A Jolly Fellowship Part 15

Augustine with us. There was still another difference, and that was in Rectus. He was a good deal livelier,--more in the spirit that had hatched out in him in the cemetery at Savannah. He seemed to be all right with Corny now, and we had a good time together. I was going to say to him, once, that he had changed his mind about girls, but I thought I wouldn't. It would be better to let well enough alone, and he was a ticklish customer.

The day after we returned to St. Augustine, we were walking on the sea-wall, when we met Corny. She said she had been looking for us. Her father had gone out fishing with some gentlemen, and her mother would not walk in the sun, and, besides, she had something to say to us.

So we all walked to the fort and sat down on the wide wall of the water-battery. Rectus bestrode one of the cannon that stood pointing out to sea, but Corny told him she wanted him to get down and sit by her, so that she wouldn't have to shout.

"Now then," said she, after pausing a little, as if she wanted to be sure and get it right, "you two saved my life, and I want to give you something to remember me by."

We both exclaimed against this.

"You needn't do that," said I, "for I'm sure that no one who saw you coming up from the bottom, like the fairy-women float up on wires at the theatre, could ever forget you. We'll remember you, Corny, without your giving us anything."

"But that wont do," said she. "The only other time that I was ever really saved was by a ferryman, and father gave him some money, which was all right for him, but wouldn't do for you two, you know; and another time there wasn't really any danger, and I'm sorry the man got anything; but he did.

"We brought scarcely anything with us, because we didn't expect to need things in this way; but this is my own, and I want to give it to you both. One of you can't use it by himself, and so it will be more like a present for both of you together, than most things would be." And she handed me a box of dominoes.

"I give it to you because you're the oldest, but, remember, it's for both of you."

Of course we took it, and Corny was much pleased. She was a good little girl and, somehow or other, she seemed to be older and more sensible when she was with us than when she was bouncing around in the bosom of her family.

We had a good deal of talk together, and, after a while, she asked how long we were going to stay in St. Augustine.

"Until next Tuesday," I said, "and then we shall start for Na.s.sau in the 'Tigris.'"

"Na.s.sau!" she exclaimed, "where's that?"

"Right down there," I said, pointing out to sea with a crook of my finger, to the south. "It's on one of the Bahamas, and they lie off the lower end of Florida, you know."

"No," said she; "I don't remember where they are. I always get the Bahamas mixed up with the Bermudas, anyway. So does father. We talked of going to one of those places, when we first thought of travelling for his lung, but then they thought Florida would be better. What is there good about Na.s.sau? Is it any better than this place?"

"Well," said I, "it's in the West Indies, and it's semi-tropical, and they have cocoa-nuts and pineapples and bananas there; and there are lots of darkeys, and the weather is always just what you want----"

"I guess that's a little stretched," said Corny, and Rectus agreed with her.

"And it's a new kind of a place," I continued; "an English colony, such as our ancestors lived in before the Revolution, and we ought to see what sort of a thing an English colony is, so as to know whether Washington and the rest of them should have kicked against it."

"Oh, they were all right!" said Corny, in a tone which settled that little matter.

"And so, you see," I went on, "Rectus and I thought we should like to go out of the country for a while, and see how it would feel to live under a queen and a cocoa-nut tree."

"Good!" cried Corny. "We'll go."

"Who?" I asked.

"Father and mother and I," said Corny, rising. "I'll tell them all about it; and I'd better be going back to the hotel, for if the steamer leaves on Tuesday, we'll have lots to do."

As we were walking homeward on the sea-wall, Rectus looked back and suddenly exclaimed:

"There! Do you see that Crowded Owl following us? He's been hanging round us all the afternoon. He's up to something. Don't you remember the captain told us he was a bad-tempered fellow?"

"What did he do?" asked Corny, looking back at the Indian, who now stood in the road, a short distance from the wall, regarding us very earnestly.

"Well, he never did anything, much," I said. "He seemed to be angry, once, because we would not buy some of his things, and the captain said he'd have him told not to worry us. That may have made him madder yet."

"He don't look mad," said Corny.

"Don't you trust him," said Rectus.

"I believe all these Indians are perfectly gentle, now," said Corny, "and father thinks so, too. He's been over here a good deal, and talked to some of them. Let's go ask him what he wants. Perhaps he's only sorry."

"If he is, we'll never find it out," I remarked, "for he can only speak one word of English."

I beckoned to Crowded Owl, and he immediately ran up to the wall, and said "How?" in an uncertain tone, as if he was not sure how we should take it. However, Corny offered him her hand, and Rectus and I followed suit. After this, he put his hand into his pocket, and pulled out three sea-beans.

"There!" said Rectus. "At it again. Disobeying military orders."

"But they're pretty ones," said Corny, taking one of the beans in her hand.

They were pretty. They were not very large, but were beautifully polished, and of a delicate gray color, the first we had seen of the kind.

"These must be a rare kind," said Rectus. "They are almost always brown.

Let's forgive him this once, and buy them."

"Perhaps he wants to make up with you," said Corny, "and has brought these as a present."

"I can soon settle that question," said I, and I took the three beans, and pulled from my pocket three quarter-dollars, which I offered to the Indian.

Crowded Owl took the money, grinned, gave a bob of his head, and went home happy.

If he had had any wish to "make up" with us, he had shown it by giving us a chance at a choice lot of goods.

"Now," said I, reaching out my hand to Corny, "here's one for each of us. Take your choice."

"For me?" said Corny. "No, I oughtn't to. Yes, I will, too. I am ever so much obliged. We have lots of sea-beans, but none like this. I'll have a ring fastened to it, and wear it, somehow."

"That'll do to remember us by," said I.

"Yes," said Rectus, "and whenever you're in danger, just hold up that bean, and we'll come to you."

"I'll do it," said Corny. "But how about you? What can I do?"

"Oh, I don't suppose we shall want you to help us much," I said.

"Well, hold up your beans, and we'll see," said Corny.

CHAPTER X.