My Fire Opal, and Other Tales Part 2

He recalled, from some vague long ago, the face of a sad-eyed woman at whose knee he had said "Now I lay me," with his sleepy little head half-buried in the soft folds of her silken gown. He remembered the same sweet face more pale and still and icy cold. He was not saying his prayer _then_. He thinks he was crying. Be that as it may; Jack cried a good deal in those days. He cried because he was cold, hungry, tired, or beaten; and, later on, he fell into a way of crying for an undefined good--a something which neither warmth, food, nor rest could afford him. This vague sense of irrepletion had first dawned upon the forlorn boy when, on a certain day, creeping about Long Wharf like a half-starved rat, he had seen another boy in a velvet jacket, and with lovely cornsilk hair, folded in the arms of a beautiful lady, but just landed from a newly-arrived steamer. From that hour a nameless longing for that undefined something, which the other lad had gotten from that gentle lady, haunted his love-lorn days.

Sometimes he actually found himself crying for it. Of this--and all other crying--Jack, being a manly little fellow, was so heartily ashamed that (to use his own words) he "swowed never to let on to his folks." Jack's "folks" were--a reputed uncle, by trade a shipwright. A creature habitually red of face; cross in the morning and nasty at night; chronically glum on week-days, and invariably sprightly on Sundays; for then it was the shipwright's prerogative to get superbly drunk!

During these Sabbath celebrations, the man (having no children of his own body to maltreat) often diverted himself by belabouring his ragged little nephew; who, more or less battered, wriggled dexterously from his clutch, and, seeking his familiar haunt, the wharf, there wore out the weary day. Jack's other "folk" was the wife of the aforesaid uncle; a poor, cowed creature, with pinched, wan face and pale, carroty hair. When the boy, upon a Sunday, did not come readily to hand, the aunt was beaten in his stead. She did not run away, this poor, spiritless scapegoat, but wearily mounting a ladder-like staircase, took sanctuary in the loft. Later, when a drunken slumber enwrapped her lord, she reappeared upon the scene, with set lips, and face so white and ghastly, that little Jack, remembering vaguely that _other_ still, white face, crept uneasily out into the sunlight, and tried to forget it.

One day, when the shipwright had beaten his wife terribly, and there was blood upon her clean Sunday gown, she did not, as usual, betake herself to that "city of refuge," the loft; but, groaning faintly, fell p.r.o.ne upon the floor. Jack's uncle then making a dive at _him_, the child scampered off to the wharf as fast as his trembling little legs would carry him. When he had skipped a good many stones into the water, had watched ever so many clouds and vessels sail by, and had seen the crimson water swallow the bloated fiery sun, little Jack felt hungry, and thought it high time to be getting home to his folks.

Forlorn little waif! His _folks_, unsatisfactory as they were, were no longer available.

He found the shipwright's dwelling thronged with excited men and women. Upon the bed lay a still, white heap. Fancying that it might be the pinch-faced aunt, who had so long partially fed and clothed him, the child pushed forward, and, creeping softly to the bed, touched, with his dirty little hand, that still, white face.

Ugh! _His_ folks were never as cold as _that_!

Repelled by this icy horror, the child stole quietly away, and, crouching timidly in a far corner of the thronged apartment, watched it all.

There was a deal of commotion in Jack's folks' house that Sunday evening; and Jack's uncle, staring vacantly at a gaping throng of men, boys, and frowsy-headed women, and sustained by two doughty dignitaries of the law, was finally conveyed absolutely beyond the line of his childish vision. After this, another gentleman, in bright b.u.t.tons, summarily cleared the house, and locked the door, with the child on the wrong side of it; and, unheeded, hungry, shelterless, and forlorn, the lad crept silently away. And this is all that Jack remembers of his folks. The next tableau in his memory is that of a ship's cabin, and a fat steward in a white ap.r.o.n, who, as he wells remembers, went busily up and down the companionway, fetching steaming viands, and carrying away empty plates and soiled gla.s.ses, which had often, at bottom, a modic.u.m of something strong and nice. He liked it--this fine, fiery stuff!--and when whole spoonfuls had been left in the gla.s.ses, and he had been let to drain them all, he felt as cheery as could be; and, at bedtime, went off to his small bunk as happy as a king. But when at dinner-time the steward, in his hurry-skurry, kicked him out of the way, and called him "a d--d little son of a gun, whom (like a soft-hearted lubber) he had smuggled into the _Argo_ to save from the poorhouse," Jack fled dejectedly to his bunk to cry alone.

Yes, he remembered well, how a long time ago--very long indeed it seemed in Jack's childish measurement of time--that cruel hunger had gnawed at his poor, depleted little stomach, when his folks' door was fast locked, and he prowling miserably about the wharf; and how the good steward had then found and fed him. From that day, he had clung to his deliverer--his providence--like a grateful spaniel, and, still at his heels, here he was in the great _Argo_, sailing on and on, no doubt, to the very end of the world.

Yes, he knew all that; and he meant to be thankful and good; but was he, for certain true, "a son of a gun?" His father, as before stated, being but an inference, Jack concluded, upon the whole, that he _might_ be.

By and by, when the old steward (whose bite was in no wise as formidable as his bark) had tided over his "hurry-skurry," and, having given him his dinner, tossed him playfully to the ceiling, like a plump little ball, as he was, when he set him to play all manner of monkey tricks for his own and the crew's diversion, calling him "a droll shaver," instead of that other objectionable name, he forgot, for the time, his childish grievances, and was comparatively content.

He liked the rough-handed steward who alternately kicked and petted him, and who, after his own poor fashion, apparently loved him. Yet, taken as they went, these were but uncomfortable years for the loving, sensitive child; and the nice fiery sups from the cabin tumblers were, on the whole, the most comfortable feature of Jack Gravesend's earlier cabin-boy experience.

As the years went on, from being by turns a nuisance and a pet, the boy became a deft-handed helper to his testy old patron, and, coming to man's estate, not only won favour with the _Argo's_ crew, but found grace in the eyes of her captain. When the fat steward, in a fit of apoplexy, went off in a final hurry-skurry, to Davy Jones's locker, Jack was promoted to his berth.

Time sped. John Gravesend, from a poor cabin-boy, had come to be second mate of the _Ohio_, when William Ferguson, as bonnie a blue-eyed lad as one might hail in a cruise round the world, had shipped as foremast hand in that stanch new craft. Then it was that our hero first knew that supreme good for which he had been instinctively yearning through all his lonely life--the true love of a human soul.

Will Ferguson, a delicate boy of eighteen, neither by birth or education suited to a sailor's life, was the only son of his mother, and she was a widow. He had a persistent cough, came of consumptive stock, and the doctor a.s.sured Madame Ferguson that a long sea voyage, if she could but bring her mind to it, would be the very thing for the lad.

"There is the _Ohio_," he went on to say, "now in port, and a finer ship never sailed." Her captain trustworthy, and her second mate personally known to him. Only last year he had carried the fellow through an attack of typhoid, at Chelsea hospital, and if, as he was saying, she could bring her mind to the thing, he would speak a good word for Will, to this officer, Gravesend--John Gravesend--who would, no doubt, keep a kindly eye on her boy all through the voyage.

Madame Ferguson _did_ bring her mind to it, although the parting was as if her heart had been torn from her warm, living side. And thus it was that Will Ferguson went sailing out of his mother's yearning sight in the good ship _Ohio_, specially committed to the care of John Gravesend, and as seasick and homesick a lad as ever smelt brine.

John Gravesend had, as hath been shown, no "folks." Once, in his love-lorn life, he had taken to his starving heart a white Angora cat.

This creature, instinct with feline beauty, had proved most unsatisfactory in temper, and, having consequently become obnoxious to an entire ship's crew, had finally been despatched at the hand of an ireful cook. A family of seven white mice had succeeded this unamiable _protege_. These tiny cannibals had also disappointed the hopes of their patron, a general home-consumption having eventually left, in the once populous cage, but a single inhabitant. The survivor, ultimately becoming as hipped as the poet's "Last Man," fell a prey to melancholy in lieu of mice. After the above abortive efforts, John Gravesend foreswore pets; but here, now, was this poor greenhorn, Ferguson, a likely lad, and consigned to his tenderest care. Why, to love _him_ would be "worth while." And when, during their first week out, on that wild, windy night in Jack's watch below, the boy, fevered and seasick, mistook his sailor nurse, with those clumsily tender ways, for his own fond mother, and, throwing his young arms about the watcher's burly neck, begged him never, never, to forget him, Jack made a strong, silent vow that he never would. Alas, he never _did_, for that was his bitter destiny, never, _never_ to forget Will Ferguson! This ailing spell well past, the lad mended steadily, and was, ere long, able to be on deck and on duty. Glad days these were for John Gravesend, and still gladder nights; for now, the boy sharing his watch on deck, the pair might, night after night, listen to the sea-song at the _Ohio's_ keel, watch the moonlight silvering the crested deep, or, in that other deep above them, might trace the splendid constellations glittering clear and far; Jack, meantime, spinning for Will bewitching sea-yarns, fraught with the simple charm of that every-day knowledge which is the fruit of experience, while Will (who was a bookish lad) might, in his turn, impart to the unread sailor that other knowledge which is the fruit of study. And thus it befell that, ere the _Ohio_ had made a third of her long voyage, this man and boy were bound heart to heart, with a two-fold cord of love, pure and pa.s.sionless, yet "pa.s.sing the love of woman."

For Gravesend, this was, indeed, a gracious time. No more craving for human tenderness, less thirst for that tempting poison, which had lured his unguarded sense in the old, cabin-boy days, when the busy steward had unwisely permitted him to drain the spirit-gla.s.ses. The pernicious taste thus engendered in the child had, alas! grown with his growth, and, at times, had even overmastered the strong man. In Samson's might, as we are told, there was but a single flaw; yet, _there_, Delilah found him weak as the weakest. So it was with our sailor, and hence, at irregular intervals, there were decidedly black days in the otherwise clean life of John Gravesend.

The _Ohio_, bound for China, in due time cast anchor at Canton. Jack and Will had got leave to go ash.o.r.e together. And there it was that John Gravesend's demon took possession of him. Through all that long afternoon of drunken riot, Will (sorely astonished and dismayed) never once left this frenzied creature. And when Jack had run his mad muck, and, laboriously piloted back to the ship, had at last been persuaded to get into his berth, where he lay, safe, but brutish and insensate, the lad cast himself wearily upon the cabin floor and had a good long, sobbing cry--like the child that he was--the single-hearted, loving child, whose faith in a human soul had been rudely shocked and shaken. On the morrow, Jack was himself again. A trifle dull and heavy-eyed, yet the same old, kind, and sober fellow.

That night in their watch the friends talked it all over. Jack retained no distinct consciousness of yesterday's wild doings. After drinking more heavily than he meant, or ought, he had fancied that the crowd had set upon him, and, with spinning head, he had rushed incontinently upon the _crowd_, and knew no more until he awoke next morning in his own snug berth, with Will yet sleeping wearily upon the hard floor. And now, with Ferguson's hand in his own warm clasp, Gravesend vowed no more to touch, taste, or handle, the unclean thing; and, through all that perilous fortnight in port, he never once broke his vow.

Again the _Ohio_ cast anchor. It was in Boston Harbor, and on a May-day evening. Will Ferguson and John Gravesend went ash.o.r.e together. The month had, this year, come smiling in, and juvenile Boston had paraded in muslin and greenery to its heart's content. Upon the Common, there still lingered a breath of the May-day festivitiy. A balmy south wind stirred among the new-leaved trees,--a delicious murmuring wind, prophesying violets, jonquils, and endless forthcoming spring delights.

On such bewitching, yet enervating nights, riotous young blood leaps hotly through quickened pulses, and, for the hour, to live in the sweet, sensuous present is enough; the soul craves no higher good.

Will Ferguson, thus far, had developed no taste for that reckless youthful procedure, apologetically termed "the sowing of wild oats."

A long sea voyage, and its consequent social limitations, had, however, quickened in the boy a legitimate youthful craving for fun and frolic, and, what with the witchery of this May night, the coming to port, the rapturous thought of home, mother, and that glad greeting of pretty Kate Benson to-morrow at Springfield, he was, as he laughingly averred, "chock full of happiness, and on hand for any sort of a lark." In the heyday of the hour he had not all forgotten that black day at Canton, and had, within himself, resolved to "hold on hard whenever he smelt mischief for Jack."

Sauntering idly into North Street, the pair were abruptly brought to a stand by the gay tw.a.n.g of a violin. "A fiddle; and a waltz!" This set Will's merry feet going; and while he shuffled, boy-fashion, on the sidewalk, a smiling personage, issuing from the door of a certain edifice having over its entrance the sprightly designation of "Dance House," with an "Hullo, there, my hearties!" begged them "Come in a while, and see the fun."

Now, Jack Gravesend was quite aware that in a dance-house "the fun" is of a questionable character. That within it is "the way to h.e.l.l going down to the chambers of death," and, being a man of clean kernel, he had no lascivious affinity with a dance-house; but here was Will eagerly curious. He liked to humour the lad; and (truth must be told) he, himself, on this May night, was somewhat morally unbraced. Thus it was that, lured on by the merry music, and the cordial solicitations of the doorway panderer, the two crossed the threshhold of this evil place. Bacchus, be it known (no less than Venus and Terpsich.o.r.e), presides over the festivities of the dance-house, and Will Ferguson, soon weary of the "fun," which was in no wise to his liking, found, to his dismay, that Jack Gravesend was weakly succ.u.mbing to the fascinations of the "Jolly G.o.d." Unable to coax him from the place, he lingered on, inwardly bemoaning his own inquisitive folly; yet resolved, let what would come, to see Jack well out of the sc.r.a.pe. It was not in John Gravesend's nature to do a thing by halves. Whatsoever he did, was done heartily, and mightily; and, having determined to drink, he _drank_, until--ah, well! the b.e.s.t.i.a.l orgies of a Circean herd are not things for description, albeit they are nightly enacted in the dance-houses of our own metropolis.

It was broad day. Jack Gravesend awoke. He rubbed his eyes, and looked curiously about him. Where was he? Strange! He couldn't have turned in _here_. He got up, and shook himself wide awake. Two villanous-looking men, having risen from two neighbouring beds, were doing likewise.

"Hullo, shipmates!" said Jack, now fairly on his feet; "lend a hand here, and tell me where I am."

The two burglars--for such they were--being well-posted in the leading particulars of his arrest, glanced knowingly at each other, and smirked with sinister significance peculiarly aggravating to Jack, and burglar number one remarked to his a.s.sociate, "Golly, Bill; he _is_ a green one! Wants to know _where he is_! do you twig, Bill? Why, my fine tar, you're in the lock-up, to be sure."

"In the _lock-up_!" said Jack; "and how in thunder _came_ I here?"

"_Brung_ here, of course," responded his informant, "'t ain't a road folks gin'ally travels on their own account, eh, Bill?" Bill a.s.senting, with a prodigious wink, Jack propounded a third query: "And what the deuce may I be here _for_?"

"_Here_ for?" responded the garrulous ruffian. "Thunderin' black job, my cove! Got drunk last night, and _killed_ a man!"

"_Killed_ a man!" groaned Jack, his eyes dilating, and his flesh creeping with sudden horror. "Killed a _man_! My G.o.d! what will Will Ferguson say?"

"Ferguson? Bill--Bill Ferguson," growled the other burglar. "By jiminy, Tom! he wants to know what Bill Ferguson'll say! Precious _little_, _I'm_ thinkin'; he's about said _his_ say! Why, grampus, Bill Ferguson's the very indentercal chap you've done for!"

Officer L---- long remembered a cry that woke the echoes of the lock-up on that May morning. It might have been the yell of a hunted thing at bay, the outcry of a mortal in fierce extremity, the despairing wail of a h.e.l.l-tormented soul.

Turning the key in the lock of No. 17, he hastily entered that apartment. On the floor, face downward, lay a man.

"Cove in a fit," explained the facetious Tom. "Bill, here, jes' let on 'bout the killin', an' he gin a howl an' went off in a jiffy."

Officer L---- was humane. Good men, thank G.o.d! fill many of these humble places of authority. Silencing the bold ruffian, he bade the pair help raise the senseless form and adjust it on the rude cot. This done, he smoothed the tossed hair, wiped the foam from the purple lips, and chafed the great brown hands as helpfully as if they had been little "May's," the dear sick lamb of his own pretty flock. At length, the convulsive throes ceased, and consciousness returned to the stricken man.

Like some dim-remembered dream, the curt, cruel words of the burglar recalled themselves to Gravesend's bewildered brain. One look into the kindly face of the officer rea.s.sured him. Feebly rising to his feet, he sank upon his trembling knees, and prayed brokenly to hear it all.

He was "all right again, and wanted to know the whole truth. He could bear the _very worst_, and would thank him for it; indeed, sir, he would." The "very worst" was soon told.

There had been, explained the officer, on the previous night, a drunken row at a dance-house on North Street. The prisoner had, unfortunately, been concerned in the affair, and, in the temporary frenzy of intoxication, had drawn his dirk upon a woman. A young man, who had hitherto looked on, taking no part in the _melee_, now dashed in to arrest the a.s.sailant's hand, and himself received the murderous thrust. The brawlers had been duly arrested, the youth carried to the hospital, where, his wound proving mortal, he had, in half an hour, expired.

On his body a small diary had been found. It was inscribed:

"Willie Ferguson, from his mother.

Springfield, Jan. 1, 18--."

Will--Fergus-on, Springfield,--18-- Will--Springfield--from--his--mother. 18--Will, Willie, Will. Will Ferguson. He had sworn never to forget him. He is keeping his oath!

Will--W-i-l-l F-e-r-g-u-s-o-n. There it is; on the walls, on the ceiling, up and down, over and across! Everywhere, everywhere, the _name_, the weary, _weary_ name!

He has spelt it, over and over, forward and backward, fast and slow, loud and softly, again and again, till his brain spins; and sparks, like wicked little sprites, dance before his strained eyes, and now, cowering among his pillows, he strives to hide from that terrible pursuing name. "Smothering? they mean to smother him, do they?" He starts from his pillow, and, wild and eager, peers about his chamber.

Blood! blood everywhere! The bed-spread is dabbled with it; it trickles down the walls; it lies in clotted pools upon the floor! In the window sits an Angora cat, white, mottled with red; she laps hungrily from an ever-br.i.m.m.i.n.g basin of blood! A knife is hanging yonder. It is a dirk-knife, bright and new. Its handle is lettered.

With aching eyes he spells, "J-a-c-k, f-r-o-m W-i-l-l. C-a-n-t-o-n, 18--." Let him but reach that knife and hurl it into the sea! He is bound; he struggles; but cannot get free; and there still is the knife, horribly familiar, with the _name_ staring at him from its heft, until every letter becomes a mocking serpent's tongue, hissing over and over in his tormented ear: "Will! Will! Will Ferguson!" He shivers; his brain is on fire; he can no longer look nor listen; he can but moan piteously: "Mercy! mercy! G.o.d have mercy!" They are putting a gla.s.s to his lips. He is terribly thirsty; and here is no blood; only an innocent saffron-tinged liquid. He drains it with eager lips. He is cooler now. The room grows dusky. He can no longer see that accursed dirk. Somebody had swabbed the floor, and they have unbound him.

A balmy evening wind, just the very idle land whisper that strayed among the leaves that night while he and Will sauntered through Boston Common, wanders in at the open cas.e.m.e.nt. It winnows the hot air, it breathes upon his fevered brow, "like the benediction that follows after prayer." He sleeps, and, in his dream, is again with Will, and on board the _Ohio_. Becalmed in the Gulf Stream, hard by the lovely "Land of Flowers," lies the huge, idle craft. It is the Sabbath, and the sailors,--idle as the ship,--gathering in lazy groups, have pleasant talk of wives and sweethearts (for they are homeward bound).

Will, half-reclined upon a coil of rope, reads aloud from his red pocket Testament. He has chanced upon this pa.s.sage, from the dream of the Patmos seer: "And them that had gotten the victory ... stand on the sea of gla.s.s, having the harps of G.o.d." The "victory!" Ah! that is a _hard_ thing to get! Shall _he_, John Gravesend, ever hold in his hand a harp of G.o.d? While he turns the text over in his mind, looking wistfully far out across the gla.s.sy deep, Will silently rises, walks swiftly astern, and, without a farewell word, drops quietly into the sea. He strives to follow. In vain! His limbs are holden in leaden heaviness. Wrestling with this demon of slumber, he at last awakes.

Springing to his feet, he searches eagerly the empty, moonlit room. He calls, softly, "Will, Will!" No answer! He fancies a gentle sigh beneath his window. Will is there, sure enough, waiting for him in the pleasant moonlight. He need but drop softly to the ground to join him.