The Drummer Boy Part 22

"What makes you dizzy?"

"Boys gimme some drink, I donowat."

"The boys gave you some drink? You don't know what?--Tucket," said Captain Edney, "what's all this? Who has been getting that boy drunk?"

Seth perceived that any attempt to disguise the truth would be futile, except so far as it might be possible by ingenious subtleties to shield his companions. The alarm, be believed, must have reached them by this time, and have scattered the group at the whiskey barrel; so he answered boldly,--

"The fact, sir, is jest this. We've been about half crazy for water, as you know, for the past week or two; and men'll do almost any thing for relief, under such circ.u.mstances. It got rumored around, somehow, that there was plenty of water in the vessel, and the boys went to hunting for't, and stumbled on the quartermaster's stores, and tapped a few casks, I believe, mostly sirup, but one turned out to be whiskey. Dry as we be, it's no more'n nat'ral 't we should drink a drop, under the circ.u.mstances."

"Who tapped the casks?"

"That's more'n I know. I didn't see it done," said Seth.

"Who drank?"

"I drinked a little, for one; jest enough to know 't wan't water.

"And how many of you are drunk?" demanded Captain Edney.

"I a'n't, for one. But I believe Manly is a little how-come ye-so. I'll say this for him, though: he had nothing to do with tapping the casks, and he didn't seem to know what it was the boys gin him. He was dry; it tasted sweet, and he drinked, nat'rally."

"Who gave him the whiskey?"

"I didn't notice, particularly," said Seth.

His accomplices were summoned, the quartermaster was notified, and the affair was still further investigated. All confessed to having tasted the liquor, but n.o.body knew who tapped the casks, or who had given the whiskey to Frank, and all had the same plausible excuse for their offence--intolerable thirst. It was impossible, where all were leagued together, and all seemed equally culpable, to single out the ringleaders for punishment, and it was not desirable to punish all. After a while, therefore, the men were dismissed with a reprimand, and the subject postponed indefinitely. That very afternoon forty barrels of water came on board, and the men had no longer a pretext for tapping casks in the hold; and a few days later was the battle, in which they wiped out by their bravery all memory of past transgressions.

And Frank? The muss, as the boys called it, was over before his senses recovered from their infinite bewilderment. He lay stupefied in his bunk, which went whirling round and round with him, sinking down and down and down, into void and bottomless chaos, where solid earth was none--type of the drunkard's moral state, where virtue has lost its foot-hold, and there is no firm ground of self-respect, and conscience is a loosened ledge toppling treacherously, and there is no steady hope to stay his horrible whirling and sinking. Stupefaction became sleep; with sleep inebriation pa.s.sed; and Frank awoke to misery.

It was evening. The boys were playing cards again by the light of the ship's lantern. The noise and the glimmer reached Frank in his berth, and called him back to time and s.p.a.ce and memory. He remembered his watch, his insolent reply to his old friend Sinjin, the scene in the hold of the vessel, the sweet-tasting stuff, and the dizziness, a strange ladder somewhere which he had either climbed or dreamed of climbing; and he thought of his mother and sisters with a pang like the sting of a scorpion. He could bear any thing but that.

He got up, determined not to let vain regrets torment him. He shut out from his mind those pure images of home, the presence of which was maddening to him. Having stepped so deep into guilt, he would not, he could not, turn back. For Frank carried even into his vices that steadiness of resolution which distinguishes such natures from those of the Jack Winch stamp, wavering and fickle alike in good and ill. He possessed that perseverance and purpose which go to form either the best and n.o.blest men, or, turned to evil, the most hardy and efficient villains. Frank was no milksop.

"O, I'm all right," said he, with a reckless laugh, in reply to his comrades' bantering. "Give me a chance there--can't you?"

For he was bent on winning back his watch. It seemed that nothing short of the impossible could turn him aside from that intent. The players made room for him, and he prepared his counters, and took up his cards.

"What do you do, Frank?" was asked impatiently; all were waiting for him.

What ailed the boy? He held his cards, but he was not looking at them.

His eyes were not on the board, nor on his companions, nor on any object there. But he was staring with a pallid, intense expression--at something. There were anguish, and alarm, and yearning affection in his look. His hair was disordered, his countenance was white and amazed; his comrades were astonished as they watched him.

"What's the matter, Frank? what's the matter?"

Their importunity brought him to himself.

"Did you see?" he asked in a whisper.

They had seen nothing that he had seen. Then it was all an illusion? a fragment of his drunken dreams? But no drunken dream was ever like that.

"Yes, I'll play," he said, trying to collect himself thinking that he would forget the illusion, and remembering he had his watch to win back.

But his heart failed him. His brain, his hand failed him also.

Absolutely, he could not play.

"Boys, I'm not very well. Excuse me--I can't play to-night."

And hesitatingly, like a person who has been stunned, he got up, and left the place. Few felt inclined to jeer him. John Winch begun to say something about "the parson going to pray," but it was frowned down.

Frank went on deck. The evening was mild, the wind was south, the sky was clear and starry; it was like a May night in New England. The schooner was riding at anchor in the sound; other vessels of the fleet lay around her, rocking gently on the tide--dim hulls, with glowing, fiery eyes; and here there was a band playing, and from afar off came the sound of solemn singing, wafted on the wind. And the water was all a weltering waste of waves and molten stars.

But little of all this Frank saw, or heard, or heeded. His soul was rapt from him; he was lost in wonder and grief.

"Can you tell me any thing?" said a voice at his side.

"O, At.w.a.ter," said Frank, clutching his hand, "what does it mean? As I was playing, I saw--I saw--every thing else disappeared; cards, counters, the bench we were playing on, and there before me, as plainly as I ever saw any thing in my life----"

"What was it?" asked At.w.a.ter, as Frank paused, unable to proceed.

"My sister Hattie." then said Frank, in a whisper of awe, "in her coffin!

in her shroud! But she did not seem dead at all. She was white as the purest snow; and she smiled up at me--such a sweet, sad smile--O! O!"

And Frank wrung his hands.

XVIII.

BITTER THINGS.

At.w.a.ter could not have said much to comfort him, even if he had had the opportunity. Some young fellows who had heard of Frank's losses at bluff, and of his intoxication, saw him on deck, and came crowding around to have some jokes with him. At.w.a.ter retired. And Frank, who had little relish for jokes just then, went below, and got into his berth, where he could be quiet, and think a little.

But thinking alone there with his conscience was torture to him. He turned on his bed and looked, and saw At.w.a.ter sitting in his bunk, with a book in his hand, reading by the dim light. The card-playing was going on close by, and jokes and oaths and laughter were heard on all sides; but At.w.a.ter heeded no one, and no one heeded him.

Only Frank: he regarded the still, earnest soldier a long time, silently admiring his calmness and strength, so perfectly expressed in his mild, firm, kindly, taciturn face, and wondering what book he had.

"What are you reading, At.w.a.ter?" he at length asked.

"My Bible," replied the soldier, giving him a grave, pleasant smile.

Frank felt pained,--almost jealous. I can't tell how it is, but we don't like too well the sight of our companions cheerfully performing those duties which we neglect or hate. Cain slew Abel for that cause.

"I didn't know you read that," said Frank.

"I never have too much. But my wife----" The soldier's voice always sunk with a peculiarly tender thrill whenever he spoke of his bride of an hour, or rather of a minute, whom he had wedded and left in such haste.

"She slipped a Bible in my knapsack unbeknown to me. I had a letter from her to-day, in which she asked me if I read it. So I must read it, and say yes, if only to please her. But the truth is," said At.w.a.ter, with a brightening eye, "I find good in it I never thought was there before."