"Dannie," says he, in his wisdom, "you've growed wonderful fond o'
Judy, isn't you?"
"I'm t' wed Judy," I answered.
'Twas with no unkindness--but with a sly twinkle of understanding--that
he looked upon me.
"When I grows up," I added, for his comfort.
"No, no!" says he. "You'll never wed Judith. A gentleman? 'Twould
scandalize Chesterfield."
"I will," said I.
"You'll _not_!" cries he, in earnest.
"But I will!"
The defiance still left him smiling. "Not accordin' t' Chesterfield,"
says he. "You'll be a gentleman, Dannie, when you grows up, an' you'll
not be wantin' t' wed Judy."
"Not _wantin'_ to?"
"No, no; you'll not be wantin' to."
"Still," says I, "will I wed Judy."
"An' why?"
"Because," said I, "I've kissed her!"
* * * * *
My uncle would have his last glass alone (he said); and I must be off
to bed and to sleep; 'twas grown late for me (said he) beyond the
stretch of his conscience to endure. Lord love us! (said he) would I
never be t' bed in season? Off with me--an' t' sleep with me! 'Twould
be the worse for me (said he) an he caught me wakeful when he turned
in. The thing had an odd look--an odd look, to be sure--for never
before had the old man's conscience pricked him to such fatherly
consideration upon a night when the wind blew high. I extinguished the
hanging lamp, smothered the smouldering coals, set his night-lamp at
hand, and drowsily climbed the stairs, having given him good-night,
with a hearty "Thank 'e, sir, for that there tutor!" He bawled after
me an injunction against lying awake; and I should presently have gone
sound asleep, worn with the excitements of the day, had I not caught
ear of him on the move. 'Twas the wary tap and thump of his staff and
wooden leg that instantly enlisted my attention; then a cautious
fumbling at the latch of the door, a draught of night air, a
thin-voiced, garrulous complaint of the weather and long waiting.
"Hist, ye fool!" says my uncle. "Ye'll wake the lad."
"Damn the lad!" was the prompt response. "I wish he were dead."
My uncle laughed.
"Dead!" the stranger repeated. "Dead, Top! And you, too--you hound!"
'Twas an anathema spoken in wrath and hatred.
"I'm thinkin'," says my uncle, "that ye're an unkind man."
The stranger growled.
"Save your temper, man," my uncle admonished. "Ye'll need the last rag
of it afore the night's by."
The man cried out against the threat.
"I'm tellin' ye," says my uncle--and I heard his broad hand come with
a meaning clap on the stranger's shoulder--"that ye'll be wakin' the
lad."
"The lad! the lad!" the stranger whined. "Is there nothing in the
world for you, Top, but that club-footed young whelp?"
I heard it! I heard the words! My door was ajar--my room at the head
of the stair--my ears wide and anxious. I heard the words! There
was no mistaking what this intruder said. "The club-footed young
whelp!" says he. "Is there nothing in the world for you, Top, but
that club-footed young whelp?" He said it--I remember that he said
it--and to this day, when I am grown beyond the years of childish
sensitiveness, I resent the jibe.
"Nothing," my uncle answered. "Nothing in the world, sir," he
repeated, lovingly, as I thought, "but only that poor club-footed
child!"
Sir? 'Twas a queer way to address, thinks I, this man of doubtful
quality. Sir? I could not make it out.
"You sentimental fool!"
"Nay, sir," my uncle rejoined, with spirit. "An they's a fool in the
company, 'tis yourself. I've that from the lad, sir, that you goes
lacking--ay, an' will go, t' the grave!"
"And what, Top," the stranger sneered, "may this thing be?"
"Ye'll laugh, sir," my uncle replied, "when I tells you 'tis his
love."
The man did laugh.
"For shame!" cried my uncle.
He was taking off his wraps--this stranger. They were so many that I
wondered. He was a man of quality, after all, it might be. "I tell
you, Top," said he, "that the boy may be damned for all I care. I said
damned. I _mean_ damned. There isn't another form of words, with which
I am acquainted, sufficient to express my lack of interest in this
child's welfare. Do you understand me, Top? And do you realize--you
obstinate noddy!--that my heart's in the word? You and I, Top, have
business together. It's a dirty business. It was in the beginning; it
is now--a dirty business for us both. I admit it. But can't we do it
reasonably? Can't we do it alone? Why introduce this ill-born whelp?
He's making trouble, Top; and he'll make more with every year he
lives. Let him shift for himself, man! I care nothing about him. What
was his father to me? What was his mother? Make him a cook on a
trader. Make him a hand on a Labradorman. Put him before the mast on a
foreign craft. What do I care? Let him go! Give him a hook and line. A
paddle-punt is patrimony enough for the like of him. Will you never
listen to reason? What's the lad to you? Damn him, say I! Let him--"
"For that," my uncle interrupted, in a passion, "I'll hurt ye! Come
soon, come late, I'll hurt ye! Hear me?" he continued, savagely. "I'll
hurt ye for them evil wishes!"
I had expected this outbreak. My uncle would not hear me damned in
this cruel way without protest.
"Top," says the stranger, with a little laugh of scorn, "when _you_
hurt _me_--I'll know that the chieftest knave of the St. John's
water-side has turned fool!"
"When I hurts ye, man," my uncle answered, "I'll hurt ye sore!"
Again the man laughed.
"Ah, man!" my uncle growled, "but ye'll squirm for that when the time
comes!"
"Come, come, Top!" says the stranger, in such a whine of terror, in
such disgusting weakness and sudden withdrawal of high boasting, in
such a failure of courage, that I could hardly credit the thing.
"Come, come, Top!" he whined. "You'll do nothing rash, will you? Not
_rash_, Top--not rash!"
"I'll make ye squirm, sir," says my uncle, "for damnin' Dannie."
"But you'll do nothing rash, man, will you?"
My uncle would not heed him.
"I'm a reasonable man, Top," the stranger protested. "You know I'm not
a hard man."
They moved, now, into the dining-room, whence no word of what they
said came to my ears. I listened, lying wide-eared in the dark, but
heard only a rumble of voices. "And you, too--you hound!" the man had
said; and 'twas spoken in the hate that forebodes murder. My uncle?
what had that childlike, tenderhearted old rascal accomplished against
this man to make the penalty of ungodly wrath a thing meet to the
offence? "And you, too--you hound!" I lay in grave trouble and
bewilderment, fearing that this strange guest might work his hate upon
my uncle, in some explosion of resentment, before my arm could aid
against the deed. There was no sound of laughter from below--no hint
of conviviality in the intercourse. Voices and the clink of bottle and
glass: nothing mellow in the voices, nothing genial in the clink of
glass--nothing friendly or hospitable. 'Twas an uneasy occupation that
engaged me; no good, as I knew, came from a surly bout with a bottle
of rum. 'Twas still blowing high; the windows rattled, the sea broke
in thunder and venomous hissing upon the rocks, the wind screamed its
complaint of obstruction; 'twas a tumultuous night, wherein, it seems
to me, the passions of men are not overawed by any display of inimical
power, but break restraint in evil company with the weather. The
voices below, as I hearkened, rose and fell, like the gusts of a gale,
falling to quiet confidences, lost in the roar of the night, swiftly
rising to threat and angry counter-threat.
It ended in a cry and a crash of glass....
* * * * *
I was by this brought out of bed and pattering down the stair to my
uncle's help. It seemed they did not hear me, or, having heard, were
enraged past caring who saw them in this evil case. At the door I
came to a stand. There was no encounter, no movement at all, within
the room; 'twas very quiet and very still. There had fallen upon the
world that pregnant silence, wherein men wait appalled, which follows
upon the irrevocable act of a quarrel. A bottle of rum was overturned
on the table, and a glass lay in splinters on the hearth at my
uncle's back, as though cast with poor aim. The place reeked with the
stench of rum, which rose from a river of liquor, overflowing the
table, dripping to the floor: a foul and sinister detail, I recall,
of the tableau. My uncle and the gray little man from St. John's,
leaning upon their hands, the table between, faced each other all too
close for peaceful issue of the broil. Beyond was my uncle's
hand-lamp, where I had set it, burning serenely in this tempest of
passion. The faces were silhouetted in profile against its quiet
yellow light. Monstrous shadows of the antagonists were cast upon
the table and ceiling. For the first time in my life I clapped eyes
on the man from St. John's; but his face was in shadow--I saw dimly.
'Twas clean-shaven and gray: I could tell no more. But yet, I knew,
the man was a man of some distinction--a gentleman. 'Twas a definite
impression I had. There was that about him--clothes and carriage and
shaven face and lean white hands--that fixed it in my memory.