A Summer's Outing Part 11

In India I met with a cunning native, who changed my locks from light to their present color, curly to straight; my complexion from florid to its olive hue. He taught me how to put a scar on my cheek that would deceive the eyes of a surgeon, but from which I could at any time free myself in a single night, and renew at will. So perfectly was my disguise, that my Indian servant, who had been with me for a year, failed to recognize me. He never knew me again. With my skin I changed my name. I was a stranger even when in my most frequented haunts, and as you see, am still disguised. I visited Siam, Burmah, China and Borneo. I wandered five years in the far East, and returned to America by the Pacific and Panama, and thence to New Orleans.

In that city, I went to a Mardi-Gras ball. On entering the brilliant a.s.sembly room, I was almost stunned by the sight of my wife, standing close by my side. She looked at me without recognition. She was the same cold, queenly woman. I was presented and talked to her of her husband, whom I had met in the far East. She seemed considerably interested in me, but did not evince the slightest emotion when I spoke of her husband and told her I had heard of his death in India.

She said in chilling tones she felt sure it was a false rumor. Had she shown any feeling, I think I would have tried to get her into my heart.

I went to my old home, and pretending to be shooting and belated, went to Jim Madison's cabin about sun-down and talked to him and Dinah.

Neither of them recognized me, but when her back was to me I spoke; she started, for my voice reached her memory. They were both true to Mars John, whom I told them I had known at college. Dinah shed bitter tears, because she could never see him again, and Jim would be like Simeon of old, if his eyes could rest upon him once more. They were to be trusted.

I went to the cabin door and finding there was no one in the neighborhood, I drew my hat over my face and said in my natural voice: "Jim, Dinah, don't you know me?"

They sprang to me at once, with a cry, "Oh bress de Lord, it's him,--it's him--it's Mars John" and for minutes I was pressed in their arms, while they shed tears and gave thanks to the good G.o.d. The two lowly hearts were true as steel to me, and would be willing to follow me to the ends of the earth. Jim was a teamster and had to draw a load of cotton to the nearest steam boat landing on the following day.

In my boyhood his aquatic qualities won my admiration and were the wonder of the negroes for many miles around. To my inquiry as to his ability in that line now, he proudly stated that "he was a duck a-top the water, an' a musrat under it." I then told him to be on the lookout, when on the wharf boat the next day; that I would be there; would manage to tumble into the river; he was to rescue me, and out of grat.i.tude I would purchase him and Dinah, and take them north to freedom.

We performed our comedy admirably. Water could scarcely drown me, for from childhood, I had been a water-dog, and when Jim made his wonderful dive, and brought me from the bottom, to which I had conveniently sunken the third time, I acted the drowned man so well, that the negroes around nearly killed me by rolling me on a barrel to get the water out of my stomach. I managed to be properly resuscitated, and in three days Jim and Dinah, paid for, were on their way north. They had no children, and left no ties behind. Jim says, "he is a bigger slave than ever, for I am always on his mind."

We reached Cincinnati last spring, and I feel certain my ident.i.ty can never be discovered. I have my two oldest earthly friends with me, and now my newest, and almost only other one. I am trying to recover a part of my fortune, for I had but little left when I reached this city. I came here because, the only words I ever distinctly caught from my brown shawled mate and her companions were, when the boy said, "but Cincinnati, you know"--that was all. I am here making a little money speculating in grain; using Jim's rheumatism to inform me as to weather probabilities and if prices will go up or down--and keeping my eyes always open for the only woman I have ever seen whom I can love.

And now fill up your chilbouque and let us have a gla.s.s of beer." He rang a bell and told Jim to open a couple of bottles of ale.

I was deeply impressed by the story--more so, than I cared my friend to see. To open up a light vein of conversation I asked:

"What was that you said about Jim's rheumatism?"

"I spoke in earnest;" answered Jack, "last summer and fall I used Jim's ankles to tell me if the weather would be favorable for crops.

He believes implicitly in his rheumatic prognostications. To humor him I follow his advice, and so far have never failed to make a good deal by so doing."

I thanked Felden for his story, and went home pondering upon his notions and pluck. It was strange to see a man who evidently so enjoyed lavish luxury, living as he did, when a beautiful wife, a vast fortune and high position were waiting for him, whenever he should acknowledge his proud name.

Toward the end of the winter, a messenger brought me, from Mr. Felden a request for the address of a first cla.s.s physician, and telling me Dinah was much indisposed. The next evening I dropped in at his house, but he begged to be excused. The message brought to the door by Jim, made me feel my visits were not desired for the time being. Ten days elapsed without any news from him, when I met Dr. J. and inquired as to the condition of his dusky patient.

"Oh! ho! Then I owe to you this new patient!"

I stated the circ.u.mstances.

"Well, Mr. Jamison, I thank you, for I have had a revelation at that bedside, for which I would not take a thousand dollars."

I expressed gratification and some surprise.

"You know," the genial doctor continued, "you know that I am an old time abolitionist, and one of the straightest kind."

I replied, I had often regretted the fact. Scarcely noticing my remark he went on:

"I have received a revelation, Mr. Jamison, and one that G.o.d willing!

will make me a more charitable--a braver, perhaps a better man. Think of it sir: I went to see this black woman, expecting to find her in charge of some other ignorant woman of her color. But instead of that, there was an elegant gentleman sitting at her bed side; his hand was upon her hot forehead, and every now and then he whispered, "Don't be afraid Mammy, little John is by you, and he will take care of you."

The poor creature was delirious. She thought herself on a southern plantation, and that some one was trying to do her bodily harm.

"When I stepped forward, he motioned me to be still. I am generally an autocrat in a sick room, but that man's look and gesture made me a regular sucking babe."

I laughed at the thought.

"You needn't laugh, sir. I am telling G.o.d's truth. Well! when he had quieted her, he took me into an adjoining room, and gave me his diagnosis of the case. It was the opinion of a man of science, absolutely correct. I left my prescription, promising to be on hand as early as possible the next morning. Would you believe it, sir, I was there before day-light? I wanted to see that man. I found him seated as he had been the night before, and learned he had been there ever since I left. She was still out of her head.

Something she said caused the gentleman to say, "She must be saved.

She and her husband are all that are left to me of a great plantation and five hundred negroes."

"Instead of feeling disgust for the owner of five hundred human beings, I felt they had lost a friend when they lost their master. For a whole week, that man never took off his clothes, and as far as I could see, never left that lowly bed side. I never saw such devotion.

It pulled her through; my drugs were a humbug, sir. That Christian gentleman saved her life."

The doctor took off his hat and mopped his brow. It was wet from the energy of his speech.

"It was a revelation to me, sir. Think of it! A man can own human beings, and still be a Christian. If our Saviour has a true follower on this earth, that born slave owner is of his chosen ones."

I told this to Felden a few days later. He smiled and said, "I thank the good doctor. Don't tell him I am a worshipper of the one unknown, and unknowable G.o.d. I reverence Jesus of Nazareth--I reverence Sidartha, the Buddh--I reverence Zoroaster. They were the greatest of men, whom long meditation sublimated and lifted above their kind. But there is only one G.o.d. No one of woman born, ever could, or can conceive his form.

The best and purest Christian I ever met was a Hindoo, not only in race, but in religion. Yet, he was a Christian in the true sense of the word. He lived and acted the life inculcated by Jesus. The next best was a Pa.r.s.ee worshipper of the sun. He did unto his kind as he would they should do unto him. He clothed the naked, fed the hungry and healed the sick; yet he gave the body of his beautiful and idolized daughter to be devoured by vultures on the Tower of Silence.

One of the genuine Christians I have met, was a Chinaman, who worshipped Joss, and daily knelt at a shrine erected to him in the back of his shop. He washed the wounds of a stranger, and nursed him for weeks, though his house was shunned as the home of pestilence.

"Forgive them Father, they know not what they do," might be offered up in behalf of fully one half of the good people of this Christian land.

They wrap themselves up in their egotism and their bigotry. They follow the blind lead of narrow minded preachers and make the pulpit their fetich. Bah! how I hate cant and hypocricy! Poor Dinah is as black as the ace of spades, but under her dusky breast is as white a soul as ever came from the breath of G.o.d; and I am supposed to be a good man, simply because I did not leave her to die like a crippled dog."

"No, Mr. Jamison, I am no better than I ought to be. Dinah nursed me on her breast and fed me from her life's blood, when I was helpless. I was only a man when I nursed her through this illness. I came to tell you she is nearly well again, and Jim wishes you to eat a dinner of his cooking to-morrow evening. Good day." And with that he showed me his straight back and ma.s.sive shoulders as he walked with swinging strides from the store.

We commenced fishing in March and spent many a pleasant hour together, on the water by day, and in his den at evening. Early in May, I went as per agreement to dine with him. Jim handed me a note. It read,

"Dear Jamison, go in and make the most of the dinner. I am off for how long, I know not. I met to-day, my fate of the brown shawl. I follow wherever it may lead me, never to stop until my doom be found.

Yours, in the height of folly,

JACK."

Jim informed me his master had come in a half hour before; after hurriedly filling a valise and satchel, he had jumped into the carriage, which brought him home, saying "Goodbye old folks, take care of the dogs, and expect me home, when you see me."

Jim added, "He's all right up here sah," touching his head, "but his heart's sort'er crazy."

I could scarcely taste the food, for I felt that there was over Jack, and thus over me, an impending disaster. I had become deeply attached to him. One knowing the intense nature of the man could not but fear he was following an ignis fatuus to his doom. Here was a married man, who had schooled his heart and reason to the belief he was not wedded--that his marriage was a fiction of the law, and not binding on his conscience. I was a religious man, and shuddered lest my friend with his marvelous fascinations, and goaded by a mad pa.s.sion, might do some act abhorrent to my notions of right.

Days and weeks of uneasiness on my own part, and apparently of distress on the part of the two colored servants pa.s.sed by, without a word from the absent one. At first I went to his house repeatedly to rest and to think of him, but finally satisfied myself with inquiries at the door.

About two months after his disappearance, it became necessary for me to make a journey to a distant state in the interest of our house. I was absent over a fortnight. Immediately upon my return, I visited the den (I had learned to call it thus). A white woman met me at the door with the information that she was the present tenant. She knew nothing of the late occupants, but referred me to a real estate firm as her landlords. I went to them. They knew nothing of the late tenants of the cottage, farther than, that Mr. Jack Felden had sent them the keys, and the rent to the end of the term. They found the premises in fine condition, but nothing to indicate where the people had gone.

It was evident that Felden had what he considered good reasons for not communicating with me. I was sure he sincerely liked me, and would not thus act, unless he desired to cover his tracks. I respected his wishes and did not afterwards refer to him. Desiring to work off my anxiety I went to the river for a hard trial at rowing. The man in charge of my boat handed me a note written he said, by himself at Jim's dictation. It simply said, "Mars Jack axes you to take his canoe for yersef. He won't want it no more. Good bye, sah, may de Lord be good to you, for Mars Jack loved you.

his Jim X Madison mark"

I soon learned to scull the outrigger called by Jim, canoe, and used it for years, but its late owner was seen by me no more in Cincinnati.

By degrees I ceased to expect him again. I often thought of him, and a prayer for his happiness became a part of my nightly supplication, before the throne of grace.