A Volunteer with Pike Part 12

"You mean fifty."

Again he surveyed me; then appraised the rich broadcloth of my companion.

"Be ye buyin' fer him?" he queried.

"We make the trip together. I can go as high as a hundred and twenty-five. We could do better at Pittsburg, but are willing to give you the bargain, to save our boots."

He looked again from my mud-smeared buckskins to the senor's fine apparel, and smiled sourly. "Ye'll git no such boat at the price, here or at Pittsburg, if ye wait till the next freeze. One fifty is my best offer. Take it or leave it."

"Skiff, kedge, sweeps, poles, and steer-oar included," I stipulated.

He a.s.sented, with well-feigned reluctance: "As she stands--lock, stock, and barrel."

I handed him a five-bit piece. "Taken! Yet I'd have had you down fifteen more if we were not in haste."

"I'd ha' eased your high-nosed don of a round two hundred, my lad, had he done his own d.i.c.kering," muttered he, as, at a word from me, the senor drew out a bulging purse and counted into my palm the hundred and fifty dollars in American gold.

CHAPTER VIII

THE HOSPITABLE BLENNERHa.s.sETS

While our sour-faced boat-dealer made out his bill of sale, I wrote down a list of provisions and furnishings for the boat. Upon reading this to the senor, he suggested the addition of some articles which I would have regarded as needless luxuries. Leaving these to his own selection, I jogged to the store of a gruff old German ship-chandler, one of the Hessians against whom my father had fought at Monmouth and Trenton, and whose wife, on my last trip, I had been so fortunate as to cure of a quinsy.

The good Frau came in as I was giving my list into the charge of her husband, and would not take a refusal to her offer of hospitality.

Horse, list, and all were taken from me before I could defend myself, and I am not sure but what the Frau would herself have put me into the tub she made ready in the bedroom had I not begged for a dish of her sauerkraut and corned beef.

Cleansed and filled, I was given no peace until she had me safe between clean, dry sheets in their canopied fourposter. Having then been given sufficient respite to write a note of explanation to the senor, I rolled over and sank into that profound slumber of which I had so great need.

I awoke to find the sun up a good two hours and the hospitable couple beaming upon me as brightly as the sunrays which shone in through the diamond panes of the latticed window. The Frau held up my buckskins, all cleansed and dried and softened; the man showed my list, with every item checked and double checked, and a receipt from the party to whom I had agreed to deliver my last mount.

Between them I soon learned that the flatboat was well stocked for the voyage, and that the senor had sent word he was about to go aboard with his party. This last would have forced me to rise and accept the good wife's intended a.s.sistance with my dressing, had she not feared that I should rush off before she could serve my breakfast. I gulped my coffee while she tied on my moccasins. There was no question of other garments than my buckskins, since saddle and all had been stored aboard the flat.

When I at last made my escape, it was with a hot sausage in either hand.

These German delicacies followed the rye bread and coffee which had gone before, while I was riding to the wharf in my host's rattling ox-cart.

Greatly to my relief, despite the plodding pace of our beasts, we were first to reach the boat. I had time to overhaul the craft and say farewell to my good German friend. As he drove off, gruff-voiced but beaming, the well-remembered cherry-wood carriage came churning through the mire. The senor had retained the right to use it for this last service.

I was at the door, with my hand on the k.n.o.b, as the driver swung around. The senor stepped out, with a sonorous, "_Buenos dias_, doctor!"

For a fraction of a moment he seemed about to turn. Then he stepped aside, and left my way clear.

My lady drew out an arm from the depths of her great ermine m.u.f.f. Her plump, bare little hand lay in my brown fingers like a snowy jasmine bloom. There was mockery in the depths of her eyes, but the scarlet lips arched in a not unkindly smile.

"_Buenos dias_, senor!" she greeted me.

"It is truly a good day which brings me sight again of Senorita Vallois," I replied. "May this clear sky prove true augury of the voyage we are to share!"

"May it prove true augury of clear sunshine to follow! These weeping skies of England and your Republic! I long for a week of dry weather."

She shivered in her single-sleeved French cloak, whose white floss net and ta.s.sels added little to the warmth of her gauzy muslins. As for her head, even her light mantilla would have been more suitable to the weather than the jaunty cap of velvet and tigerskin.

"You are cold!" I said. "There is a fire aboard our craft."

I drew her hand beneath my arm and started to lead her down the wharf as a swarthy, hard-featured woman stepped from the carriage. The senorita spoke a few words in Spanish, and the woman turned to help the driver lift down the chests and boxes from behind, under the direction of Senor Vallois.

Handing the senorita down into the boat's stern, I led her into the living-room, or kitchen, and laid more f.a.gots upon the fire which I had kindled. In another moment I had her seated before the blaze, with a blanket about her graceful shoulders. As I knelt to place a stool for her little feet, she gazed down with the velvety eyes which had looked out upon me from the coach window in Washington.

"_Maria purisima!_" she murmured. "There are tales of gallant knights--"

"Who served and adored their ladies!" I added.

She glanced about at her uncle, who was entering through the middle room.

"_Madre de los Dolores!_" she called. "These physicians! Pray, rea.s.sure him, my uncle. He is convinced I shall suffer a chill."

"Not after the precautions I have taken," I rejoined with professional gravity as I rose. "The wonder is that Senorita Vallois has so long survived the sudden changes of our seaboard climate. I know little of temperatures abroad, but on this side of the Atlantic these thin Empire gowns are sheer murder."

"Granted," replied the senor. "Yet as a physician you have doubtless long since learned the futility of arguing the cut or material of a gown with a woman."

"Only too well, senor! Fortunately every day will now carry us both nearer a milder climate and nearer the Summer. Your chests are all aboard?"

"All. And yours, senor?"

"Mine will be waiting on the wharf at Pittsburg. We will put in for it as we drift past."

"It is well," he replied. I moved toward the outer door. "A moment, if you please, doctor. We voyage together many leagues. Among my friends I am addressed as Don Pedro."

"And I as Alisanda," added the senorita gayly. Her uncle raised his brows, but said nothing. She called toward the inner door, "Chita!--Chita!"

The woman appeared, and at a sign from her mistress, crossed toward me.

"Dr. Robinson, you have not before met my faithful Chita, because she was ill and had to be left in Philadelphia when we went to Washington.

Chita, this is he of whom I spoke."

The woman courtesied with a grace which belied her stout figure, her beady eyes riveted upon my face. When she straightened I ventured to surmise from the half smile which hovered about her hard mouth that if she was not already well-disposed toward me, she was at least not an enemy.

"It is well," said Don Pedro.

"All well--and ready to cast off," I added. "If the senorita--"

"Alisanda!" she corrected, with a flashing glance.

"If--Alisanda is quite warm, she may wish to witness the event."

"I will join you immediately," she responded.

With that I led Don Pedro out to the steer-oar and showed him how to hold it to aid in bringing us about. As our craft lay in a slow eddy, I had no difficulty in casting off. The townfolk and shipyard workers were far too busy with the rush of the Spring shipping to give heed to so common an event as the departure of a flat. But it was enough to call out all my skill and strength that I thrust off under the eyes of Alisanda.