"A very good man," she repeated, eying me sharply for any sign of
incredulity.
'Twas her fancy: I might indulge it.
"I 'low, Dannie," says she, "that he was a wonderful handsome man,
though I never seed un. God's sake!" cries she, defiantly, "he'd be
hard t' beat for looks in this here harbor." She was positive; there
was no uncertainty--'twas as though she had known him as fathers are
known. And 'twas by no wish of mine, now, that our hands came close
together, that her eyes were bent without reserve upon my own, that
she snuggled up to my great, boyish body: 'twas wholly a wish of the
maid. "'Twas blue eyes he had," says she, "an' yellow hair an' big
shoulders. He was a parson, Dannie," she proceeded. "I 'low he must
have been. He--he--_was_!" she declared; "he was a great, big parson
with blue eyes." I would not be a parson, thinks I, whatever the maid
might wish. "An' he 'lowed," she continued, pursuing her wilful fancy,
"that he'd come back, some day, an' love my mother as she knowed he
could." We watched Moses Shoos come across the harbor ice and break
open the door of the postmaster's cottage. "But he was wrecked an'
drowned," says Judith, "an' 'twas an end of my mother's hope. 'Twas
on'y that," says she, "that she would tell Skipper Nicholas on the
night she died. 'Twas just the wish that he would bring me up, as
he've fetched up you, Dannie," she added: "jus' that--an' the name o'
my father. I'm not sorry," says she, with her head on my shoulder,
"that she never told the name."
Elizabeth carried her secret into the greater mystery to which she
passed; 'twas never known to us, nor to any one....
* * * * *
"Moses," says I, in delight, when the news got abroad, "I hears you
got the contract for the mail?"
"I is," says he.
"An' how in the name o' Heaven," I demanded, "did you manage so great
a thing?"
There had been competition, I knew: there had been consideration and
consultation--there had been the philosophy of the aged concerning the
carrying of mail in past years, the saucy anarchy of the young with
regard to the gruelling service, the chatter of wishful women upon the
spending value of the return, the speculatively saccharine brooding of
children--there had been much sage prophecy and infinitely knowing
advice--there had been misleading and secrecy and sly devising--there
had been envy, bickering, disruption of friendship--there had been a
lavish waste and disregard of character--there had been all this, as I
knew, and more pitiable still, in competition for the weekly four
dollars of government money. 'Twas a most marvellous achievement,
thinks I, that the fool of Twist Tickle had from this still weather of
reason and tempest of feeling emerged with the laurel of wisdom (as
my tutor said) to crown him. 'Twas fair hard to credit! I must know
the device--the clever political trick--by which the wags and
wiseacres of Twist Tickle had been discomfited. 'Twas with this hungry
curiosity that I demanded of the fool of Twist Tickle how he had
managed so great a thing.
"Eh, Moses," says I; "how _was_ it?"
"Dannie," he gravely explained, "'tis very simple. My bid," says he,
impressively, "was the lowest."
"An' how much was that, Moses?"
"Mother," he observed, "didn't hold a wonderful lot with half
measures."
'Twas no answer to my question.
"She always 'lowed," says he, with a mystifyingly elaborate wave and
accent, "that _doin'_ was better than _gettin'_."