The Woman-Haters Part 11

"I guess 'tis; seems to be. Come on, and we'll eat."

"I have eaten, thank you."

"You have? Alone?"

"Yes. That, too," with emphasis, "is a part of my business."

The lightkeeper stared, grunted, and then went out of the room. He ate a lonely meal, not of the lobster--he kept that for another occasion--but one made up of cold sc.r.a.ps from the pantry. He wandered uneasily about the premises, quieted Job's wails for the time by a gift of eatable odds and ends tossed into the boathouse, smoked, tried to read, and, when it grew dusk, lit the lamps in the towers. At last he walked to the closed door of his helper's room and rapped.

"Well?" was the ungracious response.

"It's me, Atkins," he announced, hesitatingly. "I'd like to speak to you, if you don't mind."

"On business?"

"Well, no--not exactly. Say, Brown, I guess likely I'd ought to beg your pardon again. I cal'late I've made another mistake. I jedge you wa'n't spyin' on me when you dove down that bankin'."

"Your judgment is good this time. I was not."

"No, I'm sartin you wa'n't. I apologize and take it all back. Now can I come in?"

The door was thrown open. Seth entered, looking sheepish, and sat down in the little cane-seated rocker.

"Say," he began, after a moment of uncomfortable silence, "would you mind--now that I've begged your pardon and all--tellin' me what did happen while I was away. I imagine, judgin' by the looks of things in the kitchen, that there was--er--well, consider'ble doin', as the boys say."

He grinned. Brown tried to be serious, but was obliged to smile in return.

"I'll tell you," he said. "Of course you know where that--er--remarkable dog came from?"

"I can guess," drily. "Henry G.'s present, ain't he? Humph! Well, I'd ought to have known that anything Henry would GIVE away was likely to be remarkable in all sorts of ways. All right! that's one Henry's got on me. Tomorrow afternoon me and Job take a trip back to Eastboro, and one of us stays there. It may be me, but I have my doubts. I agreed to take a DOG on trial, not a yeller-jaundiced cow with a church organ inside of it. Hear the critter whoopin' down there in the boathouse! And he's eat everything that's chewable on the reservation already. He's a famine on legs, that pup. But never mind him. He's been tried--and found guilty.

Tell me what happened."

Brown began the tale of the afternoon's performances, beginning with his experience as a lobster catcher. Seth smiled, then chuckled, and finally burst into roars of laughter, in which the narrator joined.

"Jiminy crimps!" exclaimed Seth, when the story was finished. "Oh, by jiminy crimps! that beats the Dutch, and everybody's been told what the Dutch beat. Ha, ha! ho, ho! Brown, I apologize all over again. I don't wonder you was put out when I accused you of spyin'. Wonder you hadn't riz up off that sand and butchered me where I stood. Cal'late that's what I'd have done in your place. Well, I hope there's no hard feelin's now."

"No. Your apology, is accepted."

"That's good. Er--er--say, you--you must have been sort of surprised to see me paintin' the Daisy M."

"The which?"

"The Daisy M. That's the name of that old schooner I was to work on."

"Indeed. . . . How is the weather tonight, clear?"

"Yes, it's fair now, but looks sort of thick to the east'ard. I say you must have been surprised to see me paintin' the Daisy M. I've been tinkerin' on that old boat, off and on, ever since last fall. Bought her for eight dollars of the feller that owned her, and she was a hulk for sartin then. I've caulked her up and rigged her, after a fashion. Now she might float, if she had a chance. Every afternoon, pretty nigh, I've been at her. Don't know exactly why I do it, neither. And yet I do, too. Prob'ly you've wondered where I was takin' all that old canvas and stuff. I--"

"Excuse me, Atkins. I mind my own business, you know. I ask no questions, and you are under no obligation to tell me anything."

"I know, I know." The lightkeeper nodded solemnly. He clasped his knee with his hands and rocked back and forth in his chair. "I know," he went on, an absent, wistful look in his eye; "but you must have wondered, just the same. I bought that craft because--well, because she reminded me of old times, I cal'late. I used to command a schooner like her once; bigger and lots more able, of course, but a fishin' schooner, same as she used to be. And I was a good skipper, if I do say it. My crews jumped when I said the word, now I tell you. That's where I belong--on the deck of a vessel. I'm a man there--a man."

He paused. Brown made no comment. Seth continued to rock and to talk; he seemed to be thinking aloud.

"Yes, sir," he declared, with a sigh; "when I was afloat I was a man, and folks respected me. I just do love salt water and sailin' craft.

That's why I bought the Daisy M. I've been riggin' her and caulkin' her just for the fun of doin' it. She'll never float again. It would take a tide like a flood to get her off them flats. But when I'm aboard or putterin' around her, I'm happy--happier, I mean. It makes me forget I'm a good-for-nothin' derelict, stranded in an old woman's job of lightkeepin'. Ah, hum-a-day, young feller, you don't know what it is to have been somebody, and then, because you was a fool and did a fool thing, to be nothin'--nothin'! You don't know what that is."

John Brown caught his breath. His fist descended upon the window ledge beside him.

"Don't I!" he groaned. "By George, don't I! Do you suppose--"

He stopped short. Atkins started and came out of his dream.

"Why--why, yes," he said, hastily; "I s'pose likely you do. . . . Well, good night. I've got to go on watch. See you in the mornin'."

CHAPTER VI

THE PICNIC

Seth was true to his promise concerning Job. The next afternoon that remarkable canine was decoyed, by the usual bone, into the box in which he had arrived. Being in, the cover was securely renailed above him.

Brown and the light-keeper lifted the box into the back part of the "open wagon," and Atkins drove triumphantly away, the pup's agonized protests against the journey serving as spurs to urge Joshua faster along the road to the village. When, about six o'clock, Seth reentered the yard, he was grinning broadly.

"Well," inquired Brown, "did he take him back willingly?"

"Who? Henry G.? I don't know about the willin' part, but he'll take him back. I attended to that."

"What did he say? Did he think you ungrateful for refusing to accept his present?"

Atkins laughed aloud. "He didn't say nothin'," he declared. "He didn't know it when I left Eastboro. I wa'n't such a fool as to cart that critter to the store, where all the gang 'round the store could holler and make fun. Not much! I drove way round the other way, up the back road, and unloaded him at Henry's house. I cal'lated to leave him with Aunt Olive--that's Henry's sister, keepin' house for him--but she'd gone out to sewin' circle, and there wa'n't n.o.body to home. The side door was unlocked, so I lugged that box into the settin' room and left it there.

Pretty nigh broke my back; and that everlastin' Job hollered so I thought the whole town would hear him and come runnin' to stop the murderin' that they'd cal'late was bein' done. But there ain't no nigh neighbors, and those that are nighest ain't on speakin' terms with Henry; ruther have him murdered than not, I shouldn't wonder. So I left Job in his box in the settin' room and cleared out."

The subst.i.tute a.s.sistant smiled delightedly.

"Good enough!" he exclaimed. "What a pleasant surprise for friend Henry or his housekeeper."

"Ho, ho! ain't it! I rather guess 'twill be Henry himself that's surprised fust. Aunt Olive never leaves sewin' circle till the last bit of supper's eat up--she's got some of her brother's stinginess in her make-up--so I cal'late Henry'll get home afore she does. I shouldn't wonder," with an exuberant chuckle, "if that settin' room' was some stirred up when he sees it. The pup had loosened the box cover afore I left. Ho, ho!"

"But won't he send the dog back here again?"

"No, he won't. I left a note for him on the table. There was consider'ble ginger in every line of it. No, Job won't be sent here, no matter what becomes of him. And if anything SHOULD be broke in that settin' room--well, there was SOME damage done to our kitchen. No, I guess Henry G. and me are square. He won't make any fuss; he wants to keep our trade, you see."

It was a true prophecy. The storekeeper made no trouble, and Job remained at Eastboro until a foray on a neighbor's chickens resulted in his removal from this vale of tears. Neither the lightkeeper nor his helper ever saw him again, and when Seth next visited the store and solicitously inquired concerning the pup's health, Henry G. merely looked foolish and changed the subject.

But the dog's short sojourn at the Twin-Lights had served to solve one mystery, that of Atkins's daily excursions to Pounddug Slough. He went there to work on the old schooner, the Daisy M. Seth made no more disclosures concerning his past life--that remained a secret--but he did suggest his helper's going to inspect the schooner. "Just walk across and look her over," he said. "I'd like to know what you think of her.

See if I ain't makin' a pretty good job out of nothin'. FOR nothin', of course," he added, gloomily; "but it keeps me from thinkin' too much. Go and see her, that's a good feller."