A SUDDEN RESOLVE
When Rube came down the next morning and composedly met his father’s
and mother’s anxious looks, he had the listless air of a man whose
spirit had been broken. There was a droop in his shoulders, a dulness
in his eyes that contrasted painfully with the bright alertness of his
glance and carriage of the day before. But he said nothing of his blow,
and his parents wisely forbore to say anything either, trusting that
his young and healthy body would come to the assistance of his mind,
and that the wound would soon skin over. Unfortunately for their hopes,
his love had been the pivot of his life. While a good farmer, a good
son, and a good business man, he had no hobbies, he read little, and,
being much alone, he had allowed his passion for Priscilla to become so
interwoven with his every thought and action that the knowledge of her
loss had been like a rending of soul from body. So he went about his
duties like a somnambulist, seeking no comfort, making no confidences,
and apparently as insensible to externals as a hypnotised man would be.
In this dull round of daily tasks several weeks passed away, until it
happened that he found himself at the village grocery on some trivial
errand. There was the usual knot of loungers ready to talk, and
absurdly grateful for the coming of any stranger with something fresh
to say. As he passed through them with a brief nod of recognition
to one and another, and entered the store, he saw standing erect in
their midst a tall wiry-looking man, whose face was unfamiliar to him.
Pausing for an instant, with the first symptom of interest he had
manifested for many days, he heard the stranger say:
‘Yas, ’n’ if enny ov yew fellers hed th’ grit ov a chipmunk, yew
wouldn’t take twicet t’ think over yer anser. Wut man’d go on grindin’
mud all his life in a dead-’n’-alive God-fergotten corner like this
when he’s got ’n opportoonity of seein’ the world--all th’ world, mind
ye, east, west, north, and south--an’ makin’ a small forchin ’s well?
I dunno wuts come over the yewth ov Amurica to-day. Sims t’ me they’ve
lost their old vim ’n’ push altogether. Well, s’ long, boys; if I
kain’t persuade ye I kain’t, ’n’ there’s an eend on ’t, ’n’ I mus’ be
gittin’ ’long. But ef enny ov ye wants time t’ make up yer minds, I
sh’l be back this way ag’in ter-morrer ev’nin’, ’n’ that’ll be the las’
chance you’ll git, enny ov ye.’
Although he had not heard any of the stranger’s preliminary discourse,
and shrank from making inquiries, Rube’s interest was aroused to the
highest pitch. He returned to his home with the few words he had
heard seething and bubbling in his mind. For he felt that at last
here was a way of escape from the almost insupportable deadness of
his life. He could not realise that ‘the mind is its own place,’ and
so, like a caged animal, seeing a door of hope open to him, he felt
an unconquerable longing to flee. He said not a word throughout the
evening meal, but that was so much his habit now that it passed
unnoticed. Mechanically he bowed his head at ‘worship,’ but his
father’s reading of a chapter from the Bible might have been in the
original Hebrew for all he understood of it. After gaining the solitude
of his room, he sat on the bed, his head on his hands, trying hard to
reduce the whirlpool of his thoughts to some definite shape until far
into the night, but in vain. Only one idea seemed to stand out sharply
and distinctly against the misty tumult: he must _go_. At last, wearied
with mental conflict, he fell backward, dressed as he was, and went to
sleep.
He rose unrefreshed, with a racking headache for the first time in
his life, and went about his usual round of duties automatically. But
his face bore such evident traces of his last night’s conflict that
they could not escape his mother’s keen eye. She anxiously inquired
after his health, but was met with the careless reply that he was ‘all
right.’ She knew better, of course, but it had never been her way to
force confidence, and so she manifested no more curiosity. She only
looked wistfully at her boy when unobserved by him, and hovered about
him as if more than ordinarily solicitous for his comfort. All day long
he moved and looked like a man in a dream, every thought, every feeling
merged in one idea--escape. Strange, that it never occurred to him how
impossible it is for a man to flee from himself.
Without waiting for supper, and as if dreading to be questioned, no
sooner was the day’s work done than he strode off to the village
grocery, assuming, as he approached it, a most elaborate air of
unconcern, and lounging into the midst of the little knot of listless
men hanging about the door as if nothing mattered--an attitude common
to all of them. He had not long to wait. In about ten minutes after his
arrival a brisk footfall was heard, and turning the corner sharply the
lean, keen-looking stranger of the previous evening strode into the
midst of the group.
‘Evenin’, boys,’ he jerked out, diving into the pockets of his pants
at the same time and producing a formidable plug of hard tobacco and
a knife. Having provided himself with a fresh cud and passed on the
materials to his next neighbour, he proceeded:
‘Wall, boys, hev ye made up yer minds yet? This, as the paestor sez, is
the last time ov askin’. Ye’ve got ter speak up now, ’relse stay right
whar y’ are f’rever ’n’ ever. ’N’ that, _I_ sh’d say, ’d be ’nough t’
decide fr’anny young _man_. Veg’tables don’ count anyhaow.’
This short harangue ended, he looked slily at his hearers to see
whether he had made any impression upon them, but with the exception
of a vacant half laugh or two, accompanied by an uneasy shuffle on the
part of the utterers thereof, they might as well all have been deaf
for any notice they took of him. But suddenly, to his astonishment
(although he was careful not to show it), Rube, who was a stranger to
him, stepped forward and said:
‘Wall, stranger, I guess I’ll hitch hosses with ye. When d’ ye start,
an’ what’s th’ ’rangements?’
‘Right, my boy, I’m real proud of ye. I’m startin’ this evenin’ as
ever is; ’n’ as t’ ’rangements, ye’ve only got ter sign thishyer paper
agreein’ t’ join any ship I s’lect f’r ye, ’n’ take a little keepsake
from me in the shape of two-an’-a-haef dollars. Then ye’ll pack up
yer traps, ’n’ I’ll see ye booked through to Noo Bedford. Yew’ll start
first thing in the mornin’.’
Hardly looking at the form of agreement, Rube signed, the stranger
being provided with pen and ink, and dropping the money loosely into
his pocket, he strode off homewards, leaving the loungers all agape at
the idea of Rube Eddy, who was well known to be one of the steadiest
and most comfortably established young men in the county, going off at
a minute’s notice to foreign lands. Long and earnest was the discussion
that followed, all sorts of possible and impossible reasons for the
step Rube had taken being brought forward. The stranger lolled at his
ease, listening in the hope that Rube’s example might prove contagious,
but, to his disappointment, it seemed to have quite a contrary effect.
The talkers were like men who had just witnessed one of their number
take a plunge into the fathomless abyss, from the brink of which they
all drew back with horror. This state of mind soon became evident
to the stranger, who, jerking himself to his feet, shook himself,
stretched, yawned, and finally said:
‘Wall, boys, kain’t linger with ye always. I’m beginnin’ t’ feel like
Rip Van Winkle meself in thishyer slumbersom place. I reckon I shall
hev to hurry back to civilisation agen before I go to sleep too. How on
airth yew fellers keep ’wake long ’nough t’ eat ’n drink I d’no.’
With this parting shot he turned on his heel and disappeared into the
gathering darkness, and they saw him no more.
Meanwhile Rube, his mind a blank, reached home and, hastily ascending
to his room, busied himself gathering together his clothing. Good
serviceable homespun, most of it, such as would be fit for any work,
however rough, that might fall to his lot. Having made it into a
compact bundle, with a celerity that raised a dim wonder even in
himself, he drew himself up, as if bracing all his fortitude to meet
father and mother. Memories of the quiet, pleasant years began to
crowd in upon him, but with a gesture as if to crush them back, he
deliberately walked down the narrow stairway, whose every step seemed
to utter a reproachful creak. Entering the kitchen, he crossed over
to the fireside, where his parents sat facing each other and calmly
talking over some trivial happening of the day. Standing before them,
he waited a moment, while they both looked up at him, and in that one
swift glance his mother knew that a crisis had arrived. In a husky
voice, that sounded as if it belonged to someone else, he said:
‘Mother, Dad, I’m goin’ away termorrer mornin’. Fergive me fer leavin’
ye like this, but I jest had ter go. I’m no good here any more. I’m
goin’ t’ sea, ’n’ when I come back mebbe I’ll be a stronger man. Naow
I’m a wuthless, dreamy shote, ’n’ I feel ’s if thishyer quiet easy life
’d certainly drive me mad befo’ very long.’
‘_Must_ you go to-morrow, my son?’ murmured his mother hopelessly, for
she knew the breed, knew that once set upon a thing the Eddys were
immovable, and yet she felt obliged to make an effort.
‘Yes, mother. ’Greement’s signed, th’ airnest money’s in my pocket, an’
my duds are all packed. I’m goin’, sure.’
‘Rube,’ said his father, ‘we’ve been mighty cluss friends all our
lives, an’ we ain’t goin’ ter fall eout naouw, I’m dead shore o’ that.
But ye mout ha’ told me wut ye wuz meditatin’. ’T wan’t far t’ me, boy,
naow wuz it?’
For all answer Rube reached for his father’s hand and held it tight,
while the working of his face showed how hard the simple words had hit
him.
The father broke the silence again by saying, ‘Let us pray.’ With a
sudden return to his childhood Rube knelt at his mother’s knee, while
the old man, as had been his nightly wont ever since he first brought
home his young bride, but with an added solemnity born of the shadow of
his first bereavement, spoke to his Friend:
‘Father, eour hearts air troubled. Yew’ve brung us along a pleasant
road right inter the green valley of comfortable old age. We’ve hed a
happy time together, ’n’ this our son hez alwus ben a delight to us. We
looked that he sh’d still be so, that he sh’d close eour eyes when we
laid us down at last t’ sleep. P’raps we hev been selfish, ’n’ need a
lesson to teach us wut it means to spare an only son. He’s goin’ away
from us f’r a long time--where, he doesn’t know himself; but however
fur he goes, don’t let him get away from you. We don’t ask you t’ spare
him t’ us ef it’s necessary we sh’d never see him alive any more; but
ef it _might_ be, Father, you know how ’tis yourself, ’n’ therefore you
know what it’ll mean t’ us t’ have him back again. Make him through
all he’ll have t’ bear such a man as yew’d love to have him, ’n supply
his place at home, if it ken be supplied, by a truer sense of yew’re
presence with us. Bless my son, O Father, and bless us, f’r _yewr_
Son’s sake. Amen.’
Little more was said, although they sat hand in hand far into the
night. Rube wanted nothing that his father could give him, having
sufficient money for all his prospective needs; but he accepted his
mother’s Bible gratefully, feeling that it would be a palpable link
with her. At last they went to bed, where Rube, not from callousness,
but from sheer overstrain of mind, slept soundly. His mother lay all
through the hours silently praying, while the unhindered tears trickled
slowly and continuously down. And his father watched with her.