The Wedge of Gold Part 26

"I do not know how to thank you, but I came here to teach music. I have several pupils, and have a contract to sing in the choir of one of the churches. I need the little revenue that I receive, but if I could get released from my obligations I would most gladly go, for I do covet a change exceedingly."

"Then," said Grace, "if I can get that release, and will pay you as much as you receive here, and all your expenses out and back, will you go?"

"Indeed, I will," she answered, "and will be grateful to you all my life."

The arrangement was easily made, and the further arrangement that Sedgwick and his bride should go to Ohio, visit Sedgwick's family for three or four days; then should join the Forbeses and Mrs. Hazleton at a certain hotel in New York, and all would embark on the steamer that would sail on the next week Sat.u.r.day--ten days from that day.

Then Sedgwick and Grace started for the Miami Valley.

What a welcome was there! The old house had been repaired, modernized, refurnished and repainted. A new house had been built on the other farm.

It was in the first days of February. That year there was good sleighing, and the whole town seemed to turn out to celebrate the occasion of Jim Sedgwick's bringing home his bride. Four days pa.s.sed in a whirl of pleasure. The first morning after their arrival, Sedgwick asked his brother for his trotting team, his new cutter, and the bells, to give Grace her first sleigh-ride. The steppers were of the 2:30 cla.s.s, the roads good, and the fair English girl-wife was in ecstacies. They drove past the Jasper farm on the hill, and Sedgwick told Grace that it was his dream for years to acc.u.mulate $30,000 to release the mortgage from his father's farm and to buy the Jasper farm.

"Then what would I have done?" asked Grace.

"Married some English banker, or may be some 'My Lord Fitzdoodle,'

probably," said Sedgwick.

"But, then, suppose a year later I had seen you, what would become of me?" she said.

"We should have been very formal and polite, and then have gone our several ways," said Sedgwick.

"Yes, because you are a man of principle, and I hope my pride of womanhood would have sustained me, but my heart would have broken, for with me it was a mad pa.s.sion which absorbed my life before I had been in your presence half an hour," said Grace; and then added: "I do not any more wonder at the crimes which come of mismated marriages."

Then Sedgwick told her how, when he left her side the first time, he took that ride and asked cabbie how much they would charge at Newgate to hang him.

And they both laughed, but there were tears in the eyes of Grace even while she smiled. But she rallied in a moment and said:

"Why not buy the place still? Except to leave my mother, I would be on that farm with you as happy a wife as ever lived. I would rather live upon that hill than in our great modern Babel, London."

Just then the cutter went in and out of a "Thank-ee-mom"--a hollow between two snowdrifts--and Sedgwick bent and kissed his wife.

"Thanks," said Grace.

"That was a kiss on principle. That was a pure duty," said Sedgwick.

Then he explained how venerable was the custom, and elaborated upon the respect due it because of its age and its usefulness to bashful lovers, because a youth must kiss the girl who goes sleighing with him whenever he comes to a "Thank-ee-mom" among the drifts.

"What a poor old country England is," said Grace.

"Why so?" asked Sedgwick.

"Why, had we but had snowdrifts and 'Thank-ee-moms,' I would have made you kiss me three weeks sooner than you did," said Grace.

"Did you want me to kiss you sooner than I did?" asked Sedgwick.

"O, you blind darling!" said Grace. "When I read of your exploit before the church in Devonshire, I told Jack and Rose that I would like to kiss that man. Then he told me who the man was, and after all I had to wait so long I began to fear he would never give me a chance to carry out my desire."

"Is that true, Gracie?" asked Sedgwick.

"Indeed it is," she replied, and then she quickly continued, "Does it drift badly along here?"

"Pretty badly," answered Sedgwick.

"Then, love," answered Grace, "buy the farm by all means and at all hazards."

"I believe I will," said Sedgwick. "I believe we need it in our business.

If when we get back to England it shall be known that we have bought a home in America, and are having a house built, it will take all suspicions about a possible African enterprise away."

And that day he bought the farm, and the next one to it, and told his brother he would send from England plans for a house to be built in the spring.

Next day came the parting from the old home. Sedgwick promised to return before many months and stay longer, and he and his wife started for New York.

They rested over one train at Niagara, and took in its splendor as seen in winter-time, and arrived in New York on Wednesday. Forbes had purchased the tickets, and secured the rooms on the ship for the whole party. Thursday and Friday were devoted to taking in as much as possible of the great city. On Sat.u.r.day they sailed.

The voyage was generally uneventful, except that one day they were treated to a beautiful spectacle of rescuing a crew from a water-logged craft. The wind was fresh, and there was an uneasy sea on, when a signal of distress was noted off across the water. The steamer was headed for it, and in half an hour came up to it. It was a little old lumber schooner. The sea was washing its deck with every wave. In the meantime, the second officer, with six seamen, had taken their places in a boat.

The boat had been swung out over the water. The sailors were standing by, holding the tackle by which a boat is lowered; the commander was on the bridge, and when in hailing distance of the craft he dropped his hand and the engines stopped. He shouted through his trumpet, asking what was wanted. "To come aboard," a voice came back. The commander dropped his hand again, and down ran the boat and pulled away for the wreck. It would mount a wave, and then sink out of sight of those on the ship's high deck; then climb again. It returned in twenty minutes, and it was the commander of the great ship that took the hand of the schooner's rough skipper as the boat was hoisted, and for the remainder of the voyage the shipwrecked skipper had a state-room by himself, and his seat at the table was at the commander's right hand.

They reached Liverpool on the tenth day--Monday--and went up to London the same afternoon.

Reaching the city, Sedgwick sent a message to Mrs. Hamlin to meet them at the house of Jack and Rose, for he would not go to the Hamlin house.

Sedgwick, with his wife and Mrs. Hazleton, went at once to the home of the Brownings.

Rose was wild with delight at their coming. She hugged Grace, kissed her and cried over her; kissed Sedgwick, and welcomed Mrs. Hazleton so cordially that the lady was sure it was sincere.

Then Mrs. Hamlin came, and the whole business had to be done over again, the elder lady reproaching Grace and her husband for not coming to her, and scolding even as she embraced them.

Then matters quieted down enough to talk. Rose explained that she was a deserted wife; that Jack six weeks before had come home one night and told her that he was going to sail for South America next day; that she could not go along, but must be good and not be lonesome for six or eight weeks.

Then she continued: "That is the kind of monsters these men are. They beg and tease and protest until we women take pity on them and marry them, and then when the woman's chances for getting a good man are all spoiled, they rush off on the slightest provocation to America, or India, or Australia, or China, or some other barbarous place, and all a woman can do is to mope and threaten that next time she will know better."

And then she laughed, and then as suddenly cried and said: "Poor dear old Jack! May the seas be merciful, and may the good ship bring him safely back and be quick about it!"

And sure enough, a week later a step was heard outside, someone with a night key opened the door, and Rose flew into Jack's arms and cried so hysterically that it took Jack a long time to calm her.

Browning explained to Sedgwick that he had been earning a commission by going out and reporting on a mine in Venezuela, just over the border from British Guiana. He brought to Rose a world of tropical and marine curiosities. He was in superb health and seemed to be in good spirits.

It was understood that Sedgwick would have to go away again in a month, and it was his wish and that of Grace to find a house and have an establishment of their own.

Jack and Rose insisted that during Sedgwick's absence Grace and Mrs.

Hazleton should be their guests, but Sedgwick said with a laugh: "O Mrs.

Browning, you and Jack are good, but you both know that no house is big enough for two families." And quietly Jack and Rose and Mrs. Hamlin were enjoined never in Mrs. Hazleton's presence to mention Jordan's name.

However, the difficulty was finally settled. The house Jack lived in was a double house. The other half was occupied by a gentleman, his wife and one child. The lady was delicate, and the doctors, baffled by her case, ordered her--as usual--to try a change of climate. So Sedgwick hired the house as Browning had his; the servants remained, and permission was obtained to cut a doorway in the part.i.tion walls that divided the two halls, so that Rose could visit Grace in the morning and Grace could visit Rose in the evening.

Sedgwick and Browning were almost inseparable during the day-time.

Sedgwick a.s.sured Browning that things were working well, begging him not to disturb either old man Hamlin, or Jenvie, or Stetson, but to "rig some purchase" after he should be gone, to get the remaining shares in 'The Wedge of Gold' from them, and also to be sure to keep the former owner of that mine in the country, even if he had to raise his salary.

He told him also that he expected next time to be absent four or five months.