Down South Part 23

"I don't want to go with him," said she, with a good deal of energy.

"If I could have found a place in a steamer going north, or anywhere that would take me away from him, I would have left him a year ago;"

and her bright eyes snapped as though she meant all she said.

"How long have you been married?"

"Two years; and I was very foolish to have him. Griffin is a bad man,"

said she, shaking her head. "He was discharged from the Charleston steamer for getting up a fight, and drawing a knife on the steward. He beats me and abuses me, and I have been miserable ever since I married him. I have often been afraid of my life, he is so violent, especially when he has been drinking."

"Does he drink hard?"

"Only when he is ash.o.r.e. If he did it on board any steamer, they would discharge him right off. When this trip in the Sylvania is done, I shall have a little money, and then I shall leave Florida by the first train, if the ladies will give me a recommendation so that I can get a place. I mean to change my name, and keep out of Griffin's way as long as I live, for he will kill me if I live with him. I had no comfort for a year till I came on board of this vessel."

"You were living in St. Augustine, were you?"

"Lived everywhere; we had been in St. Augustine two months when we engaged on this steamer. Griffin had a place at a hotel, and was turned off for getting drunk, and fighting. He must have been very bad, or they would not have let him go when they were so short of waiters. He wouldn't let me work anywhere, though I had plenty of chances to wait on table, and one to go in the San Jacinto to Na.s.sau. He was afraid I should get some money and leave him, as I told him I would after he had whipped and kicked me. I have a mark on my shoulder where he bit me, not a week before we came on board of this vessel."

My sympathies were greatly excited; but in a quarrel between man and wife, I had heard older people say no one should interfere unless they came to blows, and I said nothing.

"Griffin sailed in some vessel with Mr. Cornwood, I believe," I added.

"Never in this world!" protested Chloe. "He was born and raised in Fernandina, as I was; and I can tell where he was every hour of his life, up to our marriage. He was on the same steamer with me three years, and both of us were at home up to that time."

"Why did you marry him if you knew him so well?" I asked, much interested in her story.

"Because I was foolish, and thought I could manage him. Perhaps I could, if he didn't drink no liquor."

"I was not aware that he was a drinking man."

"If you had got near enough to smell his breath to-day, you would have known that he drank liquor. He never seems to be very bad, but whiskey makes him ugly."

"He seems to be a good friend of Mr. Cornwood," I suggested.

"Well, he ought to be; for Mr. Cornwood got him out of a very bad sc.r.a.pe when he nearly killed a man in Jacksonville last January. I don't think much of Mr. Cornwood, neither. I reckon he uses Griffin as a witness when he wants one, for Griffin will swear to anything."

"Did Mr. Cornwood ever fall overboard, and Griffin save him?"

"Never in this world! He never sailed in the same vessel with him, except this one."

"Do you know Captain Parker Boomsby, Chloe?"

"Never heard of him before."

"You had better go to the cabin now. As long as you remain on board, I will see that you are protected," I said, rising from my stool, for it was about time for the pilot to come on deck.

"Thank you, Captain Garningham. I have told the ladies how I am situated, and they promise to help me all they can," replied Chloe, as she tripped lightly to the companion-way aft.

It appeared from the statement of the stewardess that Cornwood had been lying to me right along in regard to Griffin Leeds. He had no interest in him, except to have him on board to act as a spy and listener upon me. But in spite of this fact--and I had no doubt it was a fact--Cornwood was an exceedingly useful person on board of the Sylvania. I could not believe that he had been acting as a guide for parties, though it was plain that he was entirely familiar with the State of Florida.

The pilot took his place at the wheel, and Washburn and I went to supper. We talked freely before Cobbington, who told us that Cornwood had offered him five dollars to be a witness in a case of a.s.sault he had not seen; but he would rather starve than commit a crime.

CHAPTER XXIV.

GREEN COVE SPRINGS AND GOVERNOR'S CREEK.

By the time we had finished our supper, the steamer was in sight of Green Cove Springs. Magnolia was abreast of us, and we had pa.s.sed Hibernia; but nothing was in sight from either place except the hotels, where winter boarders from the North are domiciled, and at the former a few cottages. There were plenty of "crackers," or natives, in the country; but they did not appear to live on the banks of the river. The ladies were seated in the pilot-house, observing the scenery, which by this time had become a little monotonous, though the scene was always delightful, for we had only the varying breadth of the river, and the forest. Occasionally we saw a few old red cedars, whose fantastic forms excited attention for a time, with their trunks divided like an inverted V, near the surface of the water. The bluffs, when there were any, were covered with blackberry vines, all in blossom, so that they looked like snow banks in the distance.

"You must get up early in the morning, ladies, and take a bath in the warm water of the spring," suggested Mr. Cornwood as we approached the village, which had quite a number of houses, compared with any other place we had seen since we left Jacksonville.

Mrs. Shepard had heard of the spring, and was desirous of trying its waters. As we approached, we discovered a small steam-yacht anch.o.r.ed off an old wharf, nearly in front of the Union Hotel. It was a very pretty craft, very broad for her length, and evidently did not draw more than two feet of water, or perhaps three. Before we came up with her Cornwood had rung the speed-bell, and we were moving very slowly.

He rang the gong when we were abreast of the yacht, and then gave two strokes of the bell to back her.

"Let go the anchor!" he shouted to the deckhands forward, for as the pa.s.sengers were to remain on board all night, I thought it was better to be off in the stream than at the wharf.

The Sylvania brought up to her cable about half-way between the end of the long pier, where the steamers made their landings, and the little steam-yacht. It was almost dark when we anch.o.r.ed, and I could not obtain a very good view of the village. In the evening our musicians were called for. Then the absence of Griffin Leeds was regretted, as he played the violin; but Cobbington declared that he had played that instrument for years before he left home: only he had no fiddle.

Fortunately, Landy Perkins, who played the violoncello, and was learning to play the violin, had one, and our orchestra was complete.

It was a beautiful, mild, and soft evening, and our party stayed on deck until eleven o'clock. I arranged an anchor-watch, so that two of the ship's company should be on deck all the time, one forward and the other aft, day and night. They were to allow no one to come on board, unless by permission of the captain or mate; and Washburn and I had agreed that one of us should remain on board all the time. Our pa.s.sengers did not care to have strangers staring at them, and no one was willing that Griffin Leeds should put his feet on the deck of the Sylvania again.

Early in the morning the boats were dropped into the water, and put in proper condition for use. At six in the morning the steward called the pa.s.sengers, as required by them, and a little later we landed them at some steps on the pier, near the sh.o.r.e, so that they had not far to walk. Mr. Cornwood and I remained on sh.o.r.e to a.s.sist the party. At the head of the wharf we found a store, a billiard-hall and a bar-room, and other evidences of civilization. A street on the right led to the Union Hotel and the Riverside Cottages, and one on the left to Orange Cottage, the two latter being large boarding-houses, which we found were occupied by people from the North.

Following the street from the wharf, we came to the Clarendon Hotel, the most pretentious establishment in the place. At the office of this house Cornwood obtained tickets for the baths. The spring and the bathing-houses are inclosed in a park, ornamented with live-oaks. We descended to the spring, around which a platform is built. The spring was similar to that we had seen at Orange Park, though there were no clouds of sand rising from the bottom of it. Though the water was eighteen feet deep, we could see to the bottom of the tunnel-shaped hole from which it issued. Its temperature was 76, and it had a very strong odor of sulphur.

We all drank a dipper each of the water, which was perfectly transparent, and I thought it was not "bad to take" as a medicine. There is a bath for ladies, and another for gentlemen. Ours was a swimming-bath, about sixty feet long; and I must say that the water was perfectly delightful.

I was told that the place was bad for consumptives, but the water was excellent for rheumatism, dyspepsia, and kidney complaints; but as I had none of them, I know nothing at all about its virtues. Colonel Shepard declared that he felt like a new man after the bath, and even the invalid Mrs. Shepard was as frisky as a young lamb. The bath was certainly a great luxury to all of us. We took a walk about the place, and found the village was very much like the rural part of Jacksonville.

The gardens were crowded with orange-trees, and the mocking-birds filled the air with their melody.

In walking over to Orange Cottage we had to cross a bridge, about fifteen feet above the water, which was a stream flowing from the spring. It was the clearest water I had ever seen, and I have gazed into the crystal tide of Lake Superior, which has a great reputation for its purity. A boat was floating on the surface, and I saw great catfish swimming lazily out of the pool. Back of the village was the forest of pine, magnolia, and live-oak. We walked far enough to see the homes of some of the crackers, which were rude and primitive.

After breakfast we landed again, and followed "St. David's Path" to Magnolia. It was through the woods, on the bank of the river. "St.

David," though he was not the original champion of Wales, had a very fine residence near the entrance to the wood. I believe he was canonized for the ink he made. Near the house we found some magnolia leaves that were nearly a foot long. The blue sand in the path was as hard as a rock, and it was strange that anything would grow in it.

The proprietor of Orange Park resented the idea, when some one called the soil nothing but blue sand; and taking up a handful of it, he rubbed it between his palms. The skin was considerably stained by the operation, which could not have been the case if the earth had been simply house-sand, as it is called in the North. We all knew that the finest oranges, bananas, lemons, sugar-cane, as well as strawberries and garden vegetables, grew out of it.

At the bridge which crosses Governor's Creek, on the other side of which is the Magnolia House, we found the boats, which had been ordered to be here. We all embarked, and ascended the creek. Our course was through water-weeds and tiger-lilies; but we soon came to clear water.

An old mill stood by the sh.o.r.e.

"There is a friend of yours, Captain Garningham," said Cornwood, as he pointed to a log, one end of which was submerged in the creek.

On the log, coiled up, with his head in the middle and resting on one of the folds of his body, was a moccasin snake just like the one I had seen in the attic room of Captain Boomsby's house.

"Mercy!" exclaimed Miss Margie. "It is a snake! Let us get away from here!"

"Don't be alarmed, Miss Tiffany," interposed the guide. "He is fast asleep."

"But he may wake, and bite some of us," insisted Miss Margie.