The Cruise of the Shining Light Part 33

"That's good," he repeated, in a muse, staring deep into the red coals in the grate. "That's very good."

I ran away--closed my door upon this wretched behavior, but could not shut its ghastly sauciness and treachery from the chambers of my memory. The habit of faith and affection was strong: I was no longer concerned for my friend John Cather, but was mightily ashamed of this failure in duty to the grotesque old hook-and-line man who had without reserve of sacrifice or strength nourished me to the l.u.s.ty years of that night. As I lay in bed, I recall, downcast, self-accusing, flushed with shame, I watched the low clouds scud across the starlit sky, and I perceived, while the torn, wind-harried ma.s.ses rushed restlessly on below the high, quiet firmament, that I had fallen far away from the serenity my uncle would teach me to preserve in every fortune.

"I'll not fail again!" thinks I. "Not I!"

'Twas an experience profitable or unprofitable, as you shall presently judge.

XVIII

A LEGACY OF LOVE

Moses Shoos, I recall, carried the mail that winter. 'Twas a thankless task: a matter of thirty miles to Jimmie Tick's Cove and thirty back again. Miles hard with peril and brutal effort--a way of sleet and slush, of toilsome paths, of a swirling mist of snow, of stinging, perverse winds or frosty calm, of lowering days and the haunted dark o' night--to be accomplished, once a week, afoot and alone, by way of barren and wilderness and treacherous ice. 'Twas a thankless task, indeed; but 'twas a task to which the fool of Twist Tickle addressed himself with peculiar reverence.

"Mother," says he, "always 'lowed that a man ought t' serve his Queen: an' mother knowed. 'Moses,' says she, afore she died, 'a good man haves just _got_ t' serve the Queen: for an good men don't,' says she, 'the poor Lady is bound t' come t' grief along o' rascals. Poor, _poor_ Lady!' says she. 'She've a wonderful lot t' put up with along o' stupid folk an' rascals. I'm not knowin' how she bears it an'

lives. 'Tis a mean, poor dunderhead, with heart an' brains in his gullet,' says she, 'that wouldn't serve the Queen. G.o.d save the Queen!' says mother. 'What's a man worth,' says she, 'that on'y serves hisself?'"

Not much, thinks I!

"An' mother knowed," says Moses, softly. "Ay, Dannie," he declared, with a proud little grin, "I bet you _mother_ knowed!"

'Twas this exalted ideal of public service, fashioned in the wisdom of the simple by the amazing mother who bore him, that led the fool, as by the hand, from a wilderness of snow and night and bewildered visions, wherein no aspiration of his own shaped itself, to the warm hearth of Twist Tickle and the sleep of a child by night.

Once I watched him stagger, white and bent with weather and labor, from the ice of Ship's Run, his bag on his back, to the smoking roofs of Twist Tickle, which winter had spread with a snowy blanket and tucked in with anxious hands. 'Twas a bitter day, cold, windy, aswirl with the dust of snow, blinding as a mist. I sat with Judith in the wide, deeply cushioned window-seat of my lib'ry, as my uncle called the comfortable, book-shelved room he had, by advice o' Sir Harry, provided for my youth. John Cather was not about; and I caressed, I recall, the long, slender fingers of her hand, which unfailingly and without hesitation gave themselves to my touch. She would never deny me that, this maid; 'twas only kisses she would hold me from. She would snuggle close and warmly, when John Cather was not about, but would call her G.o.d to witness that kisses were prohibited where happiness would continue.

"'Tis not _'lowed_, child," says she.

Her cheek was so close, so round and soft and delicately tinted, that I touched my lips to it, quite unable to resist.

"I don't mind _that_," says she.

'Twas vastly encouraging.

"'Twas so brotherly," she added.

"Judy," I implored, "I'm in need of another o' that same kind."

"No, no!" she cried. "You'd never find the spot!"

'Twas with the maid, then, I sat in the window-seat of my warm room, content with the finger-tips I might touch and kiss as I would, lifted into a mood most holy and aspiring by the weight of her small head upon my shoulder, the bewildering light and mystery of her great, blue eyes, the touch and sweet excitement of her tawny hair, which brushed my cheek, as she well knew, this perverse maid! John Cather was not about, and the maid was yielding, as always in his absence; and I was very happy. 'Twas Moses we observed, all this time, doggedly staggering, upon patriotic duty, from the white, swirling weather of that unkind day, in the Queen's service, his bag on his back.

"He've his mother t' guide un," says she.

"An' his father?"

"'Tis said that he was lost," she answered, "in the Year o' the Big Sh.o.r.e Catch; but I'm knowin' nothin' about that."

I remembered the secret Elizabeth would impart to my uncle Nicholas.

"_My_ father," says Judith, in challenge, "was a very good man."

I was not disposed to deny it.

"A very good man," she repeated, eying me sharply for any sign of incredulity.

'Twas her fancy: I might indulge it.

"I 'low, Dannie," says she, "that he was a wonderful handsome man, though I never seed un. G.o.d's sake!" cries she, defiantly, "he'd be hard t' beat for looks in this here harbor." She was positive; there was no uncertainty--'twas as though she had known him as fathers are known. And 'twas by no wish of mine, now, that our hands came close together, that her eyes were bent without reserve upon my own, that she snuggled up to my great, boyish body: 'twas wholly a wish of the maid. "'Twas blue eyes he had," says she, "an' yellow hair an' big shoulders. He was a parson, Dannie," she proceeded. "I 'low he must have been. He--he--_was_!" she declared; "he was a great, big parson with blue eyes." I would not be a parson, thinks I, whatever the maid might wish. "An' he 'lowed," she continued, pursuing her wilful fancy, "that he'd come back, some day, an' love my mother as she knowed he could." We watched Moses Shoos come across the harbor ice and break open the door of the postmaster's cottage. "But he was wrecked an'

drowned," says Judith, "an' 'twas an end of my mother's hope. 'Twas on'y that," says she, "that she would tell Skipper Nicholas on the night she died. 'Twas just the wish that he would bring me up, as he've fetched up you, Dannie," she added: "jus' that--an' the name o'

my father. I'm not sorry," says she, with her head on my shoulder, "that she never told the name."

Elizabeth carried her secret into the greater mystery to which she pa.s.sed; 'twas never known to us, nor to any one....

"Moses," says I, in delight, when the news got abroad, "I hears you got the contract for the mail?"

"I is," says he.

"An' how in the name o' Heaven," I demanded, "did you manage so great a thing?"

There had been compet.i.tion, I knew: there had been consideration and consultation--there had been the philosophy of the aged concerning the carrying of mail in past years, the saucy anarchy of the young with regard to the gruelling service, the chatter of wishful women upon the spending value of the return, the speculatively saccharine brooding of children--there had been much sage prophecy and infinitely knowing advice--there had been misleading and secrecy and sly devising--there had been envy, bickering, disruption of friendship--there had been a lavish waste and disregard of character--there had been all this, as I knew, and more pitiable still, in compet.i.tion for the weekly four dollars of government money. 'Twas a most marvellous achievement, thinks I, that the fool of Twist Tickle had from this still weather of reason and tempest of feeling emerged with the laurel of wisdom (as my tutor said) to crown him. 'Twas fair hard to credit! I must know the device--the clever political trick--by which the wags and wiseacres of Twist Tickle had been discomfited. 'Twas with this hungry curiosity that I demanded of the fool of Twist Tickle how he had managed so great a thing.

"Eh, Moses," says I; "how _was_ it?"

"Dannie," he gravely explained, "'tis very simple. My bid," says he, impressively, "was the lowest."

"An' how much was that, Moses?"

"Mother," he observed, "didn't hold a wonderful lot with half measures."

'Twas no answer to my question.

"She always 'lowed," says he, with a mystifyingly elaborate wave and accent, "that _doin'_ was better than _gettin'_."

I still must wait.

"'Moses,' says she," he pursued, "'don't you mind the price o' fish; you _cotch_ un. Fish,' says she, 'is fish; but prices goes up an'

down, accordin' t' the folly o' men. You _do_,' says she; 'an' you leave what you _gets_ t' take care of itself.' An' I 'low," says Moses, gently, a smile transfiguring his vacant face, "that mother knowed."

'Twas all, it seemed to me, a defensive argument.

"An' mother 'lowed, afore she died," he added, looking up to a gray sky, wherein a menace of snow dwelt, "that a good man would save his Queen from rascals."