Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1888-02-04
CASS.
CHAPTER !.


and are less jovial the steamers buster
in with an air of proprietorship, lie by and
shrek shrilly, take up their cargoes of ex-
cursionists and baskets and buster out
again, with much hauling of ropes, much
shouting and counter-shouting and oaths
tempered to the ears of polite pleasure par
ties. In the year 1860 the boatmen watched
their rivals jealousy and were eloquent in
the language of abuse. Their rivals have
multiplied; the boatman of to-day is
gloomy and has no longer the spirit to
rail. 1t is still place of mysterious
charm to the ragged, shoeless, cheerful
town urchins who ccngregate near the wa
ter's edge. The shops do a brisk trade
still in boiled beef and ham, buns and
pastry, flannels and printed cottons, she'll
fish, nautical instruments, and beer and
stout drank on the premises and still, in
doors and out of doors, the wholesome
odors Of rope and tar and seaweed pervade
everything. But the shops nearest the sea
have gone; after the fire in 1860 they
pulled down the two old houses and built
again on their sites. And Cas-, who used
to stand there, with her brown arms bare
to the elbow, her hands on her hips, fear
less as the sailors, and as ready with her
laugh and jest and abuse-Cass is gone
with the old houses and the old times.
Cas- was the beauty Of the Hard, and
knew it, and enjoyed the knowledge. She
enjoyed it as Prince enjoys his title and
an old poet his renown; she would have
scorned to let admiration futter her. She
sat on the doorstep OF the shop when she
was a child and looked up into the faces of
strange ladies and gentlemen who pointed
her out to one another suddenly as they
passed, and was unabashed when they
stopped to survey her closely. She looked
steadily up at them with fearless eyes and
rare bushes. The fine gentlemen smiled
at her, the fine ladies lifted their gowns a
little and bent down to question her in
SIMPLE language.
And what is your NAME little girl ?"
Cass Brady. What's yourn?" She said,
and looked at her friends the boatmen to
approve and applaud her coolness
The gentlemen would laugh as they
strolled on the ladies would murmur some
thing gently about manners. Cass had
sharp ears and a clear young voice Her
voice would follow the strangers on their
way.
Manners An where's yer own? Man
ners good as yourn any day, l reckon
When pays me penny week | won come
your way. No fearw And the boatmen
applauded loudly.
"Give 'em as good as they brought" said
Cass.
Trust you" said the men admiringly.
Cass was pretty at years old and pref
tier at Is. Her skin was as warm a brown
as that of the young Italians who sung in
the streets in picturesque attire; her eyes
were as brown as theirs and brighter and
more fearless her hair grew long and swept
back in big waves from her brow her teeth
were white, her lips rosy without being
sensual her head was well poised, her fig
ure strongly yet slenderly knit If she
laughed and talked too loudly for the pub
lie street; if her repartee was sometimes
more rough than decorous, her audience
was not critical on these points. The old
men grinned at her benignly; the young
men liked girl who could hold her OWL, cap
Jest with Jest, turn the satire against the
satirist, laugh indifferently at compliments
and whistle and hum unmoved when the
chapel preacher and the temperance mis-
sionary came down to the Hard to prosely-
tie.
The shop, the doorway of which Ciss
loved, was shop that sold cooked meats,
hot and cold potatoes Drowned at the top,
moist with gravy beneath, steaming tea
and coffee, homemade cake of a rich and
weighty kind and many other delicacies-
a shop which described itself vulgarly as
an eating house" A manufactured, gray
complexioned woman sat behind the coun-
ter, served her customers deliberately with
no unbecoming eagerness, and served all
alike without favor, melting out the exact
proportion of butter to each slice of bread,
the Just amount of fresh mustard to each
plate. Her lips were straight, and opened
and shut without lending much expression
to her face; her eyes rested shrewdly but
without interest on her customers and ac-
quaintances, on Emily, her gentle niece,
and on Cas-, her daughter. She was
woman who had seen trouble, and her
troubles had made her stolid.
Mrs Brady's was a well populated house :;
every room had its lodger, some more than
one The dodgers were for the most part old,
lonely weather-beaten men who turned in
at night and out in the morning and made
illtlG NOIh. lucy tOOh illCtl pitdhldSlS.
and sometimes teas and suppers, in two
dark little rooms behind the shop, where
the tables had oilcloth covers which could
be washed down and dried on the spot at
moments notice, without expense. Emily,
in patient, gently way, brought the
meals: Cass came in and out and brought
laughter to season the meals, and heard
complimentary comments on her bright
eyes, her pretty lips and complexion and
was in no way disconnected. And when
Jim Cross, the youngest ledger, with whom
Cas- for the last four years had been keep
ing company" looked up sternly and dis
approvingly, Cas- staid longer and laughed
more gayly to prove her freedom.
Things were going wrong between Jim
and Cass. Perhaps some one was making
mischief secretly; perhaps the preach
ings" Jim had attended lately, and his
new, severe religious views made him
clear-sighted about Cas- and the ungodly
bent of her nature; perhaps-it is useless
speculating-things were going wrong, and
Cas- was unconciliating and too proud to at
tempt to set them right. And at last they
reached crisis.
1t was late in winter. The short after
noon was almost over, and the gas, lust
lighted in the public house next door to
the Brady's, shone out through the red cur
tains and made the wet street darker and
colder. Cas- looked at the gray water and
she moored boats and shivered, and up at
the starless sky and shivered again. There
was no one to talk to and nothing to look
at The Hard was deserted. Presently a
sailor passed Cass, and said, Goodnight,
me dear" Familiarity
GOOD night" said Cas-, friendly ever,
whether to friend or stranger. How long
have been yer dear ?''
Her mother, sewing in her shop, raised
her eye sfrom her work just then, and called
TO her in flat, level tones to come indoors
and Cass at her leisure obeyed.
What be doiu' there? You'm always