THE STORY OF A WILD LIFE
Listen, how still waiting, dreaming
Of some wild, heroic life,
How the young heart, all unconscious,
Had really entered on the strife.
Now that I can reason calmly,
And look clearly back again,
I can see the brightest meaning
Threading each dark, torturing pain.
How the strong resolve was broken,
Why rash hope and foolish fear,
And the prayers which God in pity
Still refused to grant or hear.
_Anon._
It was a picturesque group gathered around that table—Zuniga, Hereward
and Lilith.
Zuniga, with his slight, elegant and graceful form, his dark
complexion—darker still with his luxuriant black curls—fine black eyes,
shadowed with black eyelashes, and arched by black eyebrows, and his
perfect features, the beautiful mouth not hidden by the twirled
moustache divided on the upper lip. Zuniga, with his laughing, reckless,
boyish air, seemed the youngest of the group of whom he was the
father—or at least the younger of the two men.
Hereward, with his tall and stately figure, his noble head, blonde
complexion, severe classic profile, and steel-blue eyes, and with his
grave and dignified demeanor, seemed, certainly, the elder of the two.
Lilith, in her simple and elegant morning dress of white foulard silk,
which well became her lovely brunette beauty, sat between them, but
nearer to the Señor Zuniga.
Had any stranger been told that here sat a married pair and a father,
and had been required to tell “which was which,” he would certainly have
pointed out Hereward as the father, and the two others as the son and
daughter.
Their relative ages were as follows: Zuniga was thirty-eight, Hereward
twenty-nine, and Lilith nineteen.
Zuniga began his story in his usual eccentric manner:
“Esteemed son-in-law and beloved daughter! That little personal pronoun,
in the first person singular, nominative case, is such a very obtrusive
person, that it should be suppressed on every possible occasion. This
autobiography, or fragment of autobiography, then, shall be delivered in
the third person, with your consent. What do you say?”
Zuniga paused for a reply.
“As you like, señor,” gravely responded Hereward.
“Yes, do, please,” assented Lilith.
Zuniga proceeded:
“About thirty-five years ago——Now don’t throw yourself back in your
chair with such a look of anticipated weariness, Hereward. Have more
respect for your venerable father-in-law, and set a better example to my
daughter, or I shall ‘set’ a mother-in-law over your head, or, rather, a
step-mother-in-law, which must be a combination of domestic autocracy.
Besides, the story is not so long as the time.
“Well, about thirty-five years ago, the good ship Polly Ann, of Glasgow,
Swift, master, bound for New York, when about half way across, sighted a
nondescript object, which, on nearer view and closer inspection, proved
to be a raft, on which languished a half-dead shipwrecked sailor, and a
three-quarters dead shipwrecked child.
“The victims were rescued, taken on board the Polly Ann, and restored by
such simple and efficacious treatment as was familiar to the skipper and
his crew as specifics ‘for such cases made and provided.’
“The sailor was a man of about fifty winters; the child, a boy of three
summers—though why the winters should always be enumerated for the old,
and the summers for the young, is more than I can understand, since both
young and old have an equal distribution of summers and winters in their
years. But this is a digression.
“As soon as the sailor was able to give an account of himself and his
fellow-sufferers, we learned that they were the survivors of the ship
Falcon, Captain Pentecost, homeward bound from Havana to Liverpool, and
foundered in the late equinoctial storm, when in latitude this and that,
and longitude so and so; never mind the figures, they are forgotten long
ago, even if they were ever exactly known, which is doubtful.
“The crew and passengers of the wrecked ship had left it in two boats
and on a raft. The captain had taken command of the first boat, the
first mate of the second boat, and the second mate of the raft.
“The sailor could give no account of the fate of either boat after they
had left the wreck.
“On the raft besides himself, Zebedee Wyvil, second mate of the Falcon,
who was in command, there were seven common seamen and three passengers;
these passengers being Señor Don Alphonzo Zuniga and his wife and child.
“A sad story could be told of the long sufferings and terrible deaths of
these shipwrecked victims, but it would not only be quite useless, but
altogether too heart-rending. Besides which, tragedy is both unpleasant
and unprofitable, except to the performers on the stage, with an
audience of two thousand persons, averaging a dollar a head.
“In brief, all the passengers on the raft perished from want and
exposure, except the sailor, whose strong vitality sustained him, and
the child, for whose sake all had denied themselves from the beginning.
“You may be sure that the captain and the crew of the Polly Ann were
very much interested in the story of the shipwrecked sailor and the
child. The captain gave Zebedee Wyvil a berth as soon as he was able to
handle a rope; and one and another talked of adopting the little Spanish
waif. But Zebedee Wyvil informed all and sundry that the child was his
own treasure trove, and that he should keep it until it should be
claimed by those, if any such lived, who should have a better right to
it than himself.
“Certainly no one on the Polly Ann ventured after that to dispute
Wyvil’s possession of the little Zuniga.
“In due time the Polly Ann reached New York, discharged her cargo of
linen, tartan, Paisley shawls, and so forth; loaded with another cargo
of tobacco and cotton, and cleared for Glasgow, Zebedee Wyvil going as
third mate, and taking with him his treasure trove, to which arrangement
no one, under the circumstances, objected.
“In due time also the Polly Ann reached Glasgow, and there Mate Wyvil,
who had only engaged for the homeward voyage, left the ship, taking his
little Spanish boy with him.
“Zebedee Wyvil was a bachelor; and he was the main support of his
sister-in-law, the widow of his younger brother, Andrew, and of her two
children, Joseph and Elizabeth, who lived at Stockton, a small village
in the West Riding of Yorkshire.
“Zebedee Wyvil, when on shore, always made his home with this
sister-in-law.
“Now, on leaving his ship, he resolved to take the Spanish child with
him to Stockton, and place him under the care of this sister-in-law.
“But first he bethought him of having the boy christened, lest that
necessary ceremony had not already been performed.
“So he took the lad to St. John’s Church in Glasgow and had him
christened Joseph Wyvil, in honor of his—Zebedee’s—own father.
“Then he carried the child to his own home and presented him to his
sister-in-law.
“The widow and her children received the sailor and the orphan boy with
great kindness; but when his name was given—
“‘Joseph Wyvil!’ exclaimed the widow. ‘Why, what in the name of sense
put you on giving the bairn that name?’
“‘It was the name of my old feyther, as good a man as ever lived,’
retorted Zebedee.
“‘But it is the name of my own lad!’
“‘So it be! I had forgot that same.’
“‘And now if the bairn bides wi’ us there’ll be two Joseph Wyvils in the
one house.’
“‘Well, then, and there cannot be too many Joseph Wyvils anywhere, if
they be one and all as good as the first of the name! And, moreover, to
distinguish the lads apart, we may even call the elder Joseph, and the
younger Joe,’ concluded Zebedee.
“And as he carried the purse, his will was law in that little household,
and so the point was settled. His nephew was known as Joseph Wyvil, and
his little treasure trove as Joe.
“Joseph was a fine, strong, red-haired and freckle-faced youth of ten,
Joe an ugly little black-a-vizzed monkey of four, and Elizabeth, or
‘Lil,’ a pretty baby of two years.
“Uncle Zeb left all his pay with his sister and shipped for another long
voyage.
“The three children were brought up together and in due time sent to
school.
“Joe, as the adopted son of Uncle Zeb, was taught to call the Widow
Wyvil ‘Aunt’ and her children each ‘Cousin.’
“Years went by with but little of incident to the humble household,
except in the periodical home-coming and sea-going of Uncle Zeb.
“When Joseph Wyvil, the widow’s son, was fifteen years of age, he was
taken from school and apprenticed to a house carpenter, and in time he
became a very skilful workman.
“When Joe was about twelve years old he was placed in a collegiate
school by his adopted father, whose ambition it was to get his son in
the naval academy.
“He remained in that school for three years, during which time two
members of the small family passed away—Zebedee Wyvil died of yellow
fever, while his ship was in port in Havana; and Susan Wyvil succumbed
to pulmonary consumption, in her cottage home at Stockton.
“At the end of the third year Joe left the collegiate school. Not that
his preparatory course was finished, and not that he wished to leave,
but because the quarterly payments for his board and tuition had ceased
with his adopted father’s life.
“And though the masters, knowing the case and the circumstances, would
have kept him longer, the pride of this son of the hidalgoes would not
suffer him to receive the favor.
“You may object that he had already received favors from humbler people,
in having been adopted and cared for by the mate of the Falcon. Ah, but
that was so different! Old Zebedee Wyvil had seemed like his own father.
He had known no other.
“Well, he left the college, and went home to Stockton, to those who
seemed like his own people, poor as they were, since they were all he
had left.
“He found his cousins, as he called them, still living together, and
occupying the old cottage.
“Joseph was now a fine young man of twenty-one, doing a thriving
business at his trade, and making a very comfortable home for his young
sister Lil, a lovely girl of thirteen, who kept house for him, and to
whom he was devotedly attached—yes, so devotedly attached that friends
and neighbors all said Joseph Wyvil would never take a wife while that
beloved sister remained unmarried and in his home.
“This sister and brother received poor Joe with the most affectionate
welcome, making him feel perfectly at home and at ease.
“In return for all this kindness the dark and swarthy descendant of the
Castilians fell desperately in love with the fair-skinned, blue-eyed and
flaxen-haired child of the Saxons. He made such ardent and persistent
love to the little maid that Lil grew frightened and fled his company,
yet never complained of him to her big brother—the little angel! I mean
she—Lil—was the little angel, you will all please to understand, and not
the big brother, though he was a good fellow enough.
“Ah, well, after Lil repulsed and fled from him, and shunned him
altogether as if he had been the horned and hoofed demon himself, he
grew desperate and went off to sea.
“Being fairly well educated, and having permission to refer to his
college masters, he got a good berth from the first, as captain’s clerk
in an East India merchantman.
“For some months all went well enough, and Joe ‘won golden opinions from
all sorts of’ officers and men. But being a wild, reckless, impulsive,
rollicking sort of a little devil, he soon began to get into all manner
of troubles, though he always contrived to get out of them again,
falling like a cat on his feet.
“During all this time he kept up an irregular correspondence with his
cousin Joseph, freely confessing all his peccadilloes, but stipulating
that no one was to tell Lil.
“After a three years’ voyage all around the world, Joe came home, and
went straight to the dear old cottage at Stockton.
“He found the house and garden enlarged and improved in proportion to
Joseph Wyvil’s increased prosperity.
“Joe was now a sun-burned sailor boy of eighteen, much darker and very
much more of a dare-devil than ever.
“Lil was sixteen, and more beautiful than before. She was still the idol
of her brother, for whom she kept house, and who—for his dear sister’s
sake, as it was said—remained unmarried and unengaged.
“The brother and sister received their sailor cousin with all their old
confiding affection. Lil had forgiven his presumption and forgotten her
fears of him.
“But, ah! poor Joe! His passion for this ‘fair one with golden locks’
was rekindled into such a fierce flame that nothing on earth seemed
strong enough to resist it.
“It was her love or somebody’s life!
“He demanded to marry Lil right off.
“But her brother opposed such precipitate measures; urged that both
parties were much too young to dream of marriage, Joe being eighteen,
and Lil but sixteen. Why, he said that he, himself, Joseph Wyvil, his
elder by six years, did not yet contemplate matrimony. Besides, he
could, in any case, give his sister a comfortable home yet for many
years, or even for her whole life, while Joe had no home to take her to,
and had still his own way to make in the world.
“In answer to all this, Joe, with the modest assurance—or shall we say
consummate impudence?—of his nature, proposed that he should immediately
marry Lil and that they should continue to live on at the cottage until
he should have to go to sea again, when he would leave his wife as
heretofore in her old home under the protection of her brother.
“Naturally enough, Mr. Wyvil did not see the excellence of this
arrangement in quite so strong and vivid a light as did Joe and even
Lil.
“After laughing a little at the ingenuous proposal, he reverted to his
first argument, that both were too young, foolish and impecunious to be
married—adding that a boy of eighteen and a girl of sixteen, who talked
of such a proceeding, should be locked up for a calendar month on a
depleting diet of bread and water.
“Whereupon the Spanish lad eagerly declared that as for himself he would
most joyfully submit to the terms, bread, water, imprisonment and
everything else that might be required to purchase the indulgence, if
only Joseph would be so good as to lock him and his sweetheart up in the
same room.
“For all answer to that suggestion, Mr. Wyvil informed the ardent lover
that he was a lunatic and should be sent to a mad-house.
“Opposition only added fuel to the flame of Joe’s passion. Mr. Wyvil did
not understand the difference between the dark blood and the bright when
he contemptuously characterized that passion as puppy love.
“Mr. Wyvil went off to his work. He was finishing the interior of a
church at that time. Joe raved and Lil cried. And then they took their
fate into their own hands. They resolved to run away and get married! Or
rather to sneak away.
“Late that night, when honest Joseph Wyvil was in bed and asleep, Joe
and Lil, in traveling rig, and with a couple of small valises, in which
all their worldly goods were packed, and which were gallantly carried by
the gentleman, who balanced them one in each brown hand, Joe and Lil
sneaked out of the back door, and under cover of the darkness, trudged
on to the railway station, where they took the 12.30 train to Scotland.
“They left the train the next morning only to hasten to the nearest
minister’s house to get married. As soon as the ceremony was concluded
and they had got a bit of breakfast at the counter of the railway
station, standing up at it, uncomfortably, to drink weak and lukewarm
coffee and eat stale sandwiches, they took the next train back to
England.
“But not daring to face Joseph Wyvil in the first hours of his ‘roused
wrath,’ they shunned the neighborhood of Stockton and stopped at a
little Yorkshire village of Orton, not far from the city of Carlisle.
“They took lodgings at a pretty, picturesque little farm-house called
Hayhurst, from which retreat they both wrote a mutual penitent letter to
Joseph Wyvil, expressing profound sorrow for having disobeyed and
offended so dear and good a brother, but declaring that they could not
do otherwise, as, though he had forbidden them to think of marriage,
they loved each other so much that they must either marry or die, and
they ended by imploring his forgiveness, and signing themselves his
devoted, obedient, loving brother and sister, Lil and Joe.
“Both Joe and Lil thought this letter so very touching, eloquent,
pathetic and convincing that it must bring Mr. Wyvil hurrying to them in
person with open arms and fervent blessings.
“And they waited for some such happy result.
“But no Mr. Wyvil came to greet their longing eyes. And no letter came
in answer to theirs.
“Every day Joe went to the village post-office, but found nothing for
them.
“A fortnight passed in this suspense, and then Joe suggested that their
letter might have miscarried, and so they sat down together and indited
a second letter, more penitent, more pathetic, more eloquent and
convincing than the first. Joe posted it with his own hands, and they
both waited confidently for some happy result.
“None came. Another fortnight passed, and then Joe grew angry and Lil
anxious.
“‘If a man is not satisfied with repentance and confession he is no
Christian,’ said Joe.
“‘But we don’t repent, and we only confess what is already known; and
perhaps Joseph is sick,’ suggested Lil.
“Then Joe wrote a confidential letter to a mutual friend in Stockton,
making inquiries concerning Mr. Joseph Wyvil. In due time he received an
answer, stating that Mr. Wyvil was well and prosperous, but so very
deeply offended by the runaway marriage that he would not permit his
sister’s or his cousin’s name to be mentioned in his presence. The
writer concluded his letter in some such words as these:
“‘Give him time and he will come around. He is too good-hearted a man
and too fond of his sister, and even of you, to hold out against you
both much longer.’
“Lil cried a good deal over this, but Joe encouraged her, and so did
their landlady, Mrs. Claxton, who had taken a great fancy to the young
pair.
“Fortunately, Joe had thirty pounds saved up from his three years’ pay
as captain’s clerk, and so there was no fear of immediate embarrassment.
“Lil, led on by the landlady, interested herself in farm life, in the
dairy and in the poultry yard. She was pleased to be permitted to help
to skim the milk, or to churn the butter, or to look after the newly
hatched, pretty little fluffy chickens and ducklings; and though she
often heaved a sigh at the thought of her brother, it soon passed away,
leaving no trace behind.
“Joe was more to be pitied. He was in more danger from his idle and
objectless life of the present moment. He went daily to the village, and
what was worse, he went nightly to the Tawny Lion, the village
ale-house, where he formed acquaintance with the young farmers and
mechanics of the neighborhood, all tenants of Squire Hawkhurst, of
Hawkhurst Hall.