The Mystery of the Locks Part 6

Silas had never known Tug when he was great, of course, for he had flourished in the time of Silas's father; but he nevertheless believed it, and seemed to have personal knowledge of the former magnificence of the rusty old lawyer. Indeed, but few of the present inhabitants of Davy's Bend had known Tug when he was clean and respectable, for he always claimed that his triumphs were triumphs of the old days, when Davy's Bend was important and prosperous, and among the energetic citizens who had moved away and made decay possible.

"I don't amount to anything except when I am drunk--now," Tug said, getting on his feet, and taking aim at his host, "but fill me with aristocratic liquor, and I am as cute as the best of them. Have you ever heard the story of the beggar on horseback? Well, here he is, at your service. Will the rich and aristocratic owner of this house oblige the beggar by pouring out his dram? Ha! the beggar is at full gallop."

Dorris good-naturedly obeyed the request, and while Tug was on his feet, his aim happened to strike Silas.

"Silas, you greatest of scoundrels," he said, "you thoroughly debased villain, loafer, and liar, I love you."

Reaching across the table, Tug cordially shook hands with his friend, who had been doing nothing up to that time save enjoying Tug's humor, and indorsing whatever he said. Whether Silas enjoyed being called a scoundrel, a villain, a loafer, and a liar, is not known, but he certainly heard these expressions very frequently; for Tug seemed to tolerate him only because of his total and thorough depravity, though the other acquaintances of Silas regarded him as a mild-mannered little man without either vices or virtues.

"I have but two friends," Tug said again, seating himself, and gazing stiffly at his host, "Rum and Davy; rum cheers me when I'm sad, and Davy feeds me when I'm hungry, though the splendid thief does not feed me as well as he might were he more industrious. Rum has a bad reputation, but I announce here that it is one of my friends. I am either ravenously hungry, or uncomfortable from having eaten too much, all the time, so that I do not get much comfort from victuals; but rum hits me just right, and I love it. You say it will make me drunk. Very well; I _want_ to get drunk. If you argue that it will make me reckless, I will hotly reply that I _want_ to be reckless, and that a few bottles will make me as famous as a lifetime of work and success will make a sober man.

Therefore I hail rum as my best friend, next to the unscrupulous rascal known for hailing purposes, when there are boots to be polished, or errands to run, as Hup-avy."

The eminent legal mind hurriedly put his hand to his mouth, as though thoroughly humiliated that he had hiccoughed, and, looking at Dorris with the air of a man who commits an unpardonable indiscretion and hopes that it has not been noticed, continued with more care, with a great many periods to enable him to guard against future weakness.

"Although I have but two friends, I have a host of enemies. Among them Tigley. My wife's cousin. When I was a reputable lawyer, Tigley appeared in Davy's Bend. Tigley was a fiddler. And spent his time in playing in the beer halls for the drinks. The late Mrs. Whittle believed him to be a great man. She called him a mastero, though he played entirely by ear; and excused his dissipation on the ground that it was an eccentricity common to genius. If Tigley ever comes in my way again there will be something to pay more disagreeable than gold. He taught me to like rum."

Silas, who acted as a kind of chorus, intimated to Dorris that his friend referred to a word of four letters beginning with an "h," and ending with an "l."

"That's _one_ reason why I am a drunkard," the victim of too many relatives added, after a moment's thought. "The other is that I could never talk up to the old women except when I was drunk, and it was necessary to talk up to her so often that I finally craved spirits."

Tug crooked his elbow and produced the package from his vest pocket, which he waved aloft as an intimation that Tigley's nose should be held, when next they met, until he swallowed its contents.

"By-the-way," Tug said, as if something new had occurred to him, "I warn you not to believe anything I say; I lie because I enjoy it. Drinking whiskey, and lying, and loving Davy, are my only recreations. Then there was Veazy Vaughn, the Vagrant--my wife's uncle--he is responsible for my idleness. When he came here, twenty odd years ago, I tried to reclaim him, and went around with him; but he enjoyed vagrancy so much, and defended his position so well, that I took a taste of it myself. I liked it. I have followed it ever since."

There was not the slightest animation about Tug, and he sat bolt upright like a post while he talked with slow and measured accent, to avoid another hiccough, and his great eye was usually as motionless as his body.

"The late Mrs. Whittle treated her relatives so well that other worthless people who were no kin to her began to appear finally, and claim to be her cousins and nieces and nephews," Tug said. "And she used my substance to get up good dinners for them. They came by railroad. By wagon. On foot. And on horseback. I was worse than a Mormon, for I married a thousand, at least, on my wedding-day. Some of them called me 'Uncle W,' while others spoke of me as their 'Dear Cousin T;' but when the last dollar of my money was invested in dried beef, and the relatives had eaten it, I protested, and then they turned me out. The relations have my money, and I have their bad habits. I have nothing left but the poison, and they are welcome to that."

He once more produced the package, and as he laid it on the table, Dorris half expected to see a troop of ill-favored people come dashing in, grab up the paper, and run away with it. But none of them came, and Tug went on:

"I was a polite man until my wife's relations made me selfish. We always had gravy when they were around, and good gravy at that; but by the time I had helped them all, there was none left for me. I now help myself first. Will the Prince pa.s.s the Pauper the fresh bottle of rum?"

The bottle was handed over, and the rare old scoundrel helped himself to a full gla.s.s of its contents, drinking as deliberately as he had talked, apparently taking nine big swallows without breathing, at the same time thinking of the one he loved the best, as a means of curing the hiccoughs.

"I like Mrs. Wedge," Tug said, looking at that excellent woman with a tipsy grin, as she came into the room with some new delicacy for her employer's guests. "She looks so common, somehow, and I don't believe she knows any more about manners than I do. Whenever you see her eating her dinner, you'll find that she puts her arms on the table, as I do, though it's not polite. Polite things are not natural, in my opinion; mind I don't a.s.sert it as positive. I hate cold water, but it's polite to bathe; and your respectable shirt-collars rub all the hide off my neck. And anything that's good for me, I don't like. There's oatmeal, and graham grits, and such like--they are healthy, therefore I don't like their taste; but give me milk gravy, or salt risin' bread, or fried beef, or anything else that's not good for me, and you'll find me at home, as the man who had the party said on his cards."

During this discourse Mr. Whittle's great eye was following Mrs. Wedge about the room, but when she disappeared it lit on Dorris.

"I'm with the crowd, though, when it comes to my wife's kin," he said, eyeing his host in an impudent way. "A good many don't say so; but it makes them all hot to fill their houses with their relations. Whenever you go to see your relations, depend upon it that they are glad when you are gone. They may pretend to like you, but they don't, except when you are away from them. But in all other respects I'm common. Common! I'm so common that I like boiled cabbage; and the olives you blow about--I'd as soon eat green pignuts soaked in brine. _Common!_" He yelled out the words as though he were calling some one of that name in the cellar. "If men were judged by their commonness, I would be a chief with plumes in my hat."

Allan Dorris and Silas Davy were seated with their backs to the windows overlooking the town, while Tug sat opposite them, and in transferring his gaze from one to the other, in dignified preparation for resuming his conversation, which both his companions were enjoying, he saw the mysterious face he had seen once before peering into the room, and which was hastily withdrawn.

Tug jumped up from his chair at sight of it, and hurried to the window with such haste that the table was almost upset; but the face, as well as the figure to which it belonged, had disappeared. Throwing up the sash, Tug found that he could step out on to a porch, and from this he dropped into the yard with a great crash through the vines and lattice-work. Silas Davy quickly followed, by way of the stairs, suspecting the cause of Tug's disappearance; and Dorris was left alone.

All this had occupied but a few moments, and he probably thought of the circ.u.mstance as one of the many eccentricities of the two odd men; for after pulling down the lever to close the gate (it is a wonder that he was not surprised to find it open) he sat down before the fire and engaged in the pleasant thoughts that were interrupted early in the evening.

Silas did not come up with Tug until he reached the vicinity of the hotel, where a single street lamp burned all night, and while they were hurrying along without speaking, the figure they were pursuing pa.s.sed quickly on the opposite side of the street from the hotel. The rays of the lamp were so feeble that the figure was only a shadow; but they easily recognized it as the one seen before--that of a man above the medium height, enveloped in a long cloak, not unlike those worn by women in wet weather, with a slouch hat pulled down over his face.

The two men hurried after it, but in the darkness they were frequently compelled to stop and listen for the footsteps of the pursued, in order to detect his course. Each time the echoes were more indistinct, for the fellow was making good use of his legs; and in this manner they traced his course to the river bank, near the ferry landing, where the ferry-boat itself was tied up for the night. They concluded that the fugitive had a skiff tied there somewhere, which he intended to use in leaving the place, and, hurrying on board the ferry-boat, they rapped loudly at the door of the little room on the upper deck where the crew usually slept, with a view of procuring means of following.

The fellow who had charge of the ferry, a native of the low lands lying along the river, was known as "Young Bill Young," although he greatly desired that the people call him "Old Captain Young;" therefore both men pounded vigorously on the door, and loudly called "Captain Young," as a tribute to his vanity. "Captain Young" soon appeared, for he always slept in a bunk with his clothes on, which he said reminded him of his sea days, although he had never really seen any other water than that on which he operated his ferry. As the two hurriedly explained to him that they wanted a boat, Young Bill Young went to the lower deck, and unlocked one that floated at the stern, and soon Tug and his friend were pulling down the river with long strokes, for there were two pairs of oars. Occasionally they stopped rowing to listen, but nothing could be heard save the gentle ripple of the current; whereupon they worked with greater vigor than before.

They had rowed in this manner for an hour or more, when, stopping to listen again, the plash of oars was indistinctly heard on the water ahead of them. Lying down in the prow of the boat, Tug could see the boat and its occupants low down on the water, between him and the first rays of light of the coming morning. There was a heavy fog on the river, which was lying close to the water, but this had lifted sufficiently to permit an inspection through the rising mist. There were two figures in the boat; one rowing, who was evidently the man they had twice seen looking in at them, and the other a much smaller person, who was seated in the stern, and steering. This fact Tug regarded as so remarkable that he told Davy to lie down, and take a look, and when Davy returned to his oars, after a long inspection, he said:--

"I make out two."

"A big one and a little one," Tug replied, bending to the oars, and causing the boat to hurry through the water. "Earn your supper up at The Locks, and I'll introduce you to them."

On the left hand a smaller stream put into the main river, and at its mouth there was an immense growth of willows, besides a chute, an island, and a bend. Into this labyrinth the boat they were pursuing effectually disappeared; for though Tug and Silas rowed about until broad daylight they could find no trace of it or its occupants.

A short distance up the smaller stream was a lonely station on a railroad that did not run into Davy's Bend, and while rowing around in the river, the roar of an approaching train was heard, and the fact that this stopped at the station, with a blast from the engine-whistle indicating that it had been signalled, may have been important; but it did not occur to either Silas or Tug, who pulled their boat back to town in silence.

CHAPTER VII.

THE LOCKS' GHOST.

There was general curiosity in Davy's Bend with reference to the new occupant of The Locks, and when the people had exhausted themselves in denouncing their own town more than _it_ deserved, and in praising Ben's City more than it deserved, they began on Allan Dorris, and made him the subject of their gossip.

Whoever was bold enough to invent new theories with reference to him, and express them, was sure of a welcome at any of the houses where the speculation concerning his previous history went on from day to day; and, this becoming generally known, there was no lack of fresh material for idle tongues. Whenever he walked into the town, he knew that the stores turned out their crowds to look at him, and that in pa.s.sing the residences which were occupied, the windows were filled with curious eyes. But although there were a hundred theories with reference to him, it was only positively known that he one day appeared at his gate, two months after his arrival, and tacked up a little sign on which was inscribed in gold letters:

DR. DORRIS.

This curiosity of the people brought Dr. Dorris a great deal of business, for many of them were willing to pay for the privilege of seeing him, and he applied himself to practice with such energy that he was soon in general demand. As the people knew more of him, their curiosity became admiration; and many of them defended him from imaginary charges as warmly as did Mrs. Wedge, for there was every reason that the people should admire him, except that he had located at Davy's Bend.

That he was skilful and experienced as a physician became apparent at once, and it was therefore generally believed that he was only there temporarily; for certainly no one who was really capable would consent to remain long in Davy's Bend.

His heart was not in his work; this was a part of the gossip concerning him, though it is difficult to imagine how the idea originated; for he appeared to be pleased when he was called out at night, as though the companionship of even those in distress suited him better than the solitude of his own house; but though he was always trying to be cheerful, he could not disguise the fact that his mind was busy with matters outside of his work. Perhaps this was the excuse of the people for saying that his heart was not in his work, and the charge may have been true. While busy, he gave whatever was in hand careful and intelligent attention, but as soon as he was idle again, he forgot his surroundings, and permitted his mind to wander--n.o.body knew where. When addressed, he good-naturedly remembered that he was in Davy's Bend, and at the service of its people, and did whatever was expected of him with so much gentleness and ability that he won all hearts. This was his brief history during the summer following his arrival, except as shall be related hereafter.

The sun, which had been struggling for mastery over the mist and the fog, had triumphed after a fashion, and the pleasanter weather, and his business, served to make him more cheerful than he had been; and had he cared to think about such matters, the conviction would no doubt have forced itself upon his mind that he was doing well, and that he had every reason to feel contented, though he was not.

Still there were times when he was lonely in spite of his rather busy life, and nights when he sent for Mrs. Wedge and Betty to keep him company; for there were strange sounds through his house, when the summer air was still and oppressive, and the doors and windows rattled in the most unaccountable manner.

Thus it came about that they were with him one night long after their usual time to retire, Dorris being particularly nervous and restless, and having asked them to come up to his room rather late in the evening.

Mrs. Wedge had told him of Annie Benton a dozen times already, but she made it a baker's dozen, and told him again of her simple history; of her popularity in the town, though the people all seemed to be shy of her, and of her gruff father, who, in Mrs. Wedge's opinion, would resent the appearance of a lover in the most alarming manner. Mrs. Wedge thought she observed that Dorris was fond of this subject, and kept on talking about it; for he was paying close attention as he lounged in his easy chair. Dorris laughed in such a way at the accounts of Thompson Benton's jealousy of his daughter that Mrs. Wedge believed that he regarded him as he might regard a growling mastiff, which growled and snapped at whoever approached, knowing it was in bad taste and not expected of him.

Mrs. Wedge was sure her employer was not afraid of old Thompson,--or of any one else, for that matter,--so she added this declaration to the great number she was constantly making in his defence, and repeated it to herself whenever he was in her mind.

She was pleased with the circ.u.mstance that he admired Annie Benton, and though she said a great deal in her praise, it was no more than the truth, for she was a girl worthy of admiration and respect. But the subject was exhausted at last, and when she got up to go out, Dorris roused himself from one of his reveries, and asked her to tell him the history of The Locks, as a last resort to induce her to keep him company.

The worthy woman seated herself again, smoothed down the folds of her ap.r.o.n, and began by saying,--