James McMurtagh, with "the old man" and "the mother," lived in a
curious little house on Salem Street, at the North End. Probably they
liked it because it might have been a little house in some provincial
town at home. To its growing defects of neighborhood they were
oblivious. It was a square two-story brick box: on the right of the
entry, the parlor, never used before, but now set apart for Mercedes;
behind, a larger square room, which was dining-room and kitchen
combined, and where the McMurtaghs, father and son, were wont to sit
in their shirt-sleeves after supper and smoke their pipes; above were
four tiny bedrooms.
Within the parlor the little lady, as Jamie already called her, was
given undisputed sway; and a strange transmogrification there she
made. The pink shells were collected from the mantel, and piled, with
others she had got, to represent a grotto, in one corner of the room;
the worked samplers were thought ugly, and banished upstairs. In
another corner was a sort of bower, made of bright-colored pieces of
stuff the child had begged from the neighbors, and called by her the
"Witch's Cave;" here little Mercedes loved to sit and tell the
fortunes of her friends. These were mostly Jamie's horny-handed
friends; the women neighbors took no part in all these doings, and
gave it out loudly that the child was being spoiled. She went, with
other boys and girls, to a small dame-school on the other side of
Bowdoin Square; for Jamie would not hear of a public school. Here she
learned quickly to read, write, and do a little embroidering, and
gained much knowledge of human nature.
One thing that they would not allow the child was her outlandish name:
Mercy she was called,--Mercy McMurtagh. Perhaps we may venture still
to call her Mercedes. The child's hair and eyes were getting darker,
but it was easy to see she would be a _blonde d'Espagne_. Jamie
secretly believed she had a strain of noble blood, though openly he
would not have granted such a thing's existence. We, with our wider
racial knowledge, might have recognized points that came from Gothic
Spain,--the deep eyes of starlight blue, so near to black, and hair
that was a brown with dust of gold. But her feet and hands were all of
Andalusia. Jamie had hardly spoken to a woman in his life,--he used to
think of himself as deformed. And now this little girl was all his
own!
So for a year or two the child was happy. Then came that day, never
to be forgotten by her, of the visit to old Mr. Bowdoin at Nahant.
They went down in a steamboat together,--two little Bowdoin girls,
younger than Mercedes, a boy, Harley, and a cousin, who was Dorothea
Dowse. At first Mercedes did not think much of the Bowdoin children;
they wore plain dresses, alike in color, while our heroine had on
every ribbon that was hers. They went down under care of Jamie
McMurtagh, dismissed at the wharf by Mr. James Bowdoin, who had a
stick of candy for each. Business was doing even then; but old Mr.
Bowdoin was not too busy to spend a summer's day at home with the
children. His favorite son, James, had married to his mind; and money
came so easy in those times!
Miss Dowse was fifteen, and she called her uncle's clerk Jamie; so
she elevated her look when she came to our Mercedes. She wore gloves,
and satin slippers with ribbons crossed at the ankle, and silk
stockings. Mercedes had no silk stockings and no gloves. Miss Dowse
had rejected the proffered stick of candy, and Mercedes sought a chance
to give hers away, one end unsucked. There was this boy in the
party,--Harleston Bowdoin,--so she made a favor of it and gave it to
him.
They were playing on the rail of the steamboat, and Jamie was sitting
respectfully apart inside. The little Bowdoin girls were sucking at
their candy contentedly; Mercedes was climbing with the Bowdoin boy
upon the rail, and he called his cousin Dolly to join them.
"I can't; the sun would make my hands so brown if I took off my
gloves," said that young lady. "Besides, it's so common, playing with
the passengers."
There was a double sting in this; for Mercedes was not just "a
passenger," but of their party. She walked into the cabin with what
dignity she could maintain, and then burst out weeping angrily in
Jamie's arms. That is, he sought to comfort her; but she pressed him
aside rudely. "Oh, Jamie," she sobbed (she was suffered to call him
Jamie), "why didn't you give me gloves?"
Poor Jamie scratched his head. He had not thought of them; and that
was all. He tried to caress the child, with a clumsy tenderness, but
she stamped her little foot. Outside, they heard the voices of the
other children. Miss Dowse was talking to Master Bowdoin of sights in
the harbor; but--how early is a boy sensible to a child's
prettiness!--he was asking after Mercedes. It was now Miss Dolly's
turn to bite her lip. "She's in the cabin, crying because she has no
gloves."
Jamie felt Mercedes quiver; her sobs stopped, panting; in a moment she
put her hand to her hair and went to the deck unconcernedly.
But no one ever made Mercedes cry again.
Poor Jamie went to a window where he could hear them talking. He took
off his white straw hat, and rubbed his eyes with a red silk
handkerchief; the tears were almost in them, too. He had wild thoughts
of trying to buy gloves at Nahant. He listened to hear if his child
was merry again. She was laughing loudly, and pointing out the white
column of Boston Light. "That is the way to sea!" she cried. "I came
in that way from sea."
The other children had crept about her, interested. Even Miss Dowse
had come over, and was standing with them.
"Did your father take you to sea?"
"I was at sea in my father's ship," said Mercedes proudly.
"Ah, I didn't know Jamie McMurtagh owned a ship," said Miss Dolly.
Jamie leaned closer to the window.
"Jamie McMurtagh is not my father," said Mercedes. She said it almost
scornfully, and McMurtagh slunk back into the cabin.
Perhaps it was the first time he had ever cried himself.... He felt so
sorry that he had not thought of gloves!