THE DERELICT FINDS A PORT
For a moment Tom’s imagination pictured the stranger as the fugitive
grandson and he was conscious of a certain amusement at the likeness of
such a meeting to the happenings in a photo-play.
“Know him?” he asked rather anxiously.
“I thought it were Joey Ganley,” the old man said.
“His folks were neighbors of mine in the old village. He went out west,
Joey did, when they stole our homes. He done well out there and sent his
mother money to build a house in the new village. You didn’t happen to
see that house?” The old man did not vouchsafe Tom any details by which
Joe Ganley’s fine gift to his mother might be identified.
“N—not to know it,” said Tom. “I haven’t been in West Hurley much.”
“In Woodstock they have crazy artists,” the old man said, apparently
forgetting all about the stranger.
“That’s near West Hurley, isn’t it?”
“Some on ’em wears socks two different colors. One of ’em has long hair
wanted to paint me in a picture. You don’t happen to know him, do you?
He gave me two dollars.”
“I didn’t know the artists over that way were so rich,” said Tom. “No, I
don’t know much about the wild artists of Woodstock; I’ve heard about
them though. Joey what’s-his-name never came back, did he?”
“He made money and got married and settled down sum’eres out there. He
was a foreman.”
“Well then I guess that wasn’t Joey,” said Tom indulgently. The old man
just trudged along, jamming his cane down with each step. He seemed to
have forgotten all about the stranger.
Nor did the little episode linger in Tom’s mind. But he thought it
rather strange that a young man working as a foreman somewhere in the
west should have prospered so exceptionally as to be able to send his
mother money enough to build a house. And this notwithstanding the fact
that he had married and incurred the expense of a home of his own. These
things did not perplex him for he was not sufficiently interested, but
the thought occurred to him.
Of one thing he felt certain, and that was that it was not the
prosperous and filially generous worker in the west whom they had just
encountered in this lonesome road. Old Caleb Dyker had been seeing
things....
Tom wondered how much of the choppy and disconnected narrative with
which this eccentric little old wanderer had beguiled him had any
foundation in fact. But he liked old Caleb Dyker, he liked his sturdy
way of trudging along and jabbing his cane down on the ground. There was
character in that.
He was amused at the old man’s way of making announcements and at his
apparent inability to enter into familiar and confidential discourse.
There was something whimsical about him which Tom could not explain to
himself. Perhaps it was the old man’s habit of taking everything for
granted, artists, movie producers, the great metropolis....
He seemed quite content to accompany Tom to camp without manifesting any
becoming hesitancy at going there or inquiring about the character of
the community which he was to visit. Tom thought his long wanderings
must have bred in him the habit of living day by day and of never being
greatly surprised at anything. To him his vigorous eccentricity was
captivating.