was goin' to stop here."
"Oh!" exclaimed Louise. "That is what I want to know myself. Am I?"