Standish of Standish Part 16

"Let me see your hands, Elder," demanded the physician in his usual dry fashion.

"No need,'t is naught. Go look after your sick folk," replied the Elder trying to push past, but Fuller caught him by the sleeve, exclaiming sharply,--

"A man whose hands are needed for others as oft as thine are, has no right to let them become useless, and 't is not in reason but they are burned."

"You're right, Fuller, and I'm but a froward child," said Brewster, a sudden smile replacing the frown of pain upon his face, and obediently opening out his burned and bleeding palms. "Come to the Common house, so as not to fright my wife within there, and do them up with some of your wonderful balsam."

"And were it not for thought of your work, you would not have let me see them," said Fuller glancing from under his penthouse brows with a look of cynical admiration.

"One cannot give thought to every pin-p.r.i.c.k with such deadly sickness on all sides," replied Brewster simply. "Best go into the hospital and see if thy poor dying folk have taken any harm of the fright before thou lookest after me."

"The Captain has gone into the sick-house. I'll hold on to you,"

returned the Doctor curtly, and Brewster yielded with his ever gracious smile.

That evening as the Elder with his bandaged hands, Carver, gaunt and pale from an attack of fever, Standish, Winslow, John Howland, and Doctor Fuller sat at supper in the Common house, Master Jones, followed by a sailor heavily laden, presented himself at the door.

"Good e'en, Masters, and how are your sick folk?" demanded he, in a would-be cordial voice.

"Thanks for your courtesy, Master Jones," replied the governor with grave politeness. "They are doing reasonably well, except some few who do not seem like to mend in this world."

"And Master Bradford? Sure he is not going to die?" pursued Jones in a voice of strange anxiety, as he sank into the great arm-chair Carver had proffered him.

"He is as low as a man can be and live," broke in the doctor gruffly, as he fixed Jones with a glance of angry reproach, beneath which even that rough companion quailed.

"He sent aboard yesterday begging a can of beer," blurted he, his brown face reddening a little.

"Yes," replied the governor sternly, "and you made answer that though it were your own father needing it, you would not stint yourself."

"I said it, and I don't deny it," retorted Jones with a feeble attempt at bl.u.s.ter. "But any man has a right to change his mind if he find cause, and I've changed mine as you will see, for I've brought not a can, but a runlet of beer for Bradford, and any others who crave it and are like to die wanting it; and when that is gone if Master Carver will send on board asking it for the sick folk, he shall have it though I be forced to drink water myself on the voyage home. I'll have no dead men haunting me and bringing a plague upon the ship."

"Truly we are greatly beholden to you, Master Jones," began Carver in great surprise, but the mariner raised his hand and continued,--

"Nay, hear me out, for that's not all. I went ash.o.r.e to-day and shot five geese, and here they are, all of them, not one spared, though I could have well fancied a bit of goose to my supper, but I brought all to you, and more than that, even, for here is the better half of a buck we found in the wood ready shot to our hand. The Indians had cut off his horns and carried them away, and doubtless were gone for help to carry the carcase home when we came upon it; haply they saw us coming and made a run for it; at all odds they had left him as he fell, and Sir Wolf was already tearing at his throat so busily that he knew not friends were nigh, until a bullet through his head heralded our coming. So here are the haunches for you, and I content myself with the poorer parts."

Taking the articles named from a bag which the sailor had at his direction laid upon the floor, Jones ranged them in an imposing line in the centre of the room, and resuming his chair looked at his hosts still in that conciliatory and half timid manner so utterly new to them and foreign to his usual demeanor.

"We are, indeed, deeply beholden to you, Master Jones," said Carver at length in his grave and courteous tones. "But if I may freely speak my thought, and if I read my brethren's minds aright, we cannot but muse curiously upon this sudden and marvelous change in your dealings with us, and would fain know its meaning."

"Feeling certain that Master Jones is not one to give something for nothing, and so in common prudence wishing to know at the outset what price he expects for bearing himself in Christian charity, as he seemeth desirous to do," suggested Standish with more candor than diplomacy.

"Thou 'rt ever ready with thy gibes on better men than thyself, art not?" exclaimed Jones turning angrily upon him. For reply Standish leaned back in his chair, pulled at his red beard, and laughed contemptuously; but Winslow hastily interposed with a voice like oil upon the waves.

"Our captain will still have his jest upon all of us, Master Jones, but in truth as the governor hath said, we cannot but admire at this wonderful generosity on thy part, and fain would know whence it ariseth."

"Why, sure 't is not far to seek," replied Jones with a hideous grimace intended for a conciliatory smile; "we have ever been good friends, have we not, and you all wish me well, as I do all of you. Certes, none of you would try to bring evil upon our heads, lest it fall upon your own instead, for still those who wish ill to others fall upon ill luck themselves. Is it not so, Elder?"

"Art speaking of Christian doctrine, or of heathen superst.i.tion, Master Jones?" inquired the Elder fixing his mild, yet penetrating eyes upon the seaman, who slunk beneath their gaze.

"Nay, then!" bl.u.s.tered he rising to his feet, "I came hither when I would fain have stayed in my own cabin aboard, and I came not to chop logic nor to be put to the question like a malefactor, but to bring help to my sick neighbors, who, to be sure, cried out for it l.u.s.tily enough before they got it, but now pick and question at my good meat and drink as if 't were like to poison them. Well, that's an end on 't, and you can take it or leave it, as you will. Good e'en to you."

"Nay, nay, Master Jones," interposed Carver hastily, as the angry man made toward the door. "Let us not part thus, especially in view of thy great kindness toward us, for which, in good sooth, we are more grateful than we have yet expressed. Let pa.s.s the over curious queries we have ventured, and sit up at the table for a little meat and drink, such as it may be. Here is some broiled fish, and here some clams"--

"I care not for eating, having finished mine own supper but now,"

grumbled Jones sinking back into Carver's arm-chair; "still if you'll broach yon runlet of beer I'll taste a mug on 't, for my throat is as dry as a chimbley."

"The beer is for our sick folk who crave it as they gather their strength," said Carver pleasantly; "but we have here a case of strong waters of our own, if that will serve thy turn."

"Why, ay, 't will serve my turn better than t' other," replied Jones drawing his hairy hand across his mouth with an agreeable smile, as he added,--

"I did but ask for the beer, thinking you who are well needed the spirits for yourselves."

"We can spare what we need for ourselves more lightly than what we need for others," said Carver in that grand simplicity of nature which fails to perceive the magnificence of its own impulses. And from a shelf above his head the governor took a square bottle of spirits, while Howland poured water from a kettle over the fire into a pewter flagon, and produced a sugar bason from a chest in the corner of the room. These, with a smaller pewter cup, he placed before the seaman who eagerly mixed himself a stiff dram, drank it, and prepared another, which he sipped luxuriously, as leaning back in his chair he looked slowly around the circle of his entertainers, and finally burst forth,--

"The plain truth is, there are no folk like these in any lat.i.tude I've sailed, and a man must deal with them accordingly. 'T is what I told Clarke and Coppin before I came ash.o.r.e. What men but you would give another what you want yourselves, and lacking it may find yourselves in worse case than him you help? And 't is not all chat, for still I've marked it both afloat and ash.o.r.e, and the poor wretches you've left in the ship will pluck the morsel from their own lips to put it to another's.

"So it is, that with all your losses, a kind of good luck aye follows you, and I shall not marvel if, in the end, you build up your colony here, and see good days when I am--well, it matters not where--I doubt me if priests or parsons know. But they who flout you or do you a churlish turn find no good luck resting on them, but rather a curse,--yea, I've marked that too. 'T is better to be friends than foes with some folk."

"'Timeo Daneos et dona ferentes,'" quoted Winslow in the ear of Elder Brewster, who sat watching the sailor curiously, and now suddenly said,--

"And so thy shipmen are very ill too, Master Jones!"

"Lo you, now! I said naught of it, and how well you knew. What dost mean, Elder?"

"Naught but friendly interest like thine own," replied the Elder gently, yet never removing that steadfast gaze, beneath which Jones fidgeted impatiently, and finally cried in a sort of desperate surrender,--

"Well, then, as well you know already, 't is that matter brought me here to-night. My men have sickened daily, and everything hath gone awry, since we bundled you and your goods ash.o.r.e a month or so agone, when some of you were fain to tarry aboard, or at least leave your stuff there, and come and go."

"But thou wast afeard we should drink thy beer by stealth. Nay, thou saidst it," declared Standish disdainfully.

"Well, yes, I'll not go back of saying it," retorted Jones half abashed and half defiant. "For where else shall you find me men who will drink water if another man hath beer where they may get it?"

"We heard from our friends on board that scurvy had broken out among the shipmen," said Carver motioning Standish to hold his peace.

"Scurvy, and fever, and rheumaticks, and flux, and the foul fiend knoweth what beside," replied Jones desperately. "Now Clarke hath still been warning me that you were so sib with the saints"--

"Nay, G.o.d forbid!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Brewster.

Jones looked at him in astonishment, then nodding his head as one who yields a point he cannot understand continued: "Well, if not the saints, whosoever you have put in their room; but Clarke says you are e'en like the warlocks of olden time who called fire out of heaven on their enemies, and it came as oft as they called; and he says Master Brewster is like some Messire Moses who dealt all manner of ill to those who crossed him; and I marked, and so did Clarke, how yester morn when I denied Bradford the beer he craved, and answered the governor in so curst a humor, three men fell ill before night, and two, who were mending, died in torment. And Clarke said, and so it seemed most like to me, that 't was you had done it, and might yet do worse; and so I would fain be friends, and I come myself to bring the beer and the meat, and I'll promise to do as much again and again; nay, I'll swear it by the toe of St. Hubert, that my mother paid gold to kiss for me or ever I was born, yea, I'll swear it, if you masters will take off the curse, and promise to say ma.s.ses, nay, nay, to say sermons and make mention of me to the Lord."

"Knowest thou what the Apostle Peter said to one Simon Magus when he would have bought the grace of G.o.d for gold?" demanded Brewster sternly.

"Nay, I never knew any of thy folk before," replied Jones humbly; but Winslow consulting the pacific governor with his eyes smoothly interposed,--

"Surely we will pray for thee and for thy men, Master Jones, albeit our prayers have no more weight than those of any other sinful men, and our Elder hath neither the power nor the will to bring plagues upon our enemies. There is naught of art-magic in our practices, I do a.s.sure thee, master."

"Well, I know not; but in all honesty I'd rather be friends than foes with men like you."

"And friends we are most heartily," said Carver. "Our folk on board are still mending, are they not?"