# Charity (Boyesen)

II. — III. — IV. — V. — VI.
CHARITY.
By H. H. Boyesen.
I.
YOU will observe," said the Rev. Albion Nichols, of Boston, to Mr. Mortimer Brooks, of New York, "that the young girls who wait upon the table here are ladies. Some of them are school-teachers. If you should address them, they would answer you in English fit to be printed."
"These potatoes are not done," observed Mr. Brooks experimentally to the first girl who approached him.
"Them is the donedest there be," answered the girl.
Mr. Brooks turned rather a supercilious smile on his loquacious neighbor and fell to dissecting his beefsteak.
"You selected that girl with malice aforethought," persisted the undaunted clergyman. "Our dear New England——"
"Has become New Ireland, or is fast becoming it," finished Mr. Brooks.
"Unhappily, yes. But there is still much of the old Puritan leaven left. Here in Poltucket, for instance, the Yankee is yet to be found unadulterated. Here is yet a little Goschen of undefiled——"
"Consumption and nasal twang," Brooks interrupted, while Mr. Nichols took a long draught of ice-water.
"Yes, perhaps—unhappily," the conciliatory clergyman admitted; "but what I mean to say is that here you have a feeling that you are in America among Americans. Here the spirit of our fathers is still alive, though much weakened by the lapse of time. That's the reason I return here year after year. When my coal-man, without the faintest perception of the difference in our stations, comes up and shakes hands with me, I make a point of returning his grasp cordially. But I presume you do not sympathize with this spirit."
"Oh! yes, I sympathize; but I wash my hands afterward."
Mr. Nichols looked up reproachfully, but could not forbear to smile.
"You are a cynic," he said; "a scoffer."
"Not at all," replied his neighbor; "I am a guileless optimist."
Mr. Nichols smiled again, this time incredulously, and drank more ice-water.
"Whatever you, with your supercilious foreign notions, may think," he said, wiping his mouth with his napkin, "the New England girl is the flower of creation."
"Yes, but too flat-chested," contended Brooks.
"Fiddle-sticks! Now look at that girl there. Charity, I think, is her name. She is book-keeper, secretary and what not to Mrs. Morgan, who, by the way, is not strong in arithmetic and chirography. Did you ever see a sweeter face than that girl has? How shy and demure and maidenly! Why, girls of that type, sir, when once the primness and the cool virginal reserve is conquered, make the loveliest wives and mothers in the world. They are the results of generations of—of——"
"Pork and beans," suggested Brooks; "and pie for breakfast."
"No, sir; they are the results of generations of high thinking and right living, of fear of God, cleanliness, virtue, and prayer."
The girl who furnished the text for these remarks had entered very opportunely, by the door leading from the office, and seated herself in the vacant chair next to Brooks. His friend's declamation had naturally aroused his interest in her; and in order to have a chance to observe more closely this epitome of all New England's virtues, he asked her kindly to pass him the casters which were standing in front of her. She was just complying with this request when suddenly he flashed upon her a gaze of deep and serious scrutiny. He was the possessor of a pair of large and extraordinarily expressive eyes; and the abruptness and solemn intensity of their glance frightened the girl. She gave a start so violent that she dropped the casters into her soup-plate, whence they fell with a crash upon the floor. The unhappy creature, seeing the havoc she had wrought, rose precipitately and ran out of the room. There was a chorus of startled exclamations from the lady boarders; the landlady apologized for the awkwardness of the girl, and declared that she would tolerate her no more in her house. But when the first excitement had subsided, Brooks found the attention of the whole table concentrated upon him. What had he done to Charity to make her behave so shockingly? There was no one who uttered this query, but it was written upon all the curious, amused, or indignant faces that were turned toward the gentleman from New York.
"Those New York men," an elderly Boston spinster was heard to remark, sotto voce, "they are shockingly—well, I won't say what I mean."
She had no idea that the New York man in question rather enjoyed the sensation he was making. He made himself as broad as he could, looked up from his plate now and then with his contemptuous smile, and ate on with a kind of insolent appetite and imperturbable defiance. Before the meal was at an end, he had managed, somehow, without opening his mouth, to make all the ladies at the table his enemies.
II.
It was not the first time in the life of Mortimer Brooks that he made an unfavorable impression. He was a tall, well-grown man with a handsome face, and yet the majority of people disliked him. From his earliest childhood he had met with antagonism and hostility, and he was utterly at a loss to explain why. He had somehow entered the world with the wrong foot foremost. There had been some difficulty between his father and mother which had clouded his earliest years; and he had a vague impression that the latter was more to blame. She had during his boyhood dragged him about from Rome to Wiesbaden and from Wiesbaden to Paris and then back again to Rome, interrupting his schooling whenever it suited her whim. An unquenchable thirst for excitement impelled her to change continually her place of residence; but like the man who moved from house to house to get rid of the Brownie, she always carried her Brownie with her. Her Brownie was named Discontent. She had been born with poor blood; and was blasé from the very cradle. Toward her son she was by turns plaintive and irritable—perhaps because she felt herself in the wrong before him and suspected in him a silent accuser. She had subordinated his life to hers, persuading herself always that whatever she liked to do was the best for him.
After fifteen years of this migratory existence, during which no permanent relations had been formed and no ties, either local or personal, Mortimer found himself impelled to explore the land of his birth. His father was then dead; and the uncle to whom he was referred for funds and counsel gave him such a cool reception that he felt disinclined to make advances. He was dimly aware that his alienism, which he deplored but could not help, was mistaken by his kinsman for affectation; and he was too proud to disabuse him. At Harvard, where he sojourned for two years, his reserve and foreign appearance gained him much admiration but no friends. And it was friends he yearned for—close human relations, freedom from restraint, and communion of souls. It was in pure self-defence that he appeared haughty; because, being driven by his temperament to extremes, he was too strong to be humble. He could not sue for confidence and good-will; even though he ardently desired them; and the only alternative was to appear to despise them. The gift to unlock hearts had somehow been denied him; and he would gladly have given all advantages he possessed in exchange for this one gift. He remembered having once envied a Roman gamin whose mother slapped him in the street and afterwards hugged him with repentant tears to her bosom. The impulsive naturalness of both acts lay so far beyond the sphere in which his lot was cast, that, by contrast, they appeared admirable. He hungered at times for censure almost as much as he hungered for praise; but both were refused him. He moved about in a shadow world, where all seemed unreal, except his own acute sense of his unsatisfied desires. People loved, wooed, and mourned round about him; and only he seemed to be cut off from all these sweet experiences of common, every-day mortality. He was scarcely himself aware that, as he brooded over the exceptional character of his lot, there grew a certain vague satisfaction within him which tempered his regret, a subtile pride in the very fact that he was exceptional. But this was a bitter-sweet feeling, after all, and far removed from contentment.
After having gotten into collision with the college authorities about a question of discipline, Mortimer left the academic halls, and drifted about for some years, in search of a vocation. He was conscious of great powers, that seemed available for almost anything; but the particular task which presented itself was always more or less distasteful. He had money enough to support existence in a modest way, without working, but could imagine nothing more contemptible than such impotent resignation. He would have taken to literature if he had not felt confident that the first note he struck would be a strident discord. He had written some things, to be sure; but had received them back from the magazines with the consoling assurance that "non-acceptance did not necessarily imply lack of merit." His private conviction was that in his case it implied too much merit; but, of course, it was useless to argue the thing, and he was too clever not to see that the magazine point of view was commercially right. In the meanwhile, feeling the need of doing something to put the editors in the wrong, he retired to the remote island of Poltucket, where the conditions for such an enterprise were said to be favorable. He engaged comfortable lodgings at Mrs. Morgan's boarding-house on the Bluff, and had just prepared himself to establish amicable relations with all the spinsters on the back piazza, when the incident with the book-keeper spoiled all his beautiful plans. During the long eventless afternoons, this scandalous occurrence was vehemently debated on all the piazzas in the town, and a Brooks and an anti-Brooks party were soon distinguishable among Mrs. Morgan's boarders. The former consisted chiefly of Miss Anastasia Herkomer, a rather plain young lady from Vassar, who declared that she could see no reason why a man should not look at a girl as much as he liked, and step on her foot, too, if it amused him, provided he granted her the privilege to step on his in return. She took it into her head to admire Brooks prodigiously (also by way of diversion), and felt flattered and exhilarated by the teasing comments and railleries which were aimed at her by her fellow-boarders. She got up quite a "Hamlet," not only in the absence of the Prince, but without his knowledge.
As for the girl who had been the innocent cause of all this disturbance, she had been in some manner spirited away. Mrs. Morgan professed to be ignorant of her whereabouts, and declined to entertain the proposition to take her back. A great deal of hysterical philanthropy which was stirred up in her behalf ran absolutely to waste. Even a purse that was made up by the lady boarders who resented her dismissal failed to reach her through the Post Office, and it was on that occasion that Miss Anastasia scandalized the company on the piazza by recommending that it be intrusted to Mr. Brooks, who probably had a better knowledge of the topography of the island than the Postmaster. The Rev. Mr. Nichols, who kindly acted as agent-in-chief for the ladies' indignation committee, had, in the meanwhile, become possessed of some scraps of the girl's history, which he communicated with slight dramatic embellishments to the committee. Her name, as they already knew, was Charity Howland. She was the daughter of a once prosperous lawyer, long since deceased; her mother was a Miss Tuthill and was said to have had some of the best blood in New England in her veins. The daughter had lived, since her mother's death, in the houses of various remote relatives, and had been badly treated by some of them. She had been an omnivorous reader and had acquired a sort of fragmentary education. She was as shy as a plover, and when you chanced to look at her, started like a bird about to take flight. The fact was, although she was born and bred on the island, nobody seemed to know much about her, one way or the other, except that she was a "poor orphaned critter," that, as an old sea-captain remarked, she was "sorter shet-up-tight, like a quore-hog," and "that it warn't no easy job to get a shot at her." Mr. Nichols was about to inquire why anybody should want to shoot at her; but caught himself in time to discover that the remark was metaphorical.
III.
The great scenic feature of Poltucket is a jagged mole or jetty, made of enormous stones, running three quarters of a mile out into the water. It has sagged a little in places and is there overrun at high tide; but when the tide is below the flood-mark, it is dotted all over with bright-colored sun-umbrellas, under each of which will be found, on investigation, a young lady, a novel, and occasionally also a young man. In the latter case, it sometimes happens that the novel floats in to the town with the rising tide. Mortimer Brooks found this jetty attractive, not so much on account of the vacancies under the sun-umbrellas, as on account of the facilities it offered for fishing. Here was an opportunity for catching lobster, scup, and even plaice-fish, without resorting to oars.
It was on a blustery afternoon in July, about two weeks after the disappearance of Charity Howland, that Brooks, in fashionable sportsman's attire, was seen looming up against the horizon, with a fishing-spear and a rod on his shoulder. He passed successfully the various pitfalls, marked by blue and scarlet parasols, and after a stiff climb over the rough stones reached the part of the jetty where eel and plaice-fish were said to abound. He stood there for fully three hours, and had fair luck, though the exasperating little wharf-fish amused themselves stealing his bait and, by their superior agility, snatching the hook before the very noses of their larger and more desirable neighbors. The tide had, in the meanwhile, changed, and was running out at a high speed. The sun had set, and the wind was blowing a gale from the north. The spray beat over the stones every moment, and flew in hissing showers through the air. It was getting decidedly unpleasant, and Brooks determined to tempt fortune no longer, but betake himself back to the security of the solid earth and Mrs. Morgan's hostile piazza. He had just wound his line on the rod, and was about to turn his back on Boreas, when he discovered the figure of a solitary woman in a dory, some twenty feet beyond the end of the jetty. She was making great exertions to pull up her anchor, but apparently did not succeed. Brooks watched her for a minute or two, then shouted to her, but received no reply. The wind drowned his voice. He could not make up his mind whether she was in danger or not; and therefore feared to appear importunate with his offer of help. The tide, in the meanwhile, which at that very point ran with the greatest vehemence, was tossing the dory up and down and drenching its occupant with spurts of flying spray. Sudden squalls swept, with smoke and blackening water in their track, across the harbor; and a few belated catboats which had been out bluefishing came scudding along with double-reefed sails, careening heavily, and burying their noses with a great splash in the white-crested waves. The young girl in the dory was casting anxious glances toward the dark-blue horizon, in the pauses between her futile struggles with the anchor-chain. Brooks had by this time made up his mind that he would rather risk offending her than see her perish before his eyes. Having fastened his rod between the stones, he started forward, with the spear, leaping from rock to rock, and in ten or fifteen minutes reached the end of the jetty. The girl was then seated with averted face in an attitude of resignation, watching the motions of the gulls that circled scream ing over her head. Two fishing-lines were hanging over the gunwale; but she did not heed them. "Do you need help?" shouted Brooks.
She started at the sound of his voice as if she had been shot; glanced shyly toward him, and then looked again at the horizon.
"Do you need help?" he repeated, bellowing with all his might against the wind. She writhed for a moment with bashful self-consciousness; then rose and seemed to struggle with a desire to leap into the water. At last, when she had no alternative but to face him, she turned slowly about, and he saw that she was none other than Charity Howland, the vanished book-keeper. It was rather an unexpected denouement, and to him, with his European notions, rather an absurd one. He appeared to himself in anything but a heroic light. However, when fate plays a prank upon you, there is no use in rebelling. Brooks promptly smothered the snobbish feeling that threatened to assert itself; and determined to play knight-errant to the book-keeper with amiability and good grace.
"Can't you pull your anchor up?" he cried.
"No, it is caught between two stones," she answered, with a look of imploring timidity that went straight to his heart.
"Try another pull; jerk sideways!"
"It is no use. I've tried every way."
A spirit of enterprise and adventure invaded the young man's soul. Steadying himself with the lobster-spear, he stalked calmly out over the submerged part of the jetty, planting his feet firmly on the slippery, kelp-covered stones. The tide whirled and eddied about his knees—six or eight steps more and he stood waist-deep in the surging water. It was hard work to keep his footing there; and he knew he could not do it long. He could now barely reach the dory with the spear; and he managed to fasten its hook in the prow and to pull it slowly toward him. The girl was crouching in the bottom of the boat, with shy glances and little timid movements, as if she were wishing to apologize for having the hardihood to exist at all.
"Come here," he commanded, as he laid hold of the boat with his hands.
She stared at him in helpless bewilderment, but did not stir.
"Come, I say, quick," he repeated, with a touch of impatience.
The girl arose, trembling with confusion, and looked as if she were again contemplating a plunge into the water.
"If you don't come," he broke forth, "I shall be carried out to sea with the tide. I can't keep my footing much longer."
That appeal she could not withstand; but she looked the picture of misery, as with flaming cheeks and a wildly palpitating heart she obeyed his summons. He put his arms about her in a prompt and business-like fashion, which ought to have been reassuring. But, for all that, she could not control an inclination to shiver.
"Lean to the left; put your arms about my neck," he said in the tone of a drill sergeant who commands: "Forward, march."
The girl obeyed bashfully because she did not dare to disobey. But suddenly a thrill of joy, of exultation, of ineffable well-being tingled through her. The blood gushed in warm streams from her heart and danced through her veins. Her humility, her bashfulness, her trembling confusion dropped from her like a garment. She sat enthroned upon his arm, with the wide horizon about her, proud and happy as a queen. She felt that he was wholly preoccupied with her rescue, oblivious of herself. But she had suddenly become quite unconcerned about herself, and absorbed in him. She was not afraid that he would stumble, though she saw him strain every nerve to keep his footing, and anxiously fumble his way with his feet over the slippery rock-weed that streamed like green hair over the stones. The brilliant star-fishes clung to the rocks and stared up at her, and somehow they had never before seemed so bright and beautiful. The gulls grew clamorous about her, and with shrill bad-weather screams swept past her, so close that she felt the wind of their wings on her cheeks. But her heart sung within her, and made light of their ominous voices. The gale tossed her hair wildly about her head; and she felt as if a new soul had been abruptly awakened within her—a soul sympathetic with all that was beautiful and bold and free. There were showers pouring in black-blue slanting lines from sky to sea, on the Western horizon, and they came sweeping eastward with splendid uproar and lashed waters and shifting play of color. All that she had never seen before; and it was wondrously beautiful.
It is said that the happiest moments in our lives appear the shortest. It is not always so. To Charity it seemed as if she had lived a life in the five or ten minutes before he put her down on the stones of the jetty. But what could she say to him now? It seemed unendurable to have to speak and thank him, and tune her exaltation down to commonplaces. She had no language in which fittingly to address him; and when her feet touched the granite blocks, an irresistible impulse set them in motion, and she flew away, leaping from stone to stone, like some shy and agile animal that hears the hounds behind it. Brooks looked after her in astonishment; but was, on the whole, not ill-pleased. He saw her slim figure outlined now against the brown land, now against the blue water: the wind strained and fluttered her garments about her form and emphasized its comeliness. The young man, dripping wet as he was, stood leaning upon the lobster-spear, regarding her leisurely. The longer he looked, the more pleased he was.
"She is original, to say the least," he muttered; "she has delicacy of feeling, Charming face, too," he added musing, "and a good figure, though a trifle too slight."
It occurred to him, at that moment, that his escapade had taken place in full view of Mrs. Morgan's piazza, and that he probably had disported himself in the focus of the three or four field-glasses which, from that social observatory, were always sweeping the horizon. That reflection drove the blood to his cheeks, and robbed him of all joy in his adventure.
IV.
The Rev. Albion Nichols felt called upon to make himself the spokesman of the universal indignation. He was a man in whom ladies naturally confided, and he could not but agree with them that Brooks's conduct was scandalous. For, of course, that Quixotic rescue from a boat, lying calmly at the end of the jetty, was, on his part at least, a mere piece of bravado, prompted by his delight in outraging the proprieties. Mr. Nichols felt justified in taking him to task for such conduct, first, because he was a clergyman, and, secondly, because he had been a classmate of Brooks at college. He was prepared, of course, to have the delinquent resent the reprimand (for he was terribly touchy, where censure was implied); but he was far from expecting such cool irony and supercilious condescension. Brooks had such an irritatingly lofty style of behavior when he chose to assume it, that scarcely a conclave of bishops would have sufficed to put him down. I fear there was a little straining of the facts in the account Mr. Nichols gave of the interview to the ladies' indignation committee, although he candidly admitted that his rebuke had been fruitless, and had perhaps even confirmed his erring friend in his obnoxious course. Miss Herkomer, who still persisted in being unsympathetic, flaunting her admiration of Brooks in the face of the shocked committee, had the hardihood to approve of the rescue of book-keepers on general principles, because it furnished a good illustration of the Horatian precept, to combine the useful with the amusing.
It was quite true that the reprimand of Mr. Nichols, which went no further than the most cautious suggestion that somebody might take offence, was one of several half-confessed motives which prompted Brooks's actions during the week that followed. He would scarcely have admitted that he cared enough for the gossiping congregation on the piazza to find it worth while to defy it; but, for all that, it gave an added zest to his enjoyment of the fresh adventures he had planned, to think that he should "send those cackling old hens into hysterics." The girl, however, had by this time become the principal object of interest to him; and he found her invading his mind at all times with the suddenness of a meteor, leaving a shining trail of thoughts behind her. He was anything but a sentimentalist; at least he was confident that he possessed that knowledge of the world which is like an adamantine armor against the mythological arrows. That distance lends enchantment, he held to be particularly true in the case of women; and more than half expecting, in his own case, to produce disenchantment by annihilating the distance. He discovered, by patient exploration of lanes and alleys, that Charity had found a refuge with an ancient retired mariner, named Captain Jewell. This worthy man, he ascertained, supported existence by making baskets, and had no objection to the visits of customers. Brooks found him a guileless old tar, crooked and gnarled, with lumps and knots in all sorts of wrong places.
"I came to look at your baskets," said the young man, as he entered.
"Ye don't say," replied the Captain, looking up from his work with a blank, senile stare.
"What is the price of this one?" inquired Brooks, after having examined the stock with an air of connoisseurship.
"Ye can give what ye like fur it."
"I prefer to give what you like."
From baskets the transition was easy to life in general, and the special problems and vexations which it presented in Poltucket. Captain Jewell had reduced these to a minimum, as his wants were few and Charity always looked out for him.
"Then you live on Charity?" remarked his visitor with wilful obtuseness.
The old man moved his jaws and looked up again with his vague, senile stare. The pun, bad as it was, was a little too much for him.
"She is out now in the dory," he observed in explanation, "gone scuppin', I reckon, or plaice-fishin'."
"Then Charity is your daughter."
"My darter! No she ain't my darter. No kin of mine—as I knows on; though my wife and her they was sorter second cousins or aunts or somethin'. She's sorter anchored here,—and a mighty good and seasonable gal she be."
"A seasonable girl!"
The Captain's mind, like a craft with a broken rudder, refused to change its tack in obedience to the wind. He could talk but he could not converse.
"She's sorter shy and skittish-like," he went on meditatively. "Ef she spies a man through the glass anywhar on the horizon, up flies her jib and mainsail, and away she skips and takes no 'count o' the weather."
That was an interesting piece of information to Brooks; the old man's guilelessness emboldened him to be more explicit.
"Then she is not married," he said; "or engaged to be married. But I suppose she has beaus?"
"Beaus! Bless ye, no. She ain't that kind of gal. Ye know Charlie Thurston, the drug clerk? Wal, he sorter cruised about her fur a year or more; signalled to her and sech like; but she didn't give him no show. Never answered his signals, nur hove him a line, nur nuthin'."
It was obvious that this was a favorite topic with the old man, for he went on without any urging, relating with much gusto anecdotes illustrative of the young girl's shyness and indifference to the charms of masculine society. Brooks felt tempted to put out a little feeler, just then, and remarked quite casually:
"By the way, I think I have seen her. Wasn't she out fishing last Monday?"
"Right ye be. That was Charity. She had been a-scuppin', but she didn't ketch nuthin'."
"I hope she got home safely—without any mishap. I saw her in her dory, lying a short distance beyond the jetty."
"It would have ter be a mighty smart mishap ter ketch up with her," chuckled the Captain, in amused retrospect. "I tell yer, she sails a boat as stiddy as any man in Poltucket. Ef she wa'n't a gal, she could take out her papers fur pilot, and beat 'em all at it. She's got a weather-eye as would make her fortune on the sea, ef the government hadn't killed our shippin' deader nor a door-nail and laid us all up in dry-docks fur ter die of dry rot and rheumatics."
Brooks could scarcely tell why the knowledge that she had not confided her adventure to the Captain filled him with satisfaction. Having gained this vantage ground, he determined to await her arrival, and in order to while away the time lighted a cigar and offered one to the Captain. They talked for an hour about the good whaling times before the war, about shark-fishing, and about the three great families which, springing from Poltucket, had played so prominent a part in commercial and political affairs. It was about five o'clock when they heard the outside gate click, and rapid steps approaching.
"Thar she blows!" said the captain, with a confidential wink to his visitor; "keep yer look-out and lay low."
These phrases, borrowed from his old whaling experience, conveyed but the faintest sort of meaning to Brooks.
"Does she blow?" he asked naïvely.
"You bet a chaw of terbacker that she do," said the old man and chuckled down into his very boots.
At this moment the door was flung open, and the girl, flushed with excitement, burst into the room.
"Captain," she cried breathlessly, opening her basket and showing him its contents; "what do you give me for that?"
She held a ten-pound bluefish close up to his nose, while her face beamed with pride.
"I'll be blowed ef it ain't bluefish," said the captain. "But who hauled it in fur ye? Ye tuk Charlie Thurston along with yer in the boat, didn't ye?"
He was about to appeal with a furtive glance to Brooks for appreciation of his delightful slyness, but a vigorous slap of the fish-tail upon his cheek frustrated his purpose. "Captain Jewell," she said, stamping her foot, "I am ashamed of you."
Brooks was amazed at such an exhibition of spirit, and the animation of her pretty face, usually so demure, took him no less by surprise. She gave the captain a vivid account of the day's adventures, and was scudding along at a brisk rate, when all of a sudden she broke off in the middle of a sentence, dropped her eyes and stared at the floor. The animation died out of her face, and the blood mounted to her cheeks and spread over her neck and forehead.
It was the sudden discovery of Brooks, sitting half hidden behind the opened door, which caused the transformation. It was pitiful to see her embarrassment. She seemed to look in vain for some crack or corner where she might creep and hide herself. If she had twisted her apron or bit her finger tips, in the conventional way, the Captain would have been relieved of his oppressive sense of guilt. But she stood utterly helpless, looking at him with the blank reproach of a creature which suffers but cannot retaliate.
"Wal now, I'll be blowed ef I hain't gone and done it," exclaimed the old mariner with a kind of half-hearted bravado; but he saw the vanity of persevering on that tack and promptly took his bearings. "I didn't mean to hurt yer, child," he added ruefully. "Ye know I be an old fool."
V.
The island of Poltucket is about as flat as a pancake. There is a saying there that, if your children go astray, you only have to stand up on a chair and look through an opera-glass; then you are sure to find them. To make assurance doubly sure, however, most of the houses in Poltucket are provided with a square platform or balcony on the roof, right around the chimney; and there you may see the aged sea-captains sit by the hour, sweeping the horizon with their telescopes. It may not be their children they are looking after; as these are apt to be beyond the age of parental tutelage, but anything, living or inanimate, on land or sea, affords a welcome break in the heavy monotony of life. A ship, if it be sound, calls half the population to their roofs; a wreck the whole. Charity Rowland was therefore perfectly in order when, the day after Brooks's visit, she was seen seated on the roof with her glass leveled toward some distant object. It was only Miss Herkomer, at Mrs. Morgan's, who found her action reprehensible; and that was probably because Miss Herkomer was herself, at that moment, engaged in marine observation. She had gotten Brooks in her focus, as he lay "scupping" in a boat out at the bell-buoy; and she had a suspicion that Charity's glass was leveled in the same direction. She had been Charity's champion, as long as she believed the whole affair to be a mere idle excitement, bred in the fancy of hysterical spinsters. But now a sharp pang of jealousy nestled in her heart; and she began to suspect that she was not so disinterested as she had imagined. And Charity, when suddenly she found Miss Herkomer's gaunt image in her focus with quite a sinister expression, and the threatening glass pointed unmistakably at herself, was smitten by her conscience, and in guilty confusion tumbled down the stairs. The damsel from Vassar, on the other hand, persevered for two hours in her task; and rather invited than repelled observation. She was endeavoring to persuade herself that her sham passion was real; while the poor little girl in Captain Jewell's garret stood with fear and trembling, staring at the wall, endeavoring to convince herself that her real passion was a delusion. A man was such a remote and formidable kind of creature to her, that it had never seriously entered into her calculations that he was indispensable to any sort of love romance ending in bliss or misery. But since her adventure at the end of the jetty, she had begun to think with vague thrills of joy and fear of the possibilities which such a relation involved. She lived over again in fancy, a hundred times, her sensations when she sat enthroned upon his arm, with the gulls and the wind shrieking in her ears and the wide glorious horizon all about her.
Such an hour,
When the shriveled life-germs burst into flower,
Compensates in a breath
For the chill and the darkness of death.
Miss Anastasia, in the deadly tedium of Mrs. Morgan's piazza, spent much time pondering on the relation of Brooks to Charity. Her own life had been desperately barren and devoid of incident. She had taken refuge in intellectual pursuits, as a dernier ressort, in order to make existence endurable. Otherwise she would have gone mad from sheer boredom. She had taken a lively interest in Charity, as long as she believed her to be a wronged member of her own sex. But she found it hard to forgive her the enjoyment of romantic misery and agitation. The telescope incident put a new face upon everything; it made her hate Charity, and yet vaguely desire to be near her. I am not sure that she resolved to outshine her intellectually, and by her superior charms to introduce an unpleasant complication into the romance which might otherwise run too smoothly. I think rather it was a dim craving for excitement which impelled her, and a dim but tantalizing curiosity as to what was really going on between those two mysterious and uncommunicative persons. She accordingly surprised Captain Jewell with a visit one afternoon, and quite dumfounded him by her lively interest in his baskets. She bought half a dozen, which she declared to be "immense," though they were but eight or ten inches in diameter; and importuned the old man to teach her how to make them. He saw no way of refusing, and finally agreed to give her lessons, at fifty cents an hour.
"And how is your sweet granddaughter?" asked Miss Herkomer with nervous vivacity; "I do hope she is well."
"She is underground these nine years, mum," answered the literal Captain; "I reckon she be comfortable."
"You don't mean to say so. Why no, that isn't possible; for I saw her only the other day, and she looked perfectly lovely."
"She was a likely child, mum, but she turned up her toes, nine years ago, in August, jest as the mackerel come, and the Spanish brigantine was wrecked on the south shore."
Miss Herkomer, feeling unequal to the further pursuit of the subject, transferred her interest to the wreck, and sat down on an empty soap-box, while the Captain consented to part with some fragments of information concerning the memorable event. He was endeavoring, with the utmost difficulty, to explain the uses of the life-saving apparatus, when the door to the kitchen was opened, and Charity entered. Miss Herkomer jumped up, put her arms about her waist, and kissed her with much effusion. She did not allow the girl's look of surprise in the least to dampen her ardor.
"I have missed you so much since you left, dear," she said; "and I regretted so much that lamentable affair with Mr. Brooks. I think he was horrid to subject you to such a humiliation; and I have never been able to forgive him for it. I assure you, I have not spoken to him once since you left. I don't suppose you have seen him, either, have you? "
"Yes," said Charity simply; "I have."
"Yes, of course, you couldn't help seeing him; but what I mean is, you haven't talked with him."
"Yes; I have talked with him too."
Anastasia was a trifle taken aback. She was not prepared for such sincerity. The thought occurred to her that Charity was crowing over her; or that perhaps she was deeper than anybody suspected.
"Now, dear, let us be perfectly frank with each other," she said; "there is nothing that I admire more than perfect sincerity. If there is one virtue I possess, it is that. You know, of course, it is of no consequence to me, one way or another, whether you have talked with Mr. Brooks."
She felt she had struck a false note there, before the words were fairly uttered; but her lips went mechanically and blundered on. There seemed to be a demon in her tongue, who delighted in this kind of transparent mendacity which deceived no one. She felt she was getting into deeper waters the longer she talked; and yet she could not stop without, somehow, appearing to herself awkward and foolish. The fact was, she was new to the rôle, having never cared enough for men to compromise her conscience on their account. But this miserable Brooks, in whom she had interested herself, at first, as a joke, had revenged himself by taking possession of her mind in a wholly unprecedented manner. She was now perfectly aware that she had lodged in Charity's heart the very suspicion she had intended to avert. She was looking anxiously toward the door, expecting, every moment, to see Brooks enter. Charity was sitting, with a kind of chilly wonder, watching her face, and dodging her direct questions with a childlike ingenuity which was admirable, because it looked like candor. As killing time was the object, Miss Anastasia again addressed herself to the Captain, who had been braiding his osiers automatically, and deplored the frequency of wrecks upon the Poltucket coast.
"It ain't no use whimperin', mum," the old man replied; "ef wrecks wasn't good fer somethin', the Lord wouldn't send 'em."
"Good for something!" exclaimed Miss Herkomer; "you don't mean to say that you like to see people perish!"
"I didn't say nuthin' of the sort, mum; but our folks has got ter live; and there ain't nuthin' else fer them to live on now, sence the guvernment killed the shippin'."
"Then you are, on the whole, glad when you hear of a wreck."
"I didn't say that, mum; I don't pray the Lord fer ships ter be wrecked; but I do pray the Lord that ef ships has ter be wrecked, they be wrecked on Poltucket."
The Captain showed a vigor of intellect on this one topic which was the more impressive, because of his decrepitude.
"I tell you, mum," he went on, after having moved his jaws, for some minutes, in silent indignation, "I voted the Republican ticket every blessed year, but now I don't no more. Sence they put up the two life-savin' stations on the island and six light-houses, I am a Democrat. And many more with me, mum; as they'll find out by and by, mum, when they put up their next man fer President."
VI.
Brooks was laboring under a difficulty which in all lands makes greatness more or less inconvenient. He was so conspicuous a figure in Poltucket that everything he did or said made something of a sensation. It seemed unchivalrous to him to expose the young girl who filled his thoughts to the cruel village gossip, unless he was irrevocably determined to ask her the fatal question. He despised himself for entertaining such pusillanimous considerations; for his ideal of a lover was a daring and unscrupulous Don Giovanni, whose joyous march of conquest was strewn with wrecked hearts. He saw himself constantly in spirit doing all sorts of audacious things which in the body he never could hope to attain. That little, timorous girl with the sweet, demure face, who looked up at him with those large, trustful blue eyes, how could he afford to experiment with her fragile heart, and throw it away, in case it should not prove to be worth keeping? He knew that, in case he made such a discovery, his pusillanimous conscience would get the better of his heroic aspiration, and he would end by keeping her heart, regardless of its value. He went occasionally to visit the Captain, and for want of anything better to do, presented him with high-flavored imported cigars, which the mariner ruthlessly bit in two, putting one half into his mouth and chewing it, and the other into his vest-pocket. After having chewed them, he dried the leaves and smoked them in a pipe. Brooks invariably, on these occasions, met Miss Herkomer (for she watched his movements through her telescope with great exactness) and was drawn into conversation with her about all sorts of nightmarish literary topics, which gave her a chance to parade her intelligence. It was obvious that the Fates were against him. There never was a courtship attended with more hopeless difficulties. The wrath of a father with a shot-gun, or of a deceived rival, thirsting for gore, would have been trifles compared with the dire vigilance of Miss Herkomer and a hundred other morbid moralists who sat in windows, on piazzas, and on the house-tops, taking social observations, all on the qui vive for scandalous developments.
It would never have occurred to Brooks that his chief persecutor should be the very one to extricate him from this sad dilemma. Miss Anastasia was inclined to believe that she had now advanced far enough in the young man's favor to risk a change of programme. She knew that the moon had the reputation of stimulating the hidden springs of sentiment in the masculine heart, and determined to arrange a moonlight sail, in which Brooks and herself should be the principal participators. She broached her plan cautiously to the Rev. Mr. Nichols, who, without suspecting ulterior motives, went headlong into the trap. He pleaded, with clerical innocence, for half an hour, to be allowed to invite Brooks, as the young man had, he thought, now been sufficiently punished for his faux pas, which had, after all, not been anything more than a youthful indiscretion. It is superfluous to add that Anastasia was convinced by this argument, and gave Mr. Nichols the desired permission. But when Brooks had accepted, she was not at all anxious to extend her hospitality further. She wanted a small, congenial party, she said, and Mr. Nichols was finally persuaded to coincide in her view. By some clever manœuvring, several were invited who, it was known, would be unable to go, and in the end the select and congenial party, when it met at three o'clock in the afternoon on the wharf, was found to consist of but four persons, the fourth of whom was Charity Howland. Brooks, who had done a little plotting of his own, had persuaded Nichols to hire Captain Jewell's catboat, (on charitable grounds as he urged) and as the young girl was amply competent to sail it, the guileless parson had concluded to engage her, and dispense with a sailing-master. That seemed, in view of what had occurred between him and Brooks (in whose good graces he was anxious to re-establish himself), a sort of amende honorable—a vote of confidence, as it were, the delicacy of which no one could fail to appreciate.
I shall not attempt to describe Anastasia's feelings, when she found herself outplotted in this shameful manner. She had to display a cheerful mask, of course, but it cost her a considerable effort. The plan was, to spend the afternoon fishing, take supper on board and sail home by moonlight, returning about 10 or 11 o'clock in the evening. The wind was fair, and the boat shot ahead at a good speed. Charity sat bare-headed at the rudder, holding the tiller with a firm grasp, and with a cool professional glance (which Brooks found ravishing) watching the sail, the water, and the horizon. She commanded "heads down" when she jibed, with a sang froid in which there was no trace of her customary timidity. The low sand-dunes that inclosed the harbor floated like enchanted isles upon the bosom of the sea, the vast vault of the sky was steeped in sunshine, and the gulls who rejoiced in its freedom seemed embodiments of bliss. If it had been Nichols and not Miss Herkomer who, in the midst of his glorious absorption in the elements, had asked Brooks what his opinion was of George Eliot's "Theophrastus Such," he would have felt tempted to do him bodily harm. In fact, the question jarred so violently on him that he had to exercise all his self-restraint, in order to give a polite answer.
"Oh, have pity on my youth and innocence, Miss Herkomer," he exclaimed with mock entreaty; "what have I done to thee, that thou should st thus maltreat me?"
"I fear, Mr. Brooks, you are one of those who disapprove of intellect in women," Miss Herkomer rejoined, with a primness which was in itself a rebuke to his levity.
"Not at all. I only hold that there are some things which are more valuable than intellect."
"More valuable than intellect! What are they, pray?"
"Health, first of all; innocence and simplicity of soul, sweet and unspoiled emotions."
He looked directly at the unconscious girl at the rudder, as if he read out of her face all the things which he found most admirable.
"You mean to say," demanded Miss Herkomer, with a note of exasperation which she found it hard to suppress, "that the mere crude health which any peasant or fisher-girl possesses is more valuable to the world than the noble intellect of a George Sand or a George Eliot?"
"If it is a question of universal application, I should say yes," answered Brooks fearlessly; "if you mean only in rare individual cases, I should say no. In my opinion, the world could better afford to spare in its womankind the intellect of George Eliot than the health which such intellectual attainments would be apt to undermine. George Eliot, as you know, died childless; if all womankind died childless, but with towering intellects, civilization would expire with us, and we should all have lived in vain."
Mr. Nichols, who had been trolling a bluefish line, here gave a shout, which happily interrupted the discussion. He rose in the boat with visible excitement, and began to haul with all his might.
"Keep your line taut," cried Charity, her eyes suddenly afire with interest;—"no, no! not that way, or you'll unhook him!"
"But he cuts my hands cruelly," whimpered Nichols. "I don't think I can stand it much longer."
"Take the tiller quick; and I'll haul him," said the girl, with quiet decision; and no sooner had the clergyman handed her the line, than, with five or six strong and steady pulls, she landed a splendid bluefish, weighing some six or seven pounds. Brooks, who could not get his eyes off her, was enchanted at the swift security and skill with which she handled the big fish, keeping at the same time a vigilant watch on the parson, whose manipulation of the tiller she evidently distrusted. Hers was no crude peasant face in which the primitive bovine virtues were legibly written. In her eye the fire of thought had been kindled, generations ago, and in the chiseling of her face nature had traced many a delicate intention. And yet, coupled with this, there were an admirable alertness of sense and practical skill which, to the young man who had spent his life among books and in the over-refinement of a foreign civilization, seemed wholly adorable. He had all his life seen helpless women who took a pride in their uselessness and ignorance of practical concerns; and by contrast, an efficient woman who, without the sacrifice of her womanly character and charm, could sail a boat, braid a basket, and cook a beefsteak, struck him as a fascinating novelty. He contrasted her deep and wholesome content with the intellectual contortions of Miss Herkomer, who skimmed with feverish restlessness over all the sciences, and was always uneasy lest she should not secure proper recognition for her attainments.
It is not improbable that Anastasia had a suspicion of what was going on in Brooks's mind; at all events, she was aware that she had displeased him by her question about "Theophrastus Such." She always felt an irrepressible irritation in the presence of men who undervalued the intellect of women; and neglected no opportunity to champion the cause of her oppressed sex. And yet, in the case of Brooks, it somehow heightened her respect for him, to know that he did not take her intellectual claims seriously. It did not occur to her "to give in," of course; but in her heart of hearts she rather liked his contemptuous tone, provoking though it was.
Nothing of any consequence occurred during the afternoon, except that several dozen scups were caught and a few sea-bass. At about seven o'clock they anchored near the island of Puckertuck, a mere reef or sand-dune, which is cut up into several islets at high tide, one of them supporting a light-house with a revolving light of three colors, and the summer cottage of a Bostonian, who thus advertises his love of solitude. The wind had stiffened somewhat, after sunset, and the tide was coming in, flowing with considerable violence over the shallow sand-flats. On the outer side of the reef they could hear the surf booming, and the wind flung, every now and then, a shower of spray toward them. The wicks were trimmed in the kerosene stove, and in an amazingly short time the big bluefish found himself split down the back and flung into the frying-pan.
"Hand me a match, please," said Charity, who was stooping over the stove, attending to the preliminaries of the banquet.
"A match? Why, certainly," answered Brooks and Nichols in chorus, and fumbled in their pockets.
"I confess I am almost hungry," said Anastasia, a little anxiously.
"I confess I am ravenous," remarked Nichols; "this sea-air has aroused in me a very unclerical appetite."
"Or say, rather, a very clerical appetite," suggested Brooks. "I do hope you have brought matches, for I have none."
"Nor have I," the clergyman rejoined, with a dismayed look; "I could have sworn I had some, but I must have left the box in my room."
An excited consultation ensued, during which Nichols suffered all the horrors of slow starvation, while Anastasia drew lots in fancy as to who was to be eaten, and found that her rival was designated for the sacrifice.
"We shall have to land at Puckertuck," said Charity. "I'll go up to Mr. Bateman's cottage and get some matches."
"But it is getting dark and foggy," Brooks objected. "You might be blown off to sea, and nobody know what had become of you."
"The moon is just rising; and anyway I am not afraid."
She sprang forward and pulled up the anchor, while Brooks hoisted the sail and Nichols got his feet entangled in the rope and came near falling overboard. In another instant she was at the tiller, ran the boat neatly up along the sandy shore, let the sail "lay to," flung the anchor up on the beach, and herself jumped after it.
"Hold on a minute," cried Brooks; "I am going with you."
He saw her form vanishing in the fog, but managed to catch up with her.
"Why do you want to run away from me?" he asked; but the thunder of the surf on the outer reef nearly drowned his voice and made it impossible to hear what she answered.
"Take my arm," he went on, "or I shall lose you altogether."
But she only hastened tremblingly on, and almost ran, as if to escape him. There was to him something sweet and primitive in this mute flight, which was no sham manœuvre, but prompted by a real fear. He fancied he could almost hear her heart beat in the twilight. All the great emotions lie close to each other in an unspoiled nature. It was not in ancient times only that women stood with fear and trembling in the presence of nature's great mysteries. To this shy and virginal soul the repellant quality of manhood was yet stronger than the attractive.
"It is no good trying to run away from me," said the young man, laughing; "I can beat you racing any day."
The fog was closing about them, and they seemed alone in an empty world. The moon looked like a dimly luminous spot in the mist, but emerged now and then with a pallid, frightened face, as the wind tore rifts in the vapors. The world seemed more than ever a world of shadows, unsubstantial, like the phantasms of a dream. He and she—the man and the woman, who loved each other—seemed to loom out of the fog as the only realities.
"Here is the Bateman cottage," said Charity, as an outline of denser obscurity became visible against the brighter mist which the moon pervaded.
"I fear they have all gone to bed," said Brooks; "there is not a light to be seen anywhere."
He walked about the house, knocking at doors and window-shutters, but received no response.
"The house is inhabited by the seven sleepers," he cried, as he rejoined Charity on the porch.
"I fear it is not inhabited at all," replied the girl; the people must have left yesterday. There were lights in the windows, night before last."
"I suppose, then, we had better try the light-house."
"I'm afraid the tide is too high; we can't get across."
"What do you propose to do, then?"
"Get back to town as fast as we can. The chances are that we shall hail some boat, as soon as the fog lifts; and then we can borrow matches."
They groped about in the twilight for a quarter of an hour, he keeping close in her track. The tide rose higher and higher, making the strip of sand upon which they walked narrower and narrower, and the surf roared along the outer reef with a deep and mighty voice. When they reached the point of land where they had put up the catboat, they began to halloo, but received no answer. Presently, they found the anchor and the rope attached to it. They stood long staring at it in speechless amazement.
"What does it mean?" exclaimed Brooks, at last; "is it a bad joke, or have they lost their senses?"
"I think I see it," Charity replied; "the clergyman was afraid to have the sail up, and so, to let it down, he untied by mistake the anchor line, and they drifted off."
"They will be sure to capsize," cried Brooks; "they will be blown to sea or perish in the breakers."
"No; the tide is running in. It'll take them back to town; if they manage to get the sail down, nothing can happen to them."
She seated herself, without visible agitation, on the beach, and he flung himself down at her feet. They were silent for a long while, listening to the heavy cannonading of the surf, which broke with its hoarse thunder against the narrow strip of sand upon which they were sitting. There was a tremendous rhythm in it—a pause, filled with a dull receding roar, then a fresh explosion of wrath, which shook the land's foundations. It seemed to her, as she sat listening, as if it were the earth itself breathing—inhaling, and exhaling,—as if she felt its mighty breast heaving. In the presence of this gigantic monster, which spoke with the voice of eternity in her ear, whose very gentlest whisper shook her innermost being, she felt herself so infinitely small. She looked half anxiously at the face of the youth who lay at her feet, and saw his features softened, as it were, through the fog. Her thoughts, her feelings, her very senses, were in a strange whirl, and all sorts of dim yearnings peeped forth, only to be hustled out of sight and bashfully hidden. She felt his eyes resting upon her tenderly, and with a sweet seriousness which made her glow and shiver in the same moment.
There must have been something sympathetic in the shiver, for he presently got up, and shivered too.
"It is getting dark," he said; "the moon will soon drop out of sight."
She made no answer, and he sauntered uneasily about her for a few minutes, gazing intently at her, as if he were battling with some great resolution. She looked lovely, as she sat there in the moon-lit fog, her eyes kindled with emotion, and her pensive, demure little face animated by a vague expectancy.
"Miss Charity," he began, his voice starting out of the dusk with sudden vehemence; "I have a world of things to say to you. I have——"
Before he had time to finish, a tremendous wave broke over the reef, spreading with scores of shallow arms over the sand. In an instant she was on her feet and rushed up the beach. But he caught her in his arms, and held her in a tight embrace, while the water gurgled about her ankles.
"You wished to say something to me," she whispered after a long silence.
He was about to answer, but found himself suddenly enveloped in an intense crimson illumination. He looked at Charity, and she too shone as if lighted up by Bengal light. It took him fully a minute to recover from his consternation, and to trace the singular phenomenon to its origin. It was the revolving light of the government light-house, which had accidentally flashed its blood-red sheen upon them. And it was owing to this circumstance that a belated fisherman who was tacking close to shore caught sight of them in the midst of the fleecy sea of indistinguishable fog.
"Man ahoy!" he called; and was not a little surprised when the answer came in a woman's voice.
He made out the mystery, however, by recollecting the passage in the marriage service which bids the two to be one.
This work was published before January 1, 1930, and is in the public domain worldwide because the author died at least 100 years ago.
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