AT THE OLD HOMESTEAD
Saturday night in the Eddy homestead. In their respective chairs,
occupied by them with hardly a break through thirty-eight years of
ideally happy married life, sat Farmer Eddy and his wife. The labours
of the week were ended, the hired people gone to rest, and husband
and wife sat face to face as they had done for so many years, but
never until the last six months with such weary hearts. Mrs. Eddy had
aged very much. Not that any care for her boy’s spiritual welfare
worried her--she felt as certain of him in that respect as if he had
been always under her eye. But since his departure from New Bedford
in the _Xiphias_ it was as if he had passed into the eternal silence,
and although she said little her heart-hunger was terrible. His
last letter was but half-a-dozen lines, hastily scrawled and posted
without signature, telling his parents that he was outward bound on a
South Sea whaling voyage, and in the hurry of the moment omitting to
mention even the name of his ship. Naturally, therefore, as the days
went by lengthening into weeks, the weeks into months, the disease of
uncertainty made her its prey, and she aged fast, perhaps as much from
the heroic effort she made to conceal her anxiety from her husband as
from its direct effect.
Alas, what Mrs. Eddy endured has too often been the lot of American
mothers. For in those days recruiting agents for the New England
whalers prowled about the country beguiling simple young men with
specious tales of the glories of a roving life and the wealth they
would by-and-by bring home. And as the recruits never knew where they
were going except that it was out upon the wide ocean, nor when they
might possibly return, except that it must not _legally_ be longer than
four years, the news they were able to send their people at the time
of shipment, even supposing they felt in good heart enough to do so,
was of necessity extremely meagre. Nor were opportunities for sending
letters frequent afterwards. An occasional whaler was spoken which
might or might not be homeward bound in the course of a year or so. It
was hardly worth while entrusting letters to such a casual packet as
that. And the land touched was almost always carefully selected for its
aloofness from civilisation, as well as its offering few inducements to
a would-be deserter who was anxious to return home.
Farmer Eddy went about much the same as usual but noticeably graver,
and, if possible, more gentle than ever. He never spoke to his
neighbours about his son, and scarcely ever to his wife, but this
latter omission mattered little, since at the evening prayer he had
ever since Rube’s departure devoted at least half of that pleasant
season to pleading with his Father for his son. Together as the old
couple knelt they saw with the eye of faith Rube upheld in right-doing,
cleansed by affliction, drawn nearer to God, and never unmindful of
them. Their simple assurance that all was well with him never wavered,
nor, although they so seldom mentioned his name at any other than
these sacred times, did either of them lose his image from their
mental vision for one waking hour. Here, however, Farmer Eddy had one
advantage over his wife--the usual one, she was the mother. And as such
she could no more help yearning over her absent son than she could help
breathing. Her faith was as robust as her husband’s without doubt, but,
oh, she wanted her boy back so badly.
In a worldly sense all had prospered with them, and looked as if that
prosperity would continue. And they had been almost compelled to extend
their possessions by the acquisition of the Fish farm. For after
Priscilla’s departure with her husband, Mrs. Fish, feeling utterly
alone except for the hired girls who came and went, visibly drooped day
by day. Mrs. Eddy came as often as she could to visit her old friend,
but that was not often, and moreover her visits were of necessity very
short. Not only was Mrs. Fish lonely, but her heart was a prey to all
sorts of apprehensions. Jake, her eldest son, was steadily going from
bad to worse, leaving the oversight of the farm more and more to his
younger brother Will, who, instead of rising to the occasion, chafed
and fretted at his position of, as he put it, farm-bailiff without
salary, except what Jake was minded to fling him occasionally with an
air of lofty contempt. Unknown to either his mother or brother, but not
unsuspected, Jake was also mortgaging the farm up to the very roof-tree
of the house, and, with an infatuation almost amounting to lunacy,
was spending the money in riotous trips to New York and Boston. He
apparently did not permit himself to think at all of the certain ruin
he was courting, nor spend one thought upon the unmerited suffering he
was bringing upon his mother and brother.
The climax was reached at last by his returning from one of his New
York trips accompanied by an exceedingly handsome but vulgar young
woman, whom he swaggeringly announced as his intended bride. His
brother and mother were sitting at their evening meal when this
happened, and when he made the announcement his mother, with one swift
and comprehensive glance at her son’s female companion, rose from her
seat, saying, ‘Will, he’p me up stairs.’ Jake, his face flaring with
rage, interposed between the departing pair and the door, demanding
almost in a shout and with many oaths what they meant by insulting him
and his intended wife. Releasing his mother’s arm, Will took a step
towards his brother, saying quietly and distinctly: ‘Yew misbul shote,
ain’t it ’nough fur yew t’ break mother’s heart with yer goin’s on but
yew must insult her ole age by bringin’ _thet_ home an’ flauntin’ it in
her face. Naow, ’r ye goin’ t’ git aout o’ eour way or ain’t ye----?’
There were no more words. Jake, maddened, flew at his brother’s throat,
and the pair, both strong young men, but the elder much debilitated
by his recent excesses, writhed and wrestled and tumbled about the
living-room like a pair of tigers. The woman Jake had brought with
him, retreating to a safe corner, eyed the wretched struggle with a
serene aloofness befitting a Roman amphitheatre, but the mother sat
wringing her hands and feebly calling upon her sons for God’s sake to
cease their unnatural strife. Suddenly, over the wreck of the table,
the pair collapsed, Will uppermost. Hoarsely he shouted, as with one
knee on his brother’s breast, one hand clutching Jake’s throat, he
raised himself a little: ‘Y’ onnatural beast, will y’ git eout o’ this,
’r sh’ll I kill ye t’ onct? Y’ ain’t fit t’ live, I know, but b’ th’
’Tarnal y’ ain’t fit t’ die. Will y’ git ’r shall I mash y’r face into
a jelly?’ ‘Yes, I’ll go,’ gasped the almost choking man, and Will,
carefully releasing him, watched him out of the house, and into the
buggy, which had been waiting ever since he arrived. No sooner had the
pair taken their seats, and the horse, under a merciless cut of Jake’s
whip, had bounded off, than Will returned to his mother, finding her
in a dead faint; indeed, looking as if coming to again was a quite
unlikely contingency. Desperately alarmed, Will called for the hired
girl, who had been busy outside, and leaving his mother to her care,
hitched up his cart and drove furiously over to the Eddy place. It did
not take many minutes for him to persuade Mrs. Eddy to return with
him to the aid of his suffering mother. But when they arrived she was
past all earthly comfort. Her mind wandered from the good man of her
youthful days to Priscilla and Jake; the only one she did not mention
in her rambling remarks was Will. But he, good fellow, made no sign of
how this omission smote upon his heart. Nevertheless, could anyone have
read his thoughts, it would have been seen how deeply he was wounded,
and how sincere was his unspoken resolve that, should his mother die,
the home of his youth, grown hateful to him, should know him no more.
At 4 A.M. Mrs. Fish passed away, still unconscious of those around,
still talking more or less intelligibly of her husband and elder son
and daughter. And Mrs. Eddy, tired out, having first persuaded Will to
retire, went to her own well-earned rest against the labours of the
coming day. The following week tried her and her husband to the utmost,
for Will, besides being almost penniless (his brother having had every
cent he could lay hands on), manifested much eagerness to be gone and
leave everything just as it was. Farmer Eddy was at his wits’ end what
to do, and it was no small relief to him when a Boston lawyer came
down empowered to sell the place and all that was on it to the highest
bidder for the benefit of the mortgagees. Then it was that Mr. Eddy
decided to buy, being, as he said, desirous that the heart-broken young
man, now so eager to be gone, should, if he were ever able, be allowed
to redeem the home of his childhood from the careful hand of a friend
instead of seeing it pass into the unsympathetic grip of a stranger.
Will professed entire indifference, but no doubt the unostentatious
kindness of his father’s old friend did him much good--especially
when in the kindest manner possible Farmer Eddy pressed upon him
a sufficient store of dollars to allow him time to look around in
Chicago, whither he was bent upon going.
Farmer Eddy saw him off, gave him his blessing, but very little
advice (wise man!--full well he knew how advice at such a time would
be received), but earnest encouragement to keep up communication
between himself and his old home; ‘for--who knows?’ said the good old
fellow--‘your sister may want a home some day.’ To his utter amazement
Will turned upon him almost fiercely, saying: ‘That wouldn’t be a
bad thing for her. It might throw for her the true light upon how she
treated mother. Don’t talk t’ me of Pris. I don’t care a cent what
becomes of her----’ But the farmer, with uplifted hand, stayed him,
saying: ‘Don’t, Will. Yew’re het up naow, an’ say wut ye don’t at all
mean. Thar, we won’t persoo th’ subjec’. Let me know as often as ye
can haow yew’re gittin’ along, an’ I’ll be glad. Good-bye, my boy,
good-bye.’ And the last of the Fish family departed.
Thenceforward the Fish place received even more attention than did his
own homestead from old man Eddy. He looked upon it in the light of a
sacred trust, a view in which he was keenly supported by his wife. For
he did cherish an earnest hope that some day his old friends’ children
might be reunited, purged by suffering, and, returning to their old
home, find with grateful hearts how good to them had been the God of
whom they had thought so little. And to this end he and his wife added
to their nightly intercourse with their Friend the petition that these
wayward ones might yet be gathered in and find peace at home.
Of Priscilla, of course, they had never heard a word since her
departure, but without a shade of resentment they remembered her and
wondered how she was faring. Their ideas, naturally, could be only of
the vaguest, since they knew no more than they did of Reuben where
she was or whither she was going. But from what they had heard from
Will, applying sensibly considerable allowance for pique, they feared
that she had before now found how great a mistake she had made, and
had repented too late to avoid the suffering it had entailed. But
none of these reflections had the effect of making them despair of a
righting of matters at the long last, and so they cheerfully took up
the additional burden of their self-imposed duties, finding that, so
far from their being irksome to perform, they brought with them many
consolations. If only they could have heard from Rube! But apparently
that could not be, and so they waited, in patient well-doing, for the
breaking of the day.
When Jake, driven forth ignominiously from the home he had so wronged,
by the brother he had despised, returned to New York, he was utterly
reckless. Without troubling to look into his affairs, he and his
companion were driven from the depot to a high-class hotel, where
they immediately resumed the course of high living and deplorable
extravagance which seemed to have become necessary to Jake’s life.
Now, the squandering of money is a thing that requires very little
teaching, and can be carried on successfully in most so-called centres
of civilisation, but I doubt very much whether any great city can
afford the spendthrift more facilities for speedily reaching the end of
his resources than New York. For its plethora of supereminently wealthy
men have perhaps unconsciously raised such a standard of expenditure
as does not obtain anywhere else in the world, and, of course, this is
ever before those fools who have neither sufficient money nor brains
as a shining example to go and do likewise as closely as circumstances
will permit them. Without blaming the multi-millionaires too much,
there can be no doubt that the example most of them set in the
direction of foolish waste of money is wholly evil.
So it came about that a fortnight after Jake Fish’s return to New
York he had exhausted every possible means of raising funds, and was
confronted with the prospect of being utterly unable to meet his
bill due on Saturday at the Hoffman House. Sobered a little by this,
he consulted his companion on the matter, and suggested her parting
with some of the costly jewellery he had given her. Vain fool! She
sympathised with him tearfully, avowed her willingness to share a
crust with him rather than live in luxury with any other man, said
the shock had so unnerved her that she must go and lie down awhile to
recover herself, after which she would come with him and dispose of
all the glittering ‘trash’--yes, she called it that--when they would
go away to some quiet spot and be very happy. Overjoyed, Jake lavished
multitudinous caresses upon her, sent her up stairs, and retired to
the smoke-room to work out some plan for making these new funds go as
far as possible without too much appearance of retrenchment. Then in
his easy chair, surrounded by every luxury of appointment a man could
desire, he fell asleep.
He was awakened by a waiter, who handed him a scented note. At
first he stared at the man stupidly, only half awake, and utterly
uncomprehending. Then as sense returned he tore open the envelope and
read:
‘Dear Jake,--You’ve had a pretty high old time, and so have I. But you
might have the savvy to let it go at that. You must be a bigger fool
than even I took you for if you imagine that I am going to slide down
to the bottom along with you, and begin by coughing up all the stuff
you’ve paid me with. No, no; you’ve been playing long enough: now run
along like a wise little man and _earn_ something. I’m off on a much
better campaign. Good luck.--Not yours,
‘A. C.
‘P.S.--If you feel inclined to kick, watch out how you do it. It isn’t
very healthy exercise for you.’
Jake read this letter thrice without understanding a word of it. Its
general import he knew, and it had paralysed him. He sat staring
stupidly at the paper until the waiter, nudging him, politely called
his attention to the fact that his bill was before him. That roused
him as does the far-heard crack of the fowling-piece arouse the timid
hare. Summoning all his energies, he dismissed the waiter with a curt
‘All right, I’ll ’tend t’ this d’reckly,’ and rising, lounged toward
the lift, his head throbbing furiously. Poor wretch, he was really
more fool than rogue--thoroughly selfish, yet beaten by one more
selfish than himself, upon whom he had lavished all he had; heartless
towards his own, yet punished for his benevolence to a stranger who
had befooled him; he was really a fair type of a large class of men
everywhere who are only virtuous because they lack opportunity or
initiative to be otherwise. Reaching his sumptuous room, he found
his clothes bestrewing the floor, showing how thorough had been the
search made by the departed one for portable plunder. He felt his head
beginning to swim, and realising that he _must_ escape or make the
acquaintance of a Tombs gaoler, he pulled himself together, slammed his
door, and, descending by another lift, passed from the hotel and was
soon lost in the crowd.
Now, there is one tremendous difference between the cities of North
America and those of Great Britain in respect of their harbourage of
such men as Jake Fish was now in a fair way to become. London, for
instance, seems to offer a premium to the most worthless. A loafing,
shiftless vagabond need exercise no ingenuity, no originality of
resource, in order to be better looked after in every way than,
let us say, a seaman in a merchant ship. London workhouses swarm
with humans of this type, well fed, well clothed, well housed, and,
oh, _so_ tenderly entreated as to work. Any little ailment that a
working man would never notice is considered sufficient warrant for
lapping these spoilt children of fortune in cotton wool and tenderly
nursing them back to convalescence again in palace chambers fitted
with all the appliances for the healing of disease that the mind of
benevolence and medical skill can devise. And for all this the sorely
burdened ratepayer must needs provide, although he, in common with
most of England’s working poor, thinks of the workhouse as the home
of disgrace, and would in most instances rather die of starvation in
silence than go there.
But in North America, while there is great store of loafers, not
confined either to the lowest class, they must have some original
talent, some inventive enterprise about them, whether in criminal way
or merely low trickery. Otherwise they become hoboes, or as we should
call them in England ‘tramps,’ whose chief qualifications must be an
unconquerable aversion to work, great powers of passive endurance, a
love of filth--in fact, a reversion to the worst type of savage without
one savage virtue. There is little room, however, for the hobo in
a city. The exercise of his chosen calling needs great open spaces
sparsely peopled, where there are hardly any police. Moreover, the
hoboes, according to Mr. Josiah Flynt, are a close corporation looking
with much disfavour upon would-be recruits, so that admission to their
ranks is not easily gained.
Jake Fish then, had he realised it, was in evil case. He was a
veritable prodigal, unrepentant, and with no father’s house to return
to in case of repentance. Only fit for farming, and hating that
furiously, he had no idea of doing anything else for his bread, and,
as we have seen, his tastes were costly. Consequently, now that he had
spent all, he felt that he had a bitter grievance against society for
not graciously providing him with the means to continue his career of
viciousness. But he was, besides, an arrant coward, an essentially
worthless man, such as may be, by a miracle, made into a useful member
of society, but, alas, very seldom is. He drifted down, down, down. The
few dollars in his pockets when he left the hotel were squandered with
the same utter absence of forethought as had always characterised him,
and then, when, driven by hunger, he would have obtained some labouring
work, he found himself fiercely shoved aside by far better men.
He disappeared. Not that there is not work and food for all in the
Great Republic, but the conditions of life are strenuous, and if a man
will not work, and work hard, he must scheme, and that cleverly, or he
will certainly disappear as Jake did, and no one will take any trouble
to inquire whither.
Will, on the other hand--bright, eager, and industrious--arrived in
Chicago with resolute determination to take his fate by the throat,
also to husband his small resources with the utmost care while seeking
among the busy throngs for something that he could do. And he was
determined not to stand choosing, but to do as he had read that so
many others had done--take the first employment offered, no matter how
deficient in qualification he might feel himself to be for it, and,
having once got work, to strive manfully to keep it, and rise from
one point to another by ceaseless attention and industry, and, above
all, to avoid the saloon (public-house) as he would a plague-spot.
Fortunately for him, he had never acquired the taste for dissipation
which had destroyed his brother, for opportunity had been lacking. It
was not a question of moral principle at all. And now, although he did
not know it, would not have believed it had he been told, he was in a
position of the utmost danger. Without any home ties, with no religious
convictions, nothing to safeguard him from ruin, he might easily have
sunk; but he had no physical inclination for the destroying vices,
having never been tempted.
At this juncture he was standing one day watching a busy little knot of
porters loading up packages of hardware from a warehouse into a couple
of heavy waggons. The swiftness and apparent eagerness with which
they did their work, without any appearance of being driven, appealed
to him, and unconsciously his face took on a wistful expression--he
would so much have liked to be one of that busy band. A keen-eyed,
pleasant-faced man of middle age, who stood in the doorway with a book
in his hand making certain entries, caught sight of the waiting,
earnest-looking man. And being of an imaginative, romantic turn of mind
(which, scoff at the idea as you may, is almost essential to the making
of a successful business man), he began in a side alley of his brain to
build up a theory concerning this evidently country-bred young fellow
who was watching manual labour being carried on with such manifest
desire to take part in it. Moreover, the owner of the warehouse, for
it was he, was a kindly Christian, whose interest in all men, but
specially his own employés, was proverbial in Chicago--that humming
hive of business that contains so much that is evil, but, thank God,
has also so much that is pre-eminently good.
Will began to move away slowly, but Mr. Schermer made half-a-dozen
swift strides after him, and tapping him smartly upon the shoulder,
said, ‘Say, young man, are you looking for work?’ ‘I am, sir,’ Will
replied smartly. ‘Then come right in here, and I’ll start you at
once. I’m wanting a young fellow of your build pretty bad.’ And in
ten minutes Will felt that he was on the high road to fortune. Plenty
of work, not difficult to learn, good thews and muscle to do it, and
a hearty, appreciative man at the head of things; he was delighted.
More by a turn of Fortune’s wheel than any design discoverable by man,
Will had fallen into just the place he needed, where not only did he
receive fair play, but where the employer kept ever before himself the
fact that each of his men was an individual soul for whom Christ died,
and not just the cog of a machine; where the employer shouldered his
responsibility for his men as he did the bills he endorsed, and with
just the same absence of consciousness that he was doing anything more
than his obvious duty. No one praised him for meeting his bills as they
fell due; why should they praise him for considering the men who were
serving him faithfully, and all the more faithfully because they knew
full well that their employer had their interests at heart as well as
his own--nay, that he regarded their interests and his as inseparable?
I must leave Will here, under the most favourable conditions, to push
his manful way up the ladder of prosperity, and to preserve, if he can,
a measure of humility with it all, in that it was his lot to fall into
good hands without any seeking of his own. Also I have a half-guilty
feeling that this has been a prosy old chapter, quite at variance with
the strain of high adventure which I have endeavoured to maintain
throughout the rest of the book. And now we must return to Priscilla.