Caleb West, Master Diver Part 21

Henry Sanford, Contractor.

"Come, Captain Joe," said Sanford, "put your signature under mine."

The captain held the pencil in his bent fingers as if it had been a chisel, and inscribed his full name, "Joseph Bell," under that of Sanford. Then Caleb and the others followed, the diver fumbling inside his dress for his gla.s.ses, the search proving fruitless until Captain Joe ran his arm down between the rubber collar of the diving-dress and Caleb's red shirt and drew them up from inside his undershirt.

"Now, Captain Joe," said Sanford, "you can send a gang in the morning at low water and raise that concrete. It will throw the upper masonry out of level, but it won't make much difference in a circle of this size."

The men gave a cheer, the humor of the situation taking possession of everyone. Even Caleb forgot his sorrow for a moment. Carleton laughed a little halting laugh himself, but there was nothing of spontaneity in it. Nickles, the cook, who, now that the cut stone was about to be laid, was permanently transferred from the Screamer to the shanty, and under whose especial care this door was placed by reason of its position,-it opened into the kitchen,-planted his fat, oily body before the curious record, read it slowly word for word, and delivered himself of this opinion: "That 'ere door's th' biggest receipt for stores I ever see come into a kitchen."

"Big or little," said Captain Joe, who could not see the drift of most of Nickles's jokes, "you spatter it with yer grease or spile it any, and ye go ash.o.r.e."

CHAPTER XIV

TWO ENVELOPES

Betty's flight had been of such short duration, and her return home accomplished under such peculiar circ.u.mstances, that the stories in regard to her elopement had multiplied with the hours. One feature of her escapade excited universal comment,-her spending the night at Mrs. Leroy's. The only explanation that could be given of this extraordinary experience was that so high a personage as Mrs. Leroy must have necessarily been greatly imposed upon by Betty, or she could never have disgraced herself and her home by giving shelter to such a woman.

Mrs. Leroy's hospitality to Betty inspired another theory,-one that, not being contradicted at the moment of its origin by Aunty Bell, had seemed plausible. Miss Peebles, the schoolmistress, who never believed ill of anybody, lent all her aid to its circulation. The conversation out of which the theory grew took place in Aunty Bell's kitchen. Betty was upstairs in her room, and the talk went on in lowered tones, lest she should overhear.

"I never shall believe that a woman holding Mrs. Leroy's position would take Betty West into her house if she knew what kind of a woman she was," remarked the elder Miss Nevins.

"And that makes me think there's some mistake about this whole thing,"

said Miss Peebles. "Who saw her with Lacey, anyhow? n.o.body but the butcher, and he don't know half the time what he's talking about, he rattles on so. Maybe she never went with Lacey at all."

"What did she go 'way for, then?" asked the younger Nevins girl, who was on her way to the store, and had stopped in, hoping she might, by chance, get a look at Betty. "I guess Lacey's money was all gone-that's why she imposed on Mrs. Leroy."

"I don't believe it," said Miss Peebles. "Betty may have been foolish, but she never told a lie in her life."

"Well, it may be," admitted the younger sister in a softened tone. "I hope so, anyhow."

Aunty Bell kept still. Betty was having trouble enough; if the neighbors thought her innocent, and would give her the benefit of the doubt, better leave it so. There were one or two threads of worldly wisdom and canny policy twisted about the little woman's heart which now and then showed their ends.

Captain Joe was in the sitting-room, reading. He had come in from the Ledge, wet, as usual, had put on some dry clothes, and while waiting for supper had picked up the "Noank Times." Aunty Bell and the others saw him come in, but thought he had changed his clothes and had gone to the dock.

He had overheard every word of the discussion. There were no raveled threads in the captain's make-up. He threw down his paper, pushed his way into the group, and said:-

"There's one thing I don't want no mistake over, and I won't have it.

Betty didn't tell no lies to Mrs. Leroy nor to n.o.body else, an' I ain't a-goin' to have n.o.body lie for 'er. Mrs. Leroy knows all about it. She took care of her 'cause she's got a heart inside of her. Betty went off with Bill Lacey 'cause he'd hoodooed 'er, an' when she come to herself she come home agin: that's all ther' is to that. She's sorry for what she's done, an' ther' ain't n.o.body outside o' heaven can do more. She's goin' to stay here 'cause me and Aunty Bell love her now more'n we ever did before. But she's goin' to start life agin fair an' square, with no lies of her own an' no lies told about 'er by n.o.body else." The captain looked at Aunty Bell. "Them that don't like it can lump it. Them as don't like Betty after this can stay away from me," and he turned about on his heel and went down to the dock.

Two currents had thus been started in Betty's favor: one the outspoken indors.e.m.e.nt of Captain Joe; and the other the protection of Mrs.

Leroy, "the rich lady who lived at Medford, in that big country-seat where the railroad crossed, and who had the yacht and horses, and who must be a good woman, or she wouldn't have come to nurse the men, or sent them delicacies, and who came herself to put up the mosquito-nets over their cots."

As the August days slipped by and the early autumn came, the gossip gradually died. Caleb continued to live alone, picking up once more the manner of life he had practiced for years aboard the light-ship: having a day every two weeks for his washing,-always Sunday, when the neighbors would see him while on their way to church,-hanging out his red and white collection on the line stretched in the garden. He cooked his meals and cleaned the house himself. n.o.body but Captain Joe and Aunty Bell crossed his threshold, except the butcher who brought him his weekly supplies. He had been but seldom to the village in the daytime,-somehow he did not like to pa.s.s Captain Joe's when any one could see him,-and had confined his outings to going from the cabin to the Ledge and back again as his duties required, locking the rear door and hanging the key on a nail beside it until his return.

He had seen Betty only once, and that was when he had pa.s.sed her on the road. He came upon her suddenly, and he thought she started back as if to avoid him, but he kept his eyes turned away and pa.s.sed on.

When he reached the hill and looked back he could see her sitting by the side of the road, a few rods from where they met, her head resting on her hand.

Only one man had dared to speak to him in an unsympathetic way about Betty's desertion, and that was his old friend Tony Marvin, the keeper of Keyport Light. They had been together a year on Bannock Rip during the time the Department had doubled up the keepers. He had not heard of Caleb's trouble until several weeks after Betty's flight; lighthouse-keepers staying pretty close indoors.

"I hearn, Caleb, that the new wife left ye for that young rigger what got his face smashed. 'Most too young, warn't she, to be stiddy?"

"No, I ain't never thought so," replied Caleb quietly. "Weren't no better gal 'n Betty; she done all she knowed how. You'd 'a' said so if ye knowed her like I did. But 'twas agin natur', I bein' so much older. But I'd rather had her go than suffer on."

"Served ye durn mean, anyhow," said the keeper. "Did she take anything with 'er?"

"Nothin' but the clo'es she stood in. But she didn't serve me mean, Tony. I don't want ye to think so, an' I don't want ye to say so, nor let n.o.body say so, neither; an' ye won't if you're a friend o' mine, which you allers was."

"I hearn there was some talk o' yer takin' her back," the keeper went on in a gentler tone, surprised at Caleb's blindness, and anxious to restore his good feeling. "Is that so?"

"No, that ain't so," Caleb answered firmly, ending the conversation on that topic and leading it into other channels.

This interview of the light-keeper's was soon public property. Some of those who heard of it set Caleb down as half-witted over his loss, and others wondered how long it would be before he would send for Betty and patch it all up again, and still others questioned why he didn't go over to Stonington and smash the other side of Lacey's face; they heard that Billy had been seen around there.

As for Betty, she had found work with a milliner on the edge of the village, within a mile of Captain Joe's cottage, where her taste in tr.i.m.m.i.n.g bonnets secured her ready employment, and where her past was not discussed. That she was then living with Captain Joe and his wife was enough to gain her admission.

There had been days, however, after her return, when she would have given way under the strain, had it not been for her remembered promise to Mrs. Leroy,-the only woman, except Aunty Bell, who had befriended her,-and for the strong supporting arm of Captain Joe, who never lost an opportunity to show his confidence in her.

And yet in spite of these promises and supports she could have plunged into the water many a time at the end of the dock and ended it all.

She would sit for hours in her little room next Aunty Bell's, on Sat.u.r.day afternoons, when she came earlier from work, and watch for the Screamer or one of the tugs to round in, bringing Caleb and the men. She could not see her own cottage from the window where she sat, but she could see her husband come down the sloop's side and board the little boat that brought him to his landing. She would often think that she could catch his good-night as he pushed off. On Monday mornings, too, when she knew he was going out, she was up at daylight, watching for a meagre glimpse of him when the skiff shot out from behind the dock and took him aboard to go to his work on the Ledge.

Little by little the captain's devotion to Betty's interests, and the outspoken way in which he praised her efforts to maintain herself, began to have their effect. People who had pa.s.sed her by without a word, as they met her on the road, volunteered a timid good-morning, which was answered by a slight nod of the head by Betty. Even one of the Nevins girls-the younger one-had joined her and walked as far as the milliner's, with a last word on the doorstep, which had detained them both for at least two minutes in full sight of the other girls who were pa.s.sing the shop.

Betty met all advances kindly, but with a certain reserve of manner.

She appreciated the good motive, but in her own eyes it did not palliate her fault,-that horrible crime of ingrat.i.tude, selfishness, and waywardness, the memory of which hung over her night and day like a pall.

Most of her former acquaintances respected her reserve,-all except Carleton. Whenever he met her under Captain Joe's roof he greeted her with a nod, but on the road he had more than once tried to stop and talk to her. At first the attempt had been made with a lifting of the hat and a word about the weather, but the last time he had stopped in front of her and tried to take her hand.

"What's the matter with you?" he said in a coaxing tone. "I ain't going to hurt you."

Betty darted by him, and reached the shop all out of breath. She said nothing to any one about her encounter, not being afraid of him in the daytime, and not wanting her affairs talked of any more.

If Caleb knew how Betty lived, he never mentioned it to Captain Joe or Aunty Bell. He would sometimes ask after her health and whether she was working too hard, but never more than that.

One Sat.u.r.day night-it was the week Betty had hurt her foot and could not go to the shop-Caleb came down to Captain Joe's and called him outside the kitchen door. It was pay-day with the men, and Caleb had in his hand the little envelope, still unopened, containing his month's pay. The lonely life he led had begun to tell upon the diver.

The deathly pallor that had marked his face the first few days after his wife's departure was gone, and the skin was no longer shrunken, but the sunken cheeks remained, and the restless, eager look in the eyes that told of his mental strain.

Caleb was in his tarpaulins; it was raining at the time.

"Come in, Caleb, come in!" cried Captain Joe in a cheery voice, laying his hand on the diver's shoulder. "Take off yer ileskins." The captain never despaired of bringing husband and wife together, somehow.

Betty was sitting inside the kitchen, reading by the kerosene lamp, out of sound of the voices.

"No, I ain't washed up nor had supper yit, thank ye. I heared from Aunty Bell that Betty was laid up this week, an' so I come down." Here Caleb stopped, and began slitting the pay-envelope with a great thumb-nail shaped like a half-worn shoe-horn. "I come down, thinkin'

maybe you'd kind'er put this where she could git it," slowly unrolling two of the four bills and handing them to the captain. "I don't like her to be beholden to ye for board nor nothin'."