THE COMING OF JOB
The next morning Seth was gloomy and uncommunicative. At the breakfast
table, when Brown glanced up from his plate, he several times caught
the lightkeeper looking intently at him with the distrustful,
half-suspicious gaze of the night before. Though quite aware of this
scrutiny, he made no comment upon it until the meal was nearly over;
then he observed suddenly:
“It's all right; you needn't.”
“Needn't what?” demanded Atkins, in astonishment.
“Look at me as if you expected me to explode at any minute. I sha'n't.
I'm not loaded.”
Seth colored, under his coat of sunburn, and seemed embarrassed.
“I don't know what you're talkin' about,” he stammered. “Have the
moskeeters affected YOUR brains?”
“No. My brains, such as they are, are all right, and I want to keep them
so. That's why I request you not to look at me in that way.”
“How was I lookin' at you? I don't know what you mean.”
“Yes, you do. You are wondering how much I know. I don't know anything
and I'm not curious. That's the truth. Now why not let it go at that?”
“See here, young feller, I--”
“No; you see here. I'm not an Old Sleuth; I haven't any ambitions that
way. I don't know anything about you--what you've been, what you've
done--”
“Done!” Seth leaned across the table so suddenly that he upset his
chair. “Done?” he cried; “what do you mean by that? Who said I'd done
anything? It's a lie.”
“What is a lie?”
“Why--why--er--whatever they said!”
“Who said?”
“Why, the ones that--that said what you said they said.”
“I didn't say anyone had said anything.”
“Then what do you mean by--by hintin'? Hey? What do you mean by it?”
He brandished a clenched fist over the breakfast dishes. Brown leaned
back in his chair and closed his eyes.
“Call me when the patient recovers his senses,” he drawled wearily.
“This delirium is painful to a sensitive nature.”
Atkins's fist wavered in mid-air, opened, and was drawn across its
owner's forehead.
“Well, by jiminy!” exclaimed the lightkeeper with emphasis, “this
is--is-- . . . I guess I BE crazy. If I ain't, you are. Would you mind
tellin' me what in time you mean by THAT?”
“It is not the mosquitoes,” continued his companion, in apparent
soliloquy; “there are no mosquitoes at present. It must be the other
thing, of course. But so early in the morning, and so violent. Alcohol
is--”
“SHUT UP!” It was not a request, but an order. Brown opened his eyes.
“You were addressing me?” he asked, blandly. “Yes?”
“Addressin' you! For thunder sakes, who else would I be ad-- . . .
There! there! Now I cal'late you're hintin' that I'm drunk. I ain't.”
“Indeed?”
“Yes, indeed. And I ain't out of my head--not yet; though keepin'
company with a Bedlamite may have some effect, I shouldn't wonder. Mr.
John Brown--if that's your name, which I doubt--you listen to me.”
“Very well, Mr. Seth Atkins--if that is your name, which I neither doubt
nor believe, not being particularly interested--I'm listening. Proceed.”
“You told me last night that you wanted the job of assistant keeper here
at these lights. Course you didn't mean it.”
“I did.”
“You DID! . . . Well, YOU must be drunk or loony.”
“I'm neither. And I meant it. I want the job.”
Seth looked at him, and he looked at Seth. At length the lightkeeper
spoke again.
“Well,” he said, slowly, “I don't understand it at all, but never mind.
Whatever happens, we've got to understand each other. Mind I don't say
the job's yours, even if we do; but we can't even think of it unless we
understand each other plain. To begin with, I want to tell you that I
ain't done nothin' that's crooked, nor wicked, nor nothin' but what I
think is right and what I'd do over again. Do you believe that?”
“Certainly. As I told you, I'm not interested, but I'll believe it with
pleasure if you wish me to.”
“I don't wish nothin'. You've GOT to believe it. And whether you stay
here ten minutes or ten years you've got to mind your own business. I
won't have any hints or questions about me--from you nor nobody else.
'Mind your own business,' that's the motto of Eastboro Twin-Lights,
while I'm boss of 'em. If you don't like it--well, the village is only
five mile off, and I'll p'int out the road to you.”
He delivered this ultimatum with extraordinary energy. Then he reached
for his overturned chair, set it on its legs, and threw himself into it.
“Well,” he demanded, after a moment; “what do you say to that?”
“Hurrah!” replied Mr. Brown cheerfully.
“Hurrah? For the land sakes! . . . Say, CAN'T you talk sensible, if you
try real hard and set your mind to it? What is there to hurrah about?”
“Everything. The whole situation. Atkins,” Brown leaned forward now and
spoke with earnestness, “I like your motto. It suits me. 'Mind your own
business' suits me down to the ground. It proves that you and I were
made to work together in a place just like this.”
“Does, hey? I want to know!”
“You do know. Why, just think: each of us has pleaded 'not guilty.'
We've done nothing--we're entirely innocent--and we want to forget it.
I agree not to ask you how old you are, nor why you wear your brand of
whiskers, nor how you like them, nor--nor anything. I agree not to ask
questions at all.”
“Humph! but you asked some last night.”
“Purely by accident. You didn't answer them. You asked me some, also,
if you will remember, and I didn't answer them, either. Good! We forget
everything and agree not to do it again.”
“Ugh! I tell you I ain't done nothin'.”
“I know. Neither have I. Let the dead past be its own undertaker, so
far as we are concerned. I'm honest, Atkins, and tolerably straight. I
believe you are; I really do. But we don't care to talk about ourselves,
that's all. And, fortunately, kind Providence has brought us together in
a place where there's no one else TO talk. I like you, I credit you with
good taste; therefore, you must like me.”
“Hey? Ho, ho!” Seth laughed, in spite of himself. “Young man,” he
observed, “you ain't cultivated your modesty under glass, have you?”
Brown smiled. “Joking aside,” he said, “I don't see why I shouldn't, in
time, make an ideal assistant lightkeeper. Give me a trial, at any rate.
I need an employer; you need a helper. Here we both are. Come; it is a
bargain, isn't it? Any brass to be scrubbed--boss?”
Of course, had Eastboro Twin-Lights been an important station, the
possibility of John Brown's remaining there would have been nonexistent.
If it had been winter, or even early spring or fall, a regular assistant
would have been appointed at once, and the castaway given his walking
papers. If Seth Atkins had not been Seth Atkins, particular friend of
the district superintendent, matters might have been different. But the
Eastboro lights were unimportant, merely a half-way mark between Orham
on the one hand and the powerful Seaboard Heights beacon on the other.
It was the beginning of summer, when wrecks almost never occurred. And
the superintendent liked Seth, and Seth liked him. So, although Mr.
Atkins still scoffed at his guest's becoming a permanent fixture at the
lights, and merely consented, after more parley, to see if he couldn't
arrange for him to “hang around and help a spell until somebody else was
sent,” the conversation with the superintendent over the long distance
'phone resulted more favorably for Brown than that nonchalant young
gentleman had a reasonable right to expect.
“The Lord knows who I can send you now, Atkins!” said the
superintendent. “I can't think of a man anywhere that can be spared. If
you can get on for a day or two longer, I'll try to get a helper down!
but where he's coming from I don't see.”
Then Seth sprung the news that he had a “sort of helper” already. “He's
a likely young chap enough,” admitted the lightkeeper, whispering the
words into the transmitter, in order that the “likely young chap” might
not hear; “but he's purty green yet. He wants the reg'lar job and, give
me time enough, I cal'late I can break him in. Yes, I'm pretty sure
I can. And it's the off season, so there really ain't no danger. In a
month he'd be doin' fust-rate.”
“Who is he? Where did he come from?” asked the superintendent.
“Name's Brown. He come from--from off here a ways,” was the strictly
truthful answer. “He used to be on a steamboat.”
“All right. If you'll take a share of the responsibility, I'll take the
rest. And, as soon as I can, I'll send you a regular man.”
“I can't pay you no steady wages,” Seth explained to his new helper.
“Salaries come from the gov'ment, and, until they say so, I ain't got
no right to do it. And I can't let you monkey with the lights, except
to clean up around and such. If you want to stay a spell, until an
assistant's app'inted, I'll undertake to be responsible for your keep.
And if you need some new shoes or stockin's or a cap, or the like of
that, I'll see you get 'em. Further'n that I can't go yet. It's a pretty
poor job for a fellow like you, and if I was you I wouldn't take it.”
“Oh, yes, you would,” replied Brown, with conviction. “If you were I,
you would take it with bells on. Others may yearn for the strenuous
life, but not your humble servant. As for me, I stay here and 'clean up
around.'”
And stay he did, performing the cleaning up and other duties with
unexpected success and zeal. Atkins, for the first day or two, watched
him intently, being still a trifle suspicious and fearful of his
“substitute assistant.” But as time passed and the latter asked no more
questions, seemed not in the least curious concerning his superior, and
remained the same cool, easy-going, cheerful individual whom Seth had
found asleep on the beach, the lightkeeper's suspicions were ended. It
was true that Brown was as mysterious and secretive as ever concerning
his own past, but that had been a part of their bargain. Atkins, who
prided himself on being a judge of human nature, decided that his helper
was a young gentleman in trouble, but that the trouble, whatever
it might be, involved nothing criminal or dishonest. That he was a
gentleman, he was sure--his bearing and manner proved that; but he was
a gentleman who did not “put on airs.” Not that there was any reason why
he should put on airs, but, so far as that was concerned, there was no
apparent reason for the monumental conceit and condescension of some
of the inflated city boarders in the village. Brown was not like those
people at all.
Seth had taken a fancy to him at their first meeting. Now his liking
steadily increased. Companionship in a lonely spot like Eastboro
Twin-Lights is a test of a man's temper. Brown stood the test well. If
he made mistakes in the work--and he did make some ridiculous ones--he
cheerfully undid them when they were pointed out to him. He was, for the
most part, good-natured and willing to talk, though there were periods
when he seemed depressed and wandered off by himself along the beach or
sat by the edge of the bluff, staring out to sea. The lightkeeper made
no comment on this trait in his character. It helped to confirm his own
judgment concerning the young fellow's trouble. People in trouble were
subject to fits of the “blues,” and during these fits they liked to be
alone. Seth knew this from his own experience. There were times when he,
too, sought solitude.
He trusted his helper more and more. He did not, of course, permit
him to take the night watch in the lights, but he did trust him to the
extent of leaving him alone for a whole afternoon while he drove the old
horse, attached to the antique “open wagon”--both steed and vehicle a
part of the government property--over to Eastboro to purchase tobacco
and newspapers at the store. On his return he found everything as it
should be, and this test led him to make others, each of which was
successful in proving John Brown faithful over a few things and,
therefore, in time, to be intrusted with many and more important ones.
Brown, on his part, liked Seth. He had professed to like him during the
conversation at the breakfast table which resulted in his remaining at
the lights, but then he was not entirely serious. He was, of course,
grateful for the kindness shown him by the odd longshoreman and enjoyed
the latter's society and droll remarks as he would have enjoyed anything
out of the ordinary and quaintly amusing. But now he really liked
the man. Seth Atkins was a countryman, and a marked contrast to any
individual Brown had ever met, but he was far from being a fool. He
possessed a fund of dry common sense, and his comments on people and
happenings in the world--a knowledge of which he derived from the
newspapers and magazines obtained on his trips to Eastboro--were a
constant delight. And, more than all, he respected his companion's
desire to remain a mystery. Brown decided that Atkins was, as he had
jokingly called him, a man with a past. What that past might be, he did
not know or try to learn. “Mind your own business,” Seth had declared to
be the motto of Eastboro Twin-Lights, and that motto suited both parties
to the agreement.
The lightkeeper stood watch in the tower at night. During most of the
day he slept; but, after the first week was over, and his trust in his
helper became more firm, he developed the habit of rising at two in the
afternoon, eating a breakfast--or dinner, or whatever the meal might be
called--and wandering off along the crooked road leading south and in
the direction of Pounddug Slough. The road, little used and grass grown,
twisted and turned amid the dunes until it disappeared in a distant
grove of scrub oaks and pitch pines. Each afternoon--except on Sundays
and on the occasions of his excursions to the village--Atkins would rise
from the table, saunter to the door to look at the weather, and then,
without excuse or explanation, start slowly down the road. For the first
hundred yards he sauntered, then the saunter became a brisk walk, and
when he reached the edge of the grove he was hurrying almost at a dog
trot. Sometimes he carried a burden with him, a brown paper parcel
brought from Eastboro, a hammer, a saw, or a coil of rope. Once he
descended to the boathouse at the foot of the bluff by the inlet and
emerged bearing a big bundle of canvas, apparently an old sail; this
he arranged, with some difficulty, on his shoulder and stumbled up the
slope, past the corner of the house and away toward the grove. Brown
watched him wonderingly. Where was he going, and why? What was the
mysterious destination of all these tools and old junk? Where did
Seth spend his afternoons and why, when he returned, did his hands and
clothes smell of tar? The substitute assistant was puzzled, but he asked
no questions. And Seth volunteered no solution of the puzzle.
Yet the solution came, and in an unexpected way. Seth drove to the
village one afternoon and returned with literature, smoking materials
and an announcement. The latter he made during supper.
“I tried to buy that fly paper we wanted today,” he observed, as a
preliminary. “Couldn't get none. All out.”
“But will have some in very shortly, I presume,” suggested the
assistant, who knew the idiosyncrasies of country stores.
“Oh, yes, sartin! Expectin' it every minute. That store's got a
consider'ble sight more expectations in it than it has anything else.
They're always six months ahead of the season or behind it in that
store. When it's so cold that the snow birds get chilblains they'll have
the shelves chuck full of fly paper. Now, when it's hotter than a kittle
of pepper tea, the bulk of their stock is ice picks and mittens. Bah!
However, they're goin' to send the fly paper over when it comes, along
with the dog.”
“The dog?” repeated Brown in amazement.
“Yup. That's what I was goin' to tell you--about the dog. I ordered a
dog today. Didn't pay nothin' for him, you understand. Henry G., the
storekeeper, gave him to me. The boy'll fetch him down when he fetches
the fly paper.”
“A dog? We're--you're going to keep a dog--here?”
“Sure thing. Why not? Got room enough to keep a whole zoological
menagerie if we wanted to, ain't we? Besides, a dog'll be handy to have
around. Bill Foster, the life saver, told me that somebody busted into
the station henhouse one night a week ago and got away with four of
their likeliest pullets. He cal'lates 'twas tramps or boys. We don't
keep hens, but there's some stuff in that boathouse I wouldn't want
stole, and, bein' as there's no lock on the door, a dog would be a sort
of protection, as you might say.”
“But thieves would never come way down here.”
“Why not? 'Tain't any further away from the rest of creation than the
life savin' station, is it? Anyhow, Henry G. give the dog to me free for
nothin', and that's a miracle of itself. You'd say so, too, if you
knew Henry. I was so surprised that I said I'd take it right off; felt
'twould be flyin' in the face of Providence not to. A miracle--jumpin'
Judas! I never knew Henry to give anybody anything afore--unless 'twas
the smallpox, and then 'twan't a genuine case, nothin' but varioloid.”
“But what kind of a dog is it?”
“I don't know. Henry used to own the mother of it, and she was one
quarter mastiff and the rest assorted varieties. This one he's givin'
me ain't a whole dog, you see; just a half-grown pup. The varioloid
all over again--hey? Ho, ho! I didn't really take him for sartin, you
understand; just on trial. If we like him, we'll keep him, that's all.”
The third afternoon following this announcement, Brown was alone in
the kitchen, and busy. Seth had departed on one of his mysterious
excursions, carrying a coil of rope, a pulley and a gallon can of paint.
Before leaving the house he had given his helper some instructions
concerning supper.
“Might's well have a lobster tonight,” he said. “Ever cook a lobster,
did you?”
No, Mr. Brown had never cooked a lobster.
“Well, it's simple enough. All you've got to do is bile him. Bile him in
hot water till he's done.”
“I see.” The substitute assistant was not enthusiastic. Cooking he did
not love.
“Humph!” he grunted. “I imagined if he was boiled at all, it was be in
hot water, not cold.”
Atkins chuckled. “I mean you want to have the water bilin' hot when you
put him in,” he explained. “Wait till she biles up good and then souse
him; see?”
“I guess so. How do you know when he's done?”
“Oh--er--I can't tell you. You'll have to trust to your instinct, I
cal'late. When he looks done, he IS done, most gen'rally speakin'.”
“Dear me! how clear you make it. Would you mind hintin' as to how he
looks when he's done?”
“Why--why, DONE, of course.”
“Yes, of course. How stupid of me! He is done when he looks done, and
when he looks done he is done. Any child could follow those directions.
HOW is he done--brown?”
“No. Brown! the idea! Red, of course. He's green when you put him in
the kittle, and when you take him out, he's red. That's one way you can
tell.”
“Yes, that will help some. All right, I'll boil him till he's red, you
needn't worry about that.”
“Oh, I sha'n't worry. So long. I'll be back about six or so. Put him in
when the water's good and hot, and you'll come out all right.”
“Thank you. I hope HE will, but I have my doubts. Where is he?”
“Who? the lobster? There's dozens down in the car by the wharf. Lift the
cover and fish one out with the dip net. Pick out the biggest one you
can find, 'cause I'm likely to be hungry when I get back, and your
appetite ain't a hummin' bird's. There! I've got to go if I want to get
anything done afore-- . . . Humph! never mind. So long.”
He hurried away, as if conscious that he had said more than he intended.
At the corner of the house he turned to call:
“I say! Brown! be kind of careful when you dip him out. None of 'em are
plugged.”
“What?”
“I say none of them lobsters' claws are plugged. I didn't have time to
plug the last lot I got from my pots, so you want to handle 'em careful
like, else they'll nip you. Tote the one you pick out up to the house in
the dip-net; then you'll be all right.”
Evidently considering this warning sufficient to prevent any possible
trouble, he departed. John Brown seated himself in the armchair by the
door and gazed at the sea. He gazed and thought until he could bear to
think no longer; then he rose and entered the kitchen, where he kindled
a fire in the range and filled a kettle with water. Having thus made
ready the sacrificial altar, he took the long-handled dip-net from its
nail and descended the bluff to the wharf.
The lobster car, a good-sized affair of laths with a hinged cover
closing the opening in its upper surface, was floating under the wharf,
to which it was attached by a rope. Brown knelt on the string-piece
and peered down at it. It floated deep in the water, the tide rippling
strongly through it, between the laths. The cover was fastened with a
wooden button.
The substitute assistant, after a deal of futile and exasperating poking
with the handle of the net, managed to turn the button and throw back
the leather-hinged cover. Through the square opening the water beneath
looked darkly green. There was much seaweed in the car, and occasionally
this weed was stirred by living things which moved sluggishly.
John Brown reversed the net, and, lying flat on the wharf, gingerly
thrust the business end of the contrivance through the opening and into
the dark, weed-streaked water. Then he began feeling for his prey.
He could feel it. Apparently the car was alive with lobsters. As he
moved the net through the water there was always one just before it or
behind it; but at least ten minutes elapsed before he managed to get
one in it. At length, when his arms were weary and his patience almost
exhausted, the submerged net became heavy, and the handle shook in his
grasp. He shortened his hold and began to pull in hand over hand. He had
a lobster, a big lobster.
He could see a pair of claws opening and shutting wickedly. He raised
the creature through the opening, balanced the net on its edge, rose on
one knee, tried to stand erect, stumbled, lost his hold on the handle
and shot the lobster neatly out of the meshes, over the edge of the car,
and into the free waters of the channel. Then he expressed his feelings
aloud and with emphasis.
Five minutes later he got another, but it was too small to be of use. In
twenty minutes he netted three more, two of which got away. The third,
however, he dragged pantingly to the wharf and sat beside it, gloating.
It was his for keeps, and it was a big one, the great-grandaddy of
lobsters. Its claws clashed and snapped at the twine of the net like a
pair of giant nut crackers.
Carrying it as far from his body as its weight at the end of the handle
would permit, he bore it in triumph to the kitchen. To boil a lobster
alive had seemed a mean trick, and cruel, when Seth Atkins first ordered
him to do it. Now he didn't mind; it would serve the thing right for
being so hard to catch. Entering the kitchen, he balanced the net across
a chair and stepped to the range to see if the water was boiling. It was
not, and for a very good reason--the fire had gone out. Again Mr. Brown
expressed his feelings.
The fire, newly kindled, had burned to the last ash. If he had been
there to add more coal in season, it would have survived; but he had
been otherwise engaged. There was nothing to be done except rake out the
ashes and begin anew. This he did. When he removed the kettle he decided
at once that it was much too small for the purpose required of it. To
boil a lobster of that size in a kettle of that size would necessitate
boiling one end at a time, and that, both for the victim and himself,
would be troublesome and agonizing. He hunted about for a larger kettle
and, finding none, seized in desperation upon the wash boiler, filled
it, and lifted it to the top of the stove above the flickering new fire.
The fire burned slowly, and he sat down to rest and wait. As he sank
into the chair--not that across which the netted lobster was balanced,
but another--he became aware of curious sounds from without. Distant
sounds they were, far off and faint, but growing steadily louder; wails
and long-drawn howls, mournful and despairing.
“A-a-oo-ow! Aa-ow-ooo!”
“What in the world?” muttered Brown, and ran out of the kitchen and
around the corner of the house.
There was nothing in sight, nothing strange or unusual, that is. Joshua,
Seth's old horse, picketted to a post in the back yard and grazing, or
trying to graze, on the stubby beach grass, was the only living exhibit.
But the sounds continued and grew louder.
“Aa-ow-ooo! Ow-oo-ow-ooo!”
Over the rise of a dune, a hundred yards off, where the road to Eastboro
village dipped towards a swampy hollow, appeared a horse's head and
the top of a covered wagon. A moment later the driver became visible,
a freckled faced boy grinning like a pumpkin lantern. The horse trotted
through the sand up to the lights. Joshua whinnied as if he enjoyed the
prospect of company. From the back of the wagon, somewhere beneath the
shade of the cover, arose a heartrending wail, reeking of sorrow and
agony.
“Aa-ow-OOO! Ooo-aa-OW!”
“For heaven's sake,” exclaimed the lightkeeper's helper, running to meet
the vehicle, “what is the matter?”
The boy grinned more expansively than ever. “Whoa!” he shouted, to the
horse he was driving. The animal stopped in his tracks, evidently glad
of the opportunity. Another howl burst from the covered depths of the
wagon.
“I've got him,” said the boy, with a triumphant nod and a jerk of his
thumb over his shoulder. “He's in there.”
“He? Who? What?”
“Job. He's in there. Hear him? He's been goin' on like that ever since
he finished his bone, and that was over two mile back. Say,” admiringly,
“he's some singer, ain't he! Hear that, will ye?”
Another wail arose from the wagon. Brown hastened to the rear of the
vehicle, on the canvas side of which were painted the words “Henry G.
Goodspeed, Groceries, Dry and Fancy Goods and Notions, Eastboro,” and
peered in over the tailboard. The interior of the wagon was well nigh
filled by a big box with strips of board nailed across its top. From
between these strips a tawny nose was uplifted. As the helper stared
wonderingly at the box and the nose, the boy sprang from his seat and
joined him.
“That's him,” declared the boy. “Hi, there, Job, tune up now! What's the
matter with ye?”
His answer was an unearthly howl from the box, accompanied by a mighty
scratching. The boy laughed delightedly.
“Ain't he a wonder?” he demanded. “Ought to be in church choir, hadn't
he.”
Brown stepped on the hub of a rear wheel, and, clinging to the post of
the wagon cover, looked down into the box. The creature inside was about
the size of a month old calf.
“It's a--it's a dog,” he exclaimed. “A dog, isn't it?”
“Sure, it's a dog. Or he'll be a dog when he grows up. Nothin' but a pup
now, he ain't. Where's Seth?”
“Seth? Oh, Mr. Atkins; he's not here.”
“Ain't he? Where's he gone?”
“I don't know.”
“Don't ye? When's he comin' back? HUSH UP!” This last was a command to
the prisoner in the box, who paid absolutely no attention to it.
“I don't know when he'll be back. Do you want to see him personally?
Won't I do? I'm in charge here till he returns.”
“Be ye? Oh, you're the new assistant from Boston. You'll do. All I want
to do is unload him--Job, I mean--and leave a couple bundles of fly
paper Seth ordered. Here!” lowering the tailboard and climbing into the
wagon, “you catch aholt of t'other end of the box, and I'll shove on this
one. Hush up, Job! Nobody's goin' to eat ye--'less it's the moskeeters.
Now, then, mister, here he comes.”
He began pushing the box toward the open end of the wagon. The dog's
whines and screams and scratchings furnished an accompaniment almost
deafening.
“Wait! Stop! For heaven's sake, wait!” shouted Brown. “What are you
putting that brute off here for? I don't want him.”
“Yes, you do. Seth does, anyhow. Henry G. made him a present of Job last
time Seth was over to the store. Didn't he tell ye?”
Then the substitute assistant remembered. This was the “half-grown pup”
Atkins had said was to be brought over by the grocery boy. This was the
creature they were to accept “on trial.”
“Well, by George!” he exclaimed in disgust.
“Didn't Seth tell ye?” asked the boy again.
“Yes. . . . Yes, I believe he did. But--”
“Then stand by while I unload him. Here he comes now. H'ist him down
easy as you can.”
That was not too easy, for the end of the box slid from the tail-board
to the ground with a thump that shook the breath from the prisoner
within. But the breath came back again and furnished motive power for
more and worse howls and whines. Joshua pricked up his ears and trotted
to the further end of his halter.
“There!” said Henry G.'s boy, jumping to the ground beside the box,
“that's off my hands, thank the mercy! Here's your fly paper. Five dozen
sheets. You must have pretty nigh as many flies down here as you have
moskeeters. Well, so long. I got to be goin'.”
“Wait a minute,” pleaded Brown. “What shall I do with this--er--blessed
dog? Is he savage? Why did you bring him in a crate--like a piano?”
“'Cause 'twas the easiest way. You couldn't tie him up, not in a cart no
bigger'n this. Might's well tie up an elephant. Besides, he won't stay
tied up nowheres. Busted more clotheslines than I've got fingers and
toes, that pup has. He needs a chain cable to keep him to his moorin's.
Don't ye, Job, you old earthquake? Hey?”
He pounded on the box, and the earthquake obliged with a renewed series
of shocks and shakings.
The lightkeeper's assistant smiled in spite of himself.
“Who named him Job?” he asked.
“Henry G.'s cousin from Boston. He said he seemed to be always sufferin'
and fillin' the land with roarin's, like Job in the Bible. So, bein' as
he hadn't no name except cuss words, that one stuck. I cal'late Henry
G.'s glad enough to get rid of him. Ho! ho!”
“Did Mr. Atkins see his--this--did he see his present before he accepted
it?”
“No. That's the best part of the joke. Well,” clambering to his seat
and picking up the reins, “I've got five mile of sand and moskeeters to
navigate, so I've got to be joggin'. Oh, say! goin' to leave him in the
box there, be ye?”
“I guess so, for the present.”
“Well, I wouldn't leave him too long. He's stronger'n Samson and the
Philippines rolled together, and he's humped up his back so much on the
way acrost that he's started most of the nails in them slats over top of
him. I tell ye what you do: Give him a bone or a chunk of tough meat to
chaw on. Then he'll rest easy for a spell. Goodbye. I wish I could
stay and see Seth when he looks at his present, but I can't. Gid-dap,
January.”
The grocery wagon rolled out of the yard. The forsaken Job sent a
roar of regret after him. Also, he “humped us his back,” and the nails
holding the slats in place started and gave alarmingly. John Brown
hastened to the house in quest of a bone.