Margret Howth, a Story of To-day Part 8

So many trifles that day roused the undercurrent of old thoughts and old hopes that taunted him,--trifles, too, that he would not have heeded at another time. Pike came in on business, a bunch of bills in his hand. A wily, keen eye he had, looking over them,--a lean face, emphasized only by cunning. No wonder Dr. Knowles cursed him for a "slippery customer," and was cheated by him the next hour. While he and Holmes were counting out the bills, a little white-headed girl crept shyly in at the door, and came up to the table,--oddly dressed, in a frock fastened with great horn b.u.t.tons, and with an old-fashioned anxious pair of eyes, the color of blue Delft. Holmes smoothed her hair, as she stood beside them; for he never could help caressing children or dogs. Pike looked up sharply,--then half smiled, as he went on counting.

"Ninety, ninety-five, AND one hundred, all right,"--tying a bit of tape about the papers. "My Sophy, Mr. Holmes. Good girl, Sophy is. Bring her up to the mill sometimes," he said, apologetically, "on 'count of not leaving her alone. She gets lonesome at th' house."

Holmes glanced at Pike's felt hat lying on the table: there was a rusty strip of c.r.a.pe on it.

"Yes," said Pike, in a lower tone, "I'm father and mother, both, to Sophy now."

"I had not heard," said Holmes, kindly. "How about the boys, now?"

"Pete and John 's both gone West," the man said, his eyes kindling eagerly. "'S fine boys as ever turned out of Indiana. Good eddications I give 'em both. I've felt the want of that all my life.. Good eddications. Says I, 'Now, boys, you've got your fortunes, nothing to hinder your bein' President. Let's see what stuff 's in ye,' says I.

So they're doin' well. Wrote fur me to come out in the fall. But I'd rather scratch on, and gather up a little for Sophy here, before I stop work."

He patted Sophy's tanned little hand on the table, as if beating some soft tune. Holmes folded up the bills. Even this man could spare time out of his hard, stingy life to love, and be loved, and to be generous!

But then he had no higher aim, knew nothing better.

"Well," said Pike, rising, "in case you take th' mill, Mr. Holmes, I hope we'll be agreeable. I'll strive to do my best,"--in the old fawning manner, to which Holmes nodded a curt reply.

The man stopped for Sophy to gather up her bits of broken "chayney"

with which she was making a tea-party on the table, and went down-stairs.

Towards evening Holmes went out,--not going through the narrow pa.s.sage that led to the offices, but avoiding it by a circuitous route. If it cost him any pain to think why he did it, he showed none in his calm, observant face. b.u.t.toning up his coat as he went: the October sunset looked as if it ought to be warm, but he was deathly cold. On the street the young doctor beset him again with bows and news: c.o.x was his name, I believe; the one, you remember, who had such a Talleyrand nose for ferreting out successful men. He had to bear with him but for a few moments, however. They met a crowd of workmen at the corner, one of whom, an old man freshly washed, with honest eyes looking out of horn spectacles, waited for them by a fire-plug. It was Polston, the coal-digger,--an acquaintance, a far-off kinsman of Holmes, in fact.

"Curious person making signs to you, yonder," said c.o.x; "hand, I presume."

"My cousin Polston. If you do not know him, you'll excuse me?"

c.o.x sniffed the air down the street, and twirled his rattan, as he went. The coal-digger was abrupt and distant in his greeting, going straight to business.

"I will keep yoh only a minute, Mr. Holmes"----

"Stephen," corrected Holmes.

The old man's face warmed.

"Stephen, then," holding out his hand, "sence old times dawn't shame yoh, Stephen. That's hearty, now. It's only a wured I want, but it's immediate. Concernin' Joe Yare,--Lois's father, yoh know? He's back."

"Back? I saw him to-day, following me in the mill. His hair is gray?

I think it was he."

"No doubt. Yes, he's aged fast, down in the lock-up; goin' fast to the end. Feeble, pore-like. It's a bad life, Joe Yare's; I wish 'n' 't would be better to the end"----

He stopped with a wistful look at Holmes, who stood outwardly attentive, but with little thought to waste on Joe Yare. The old coal-digger drummed on the fire-plug uneasily.

"Myself, 't was for Lois's sake I thowt on it. To speak plain,--yoh'll mind that Stokes affair, th' note Yare forged? Yes? Ther' 's none knows o' that but yoh an' me. He's safe, Yare is, only fur yoh an' me.

Yoh speak the wured an' back he goes to the lock-up. Fur life. D' yoh see?"

"I see."

"He's tryin' to do right, Yare is."

The old man went on, trying not to be eager, and watching Holmes's face.

"He's tryin'. Sendin' him back--yoh know how THAT'll end. Seems like as we'd his soul in our hands. S'pose,--what d' yoh think, if we give him a chance? It's yoh he fears. I see him a-watchin' yoh; what d'

yoh think, if we give him a chance?" catching Holmes's sleeve. "He's old, an' he's tryin'. Heh?"

Holmes smiled.

"We didn't make the law he broke. Justice before mercy. Haven't I heard you talk to Sam in that way, long ago?"

The old man loosened his hold of Holmes's arm, looked up and down the street, uncertain, disappointed.

"The law. Yes. That's right! Yoh're just man, Stephen Holmes."

"And yet?"----

"Yes. I dun'no'. Law's right, but Yare's had a bad chance, an' he's tryin'. An' we're sendin' him to h.e.l.l. Somethin' 's wrong. But I think yoh're a just man," looking keenly in Holmes's face.

"A hard one, people say," said Holmes, after a pause, as they walked on.

He had spoken half to himself, and received no answer. Some blacker shadow troubled him than old Yare's fate.

"My mother was a hard woman,--you knew her?" he said, abruptly.

"She was just, like yoh. She was one o' th' elect, she said. Mercy's fur them,--an' outside, justice. It's a narrer showin', I'm thinkin'."

"My father was outside," said Holmes, some old bitterness rising up in his tone, his gray eye lighting with some unrevenged wrong.

Polston did not speak for a moment.

"Dunnot bear malice agin her. They're dead, now. It wasn't left fur her to judge him out yonder. Yoh've yer father's Stephen, 'times.

Hungry, pitiful, like women's. His got desper't' 't th' last. Drunk hard,--died of 't, yoh know. But SHE killed him,--th' sin was writ down fur her. Never was a boy I loved like him, when we was boys."

There was a short silence.

"Yoh're like yer mother," said Polston, striving for a lighter tone.

"Here,"--motioning to the heavy iron jaws. "She never--let go.

Somehow, too, she'd the law on her side in outward showin', an' th'

right. But I hated religion, knowin' her. Well, ther' 's a day of makin' things clear, comin'."

They had reached the corner now, and Polston turned down the lane.

"Yoh 'll think o' Yare's case?" he said.

"Yes. But how can I help it," Holmes said, lightly, "if I am like my mother, here?"--putting his hand to his mouth.

"G.o.d help us, how can yoh? It's hard to think father and mother leave their souls fightin' in their childern, cos th' love was wantin' to make them one here."

Something glittered along the street as he spoke: the silver mountings of a low-hung phaeton drawn by a pair of Mexican ponies. One or two gentlemen on horseback were alongside, attendant on a lady within, Miss Herne. She turned her fair face, and pale, greedy eyes, as she pa.s.sed, and lifted her hand languidly in recognition of Holmes. Polston's face coloured.