Round the Block Part 61

CHAPTER V.

A RETURNED CALIFORNIAN.

At last, Matthew Maltboy was engaged. He had, since twenty, been dallying on the edge of a betrothal. Now he had taken the momentous step into that anomalous region which lies between celibacy and married life, where a man is not exactly a bachelor, nor yet, by any means, a husband. It is the land in which the dim enchantments of romance begin to a.s.sume the plain outlines of reality. It is the land in which the pledge of undying affection, breathed, at some rapturous moment, into a delicate, inclining ear, becomes invested with awful meaning, and has a value in the legal market like a bond and mortgage. It is the land where the excitement of pursuit is over, and the game is securely cornered, but not yet in hand. It is the spot where the ardent huntsman of Love pauses to look back, and ceases to bend his longing gaze into the distance beyond.

How it came to pa.s.s that the unreliable Matthew Maltboy had become the affianced one of the pleasant widow Frump, it is not the purpose of this history to record. Let it suffice to say, that the mutual aversion which they felt, some months before, at Mr. Whedell's house, on New Year's day, was the starting point in their course of true love. Such an aversion, subsequently smoothed away, is often the most promising beginning of a courtship.

Mrs. Frump had frequently met Matthew on the street, and been gratified with his deferential bow. His bulk, to which, as a rotund lady, she had taken an antipathy, seemed to dwindle down as it was looked at. Matthew, whose ideal was a delicate woman with observable shoulder blades, had also, by repeated sights of Mrs. Frump, become reconciled to her ample proportions. Meantime, they had heard much, incidentally, of each other through Marcus Wilkeson. Matthew had come to esteem Mrs. Frump for her affectionate devotion to old Van Quintem; and Mrs. Frump had secretly admired the powerful though silent legal ability displayed by Mr.

Maltboy in the inquisition before Coroner Bullfast.

One night, Matthew, accompanied Marcus to his old friend's house; and, on the second night following, this couple were engaged--a happy event, which was brought about no less by the widow's experience, and conviction that there was no time to lose, than by Matthew's impulsive ardor.

He had been engaged ten days; and so entirely had he talked out the time to the widow, that it seemed six months.

"Why is it," thought Matthew, stretching himself in his chair, and looking critically at the widow, who was knitting crotchet work, "why is it that I no longer adore her? She is just as pretty, just as amiable, just as affectionate as ever. Now, why don't I care a b.u.t.ton for her at this moment?" Matthew was not a transcendental philosopher; and the true answers to these questions did not come to him.

Old Van Quintem, pale and beautiful in his declining years, sat by the window that opened on the green leaves of the back yard, calmly smoking his pipe, and thinking, with a holy sadness, of his dead wife and his worse-than-dead son. The old gentleman, and the two quiet affianced ones, who sat near him, made up a well-dressed and handsome group; the pictorial effect of which was suddenly marred by the apparition of a stranger in the doorway.

He was tall, muscular, and what little could be seen of his face through a heavy growth of whiskers was mild and prepossessing, in spite of two large scars just visible below the broad brim of a rough hat. His dress was faded and dirty.

The stranger stood in the doorway, and surveyed the occupants of the room.

Old Van Quintem looked at the intruder a moment, and then said, as if remembering something, "Are you the man sent by Crumley to mend my piazza railing?"

There was the least hesitation in the man's voice, as he answered, "Yes, sir. I'm here to do that job." His voice was a deep growl, as of a grizzly bear half tamed.

"Where are your tools?" asked old Van Quintem.

The stranger communed with himself, and then replied, in the most natural manner, "I s'pose I only want a saw, a hammer, and a few nails.

You have 'em, haven't yer?"

"You're a funny sort of carpenter, to travel without your tools. Do you know, now, that you look more like a California miner than a carpenter?"

"That's not very 'markable," returned the stranger, in profound guttural accents, "considerin' as how I come from California this week."

"You have brought home tons of gold, I dare say," said old Van Quintem, playfully.

"A little," growled the stranger. "The diggins was poor in Calaveras County when I fust went there, but latterly they improved."

At the mention of Calaveras County, the widow suddenly fixed her eyes upon the stranger, and then dropped them on her crotchet work.

Matthew Maltboy here conceived a happy thought, namely, to ask this stranger if he ever knew Amos Frump (the deceased husband of Mrs.

Frump), who was killed in that very county in an affray growing out of a disputed claim, five years before. Mrs. Frump, after her engagement to Matthew, had furnished him with slips from three California papers, giving full particulars of the sanguinary affair. Before he was engaged, he had never felt the slightest curiosity to know the history of his predecessor; but, since then, he had entertained a strong secret desire to learn more of him, and especially of the reasons which induced him to abandon a young and lovely wife, and make a Californian exile of himself. Upon this subject the widow had never volunteered any satisfactory information, and he had been politely reluctant to ask her about it.

Old Van Quintem, who was too sleepy at that time to talk much, procured the necessary tools from a cupboard in the kitchen, and showed the stranger what work was to be done. The old gentleman then returned to his easy chair by the window, threw a handkerchief over his head, and settled himself for a nap.

Before the carpenter had struck the first blow, Matthew Maltboy rose, remarked to the widow that he wanted to stretch himself a little, and walked out upon the piazza.

The carpenter stood near the door, with the saw in one hand and the hammer in the other, very much in the att.i.tude of listening. At Matthew's approach, he commenced feeling the teeth of the saw, as if to test their sharpness.

"I would like to speak a word with you, sir," said Matthew, in a low voice, motioning the carpenter to accompany him to a corner of the piazza, out of the widow's possible hearing.

Having attained that safe position, Matthew opened the great subject.

"You remarked that you had dug gold in Calaveras County," said he. "Did you ever happen to know a man by the name of Frump--Amos Frump--who was a miner there?"

"Frump!" replied the carpenter. "He was an intimate friend of mine."

"Now that's lucky," said Matthew, "for I want to find out something about the man."

"Then you've come to the right shop," answered the carpenter; "for his own brother--if he ever had one--couldn't tell you more about him than I."

"I am indeed fortunate. In the first place, then this man Frump is really--dead?"

The carpenter pulled his rough hat farther over his forehead, and replied:

"As dead as two big splits in the skull could make him. But 'xcuse me, sir; he was my bosom friend, and I can't bear to talk of his death."

"He _is_ dead, then, and no mistake," said Matthew, soliloquizing. "Yet I am not exactly glad to know it."

The carpenter's face expressed surprise at this remark.

"I beg your pardon," said Matthew. "Of course I am not glad to hear of your friend's death. But, to tell the truth," he continued (inventing an excuse), "I had always heard that this Frump was a wild fellow; that he didn't treat his wife decently, and at last ran away from her. You see I am acquainted with the family. In fact, I know Mrs. Frump quite well."

"And did she tell you all this about her dead husband?" asked the carpenter.

"Oh, no!" returned Matthew, who began to fear that he had gone too far.

"She never says anything about his personal character. I only spoke from common report."

"Then common report is a common liar; for I know there never was a steadier chap than this same Amos Frump; and his wife can't say that he ever struck her, or said a cross word to her. Amos told me all about himself; and I'd believe him through thick and thin." The carpenter spoke in his dismal chest voice, without the least indication of excitement.

"Then why did he leave his wife? and why did she never hear of him until the time of his death? You will confess that _that_ was odd."

"I give you the reasons," answered the carpenter, "as Amos give 'em to me. It seems that _he_ was a poor, uneducated feller. _She_ had a few thousand dollars from her grandfather's property, and was sent by her parents to the best o' schools. Though he and she were so much unlike, they got up a kind o' fondness for each other from the time when Amos saved her from bein' run over by a horse. They used to meet each other secretly, because, you see, her folks didn't like Amos. They thought that a girl with three or four thousand dollars in her own name, ought to set her eyes rather above a feller like him. Well, arter no end o'

trouble, they was married. Her folks pretended to treat Amos all right, but was allers talkin' agin him; and finally they pizened her mind with the idee that he had married her only for her money, and that all the while he loved another gal. She began to treat him very cold like, and, one day, when she was in a little bit of temper--"

"Has Mrs. Frump any temper?" asked Matthew, anxiously. "I never saw it."

"But you a'n't her husband," replied the carpenter. "Amos told me that she did show a leetle temper now and then. However, he allers said she was a pooty good gal in the main. Well, one day, when her dander was up about somethin', she told him that she b'lieved he married her for her money, and she'd die before he should have a cent. Amos was a proud feller, if he _was_ poor; and, when he heerd this, he left the house right off, walked to New York, and shipped as a sailor to San Francisco.

I met him when he fust come to the mines, and, as he was a spry, tough chap, I let him work a claim with me on shares. We ate and slept together, and many a time, in the dark night, has he spoke to me about his wife, and how much he thought of her; but he said he never should go back till he had money enough to buy out her and her hull family. We was very unlucky, and Amos got downhearted, and took to drink. By and by he moved off to another claim, and worked on his own hook. He did better there; but all the gold he dug out he used to spend in gamblin' and rum; and at last a drunken quarrel put an end to Amos Frump."

"Poor fellow!" said Matthew. "And do you think the widow ever grieved for him?"

"No, I guess not; for Amos allers said that she was not a very lovin', affectionate woman; though, if he had been as rich as her, or if her family had let her alone, she would have made him a tol'able wife."

"Not loving! Not affectionate!" thought Matthew. "And I am about to marry her!" A cold shudder crept over him.

Hiding his emotions with an effort, he again interrogated the affable carpenter: