← catalogue

Cy Whittaker's Place

by Joseph Crosby Lincoln · English · Gutenberg #3281 · 514,997 chars · public domain (US)

The Project Gutenberg eBook of Cy Whittaker's Place
    
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online
at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States,
you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located
before using this eBook.

Title: Cy Whittaker's Place

Author: Joseph Crosby Lincoln


        
Release date: June 3, 2006 [eBook #3281]
                Most recently updated: January 8, 2023

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3281

Credits: Donald Lainson; David Widger


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CY WHITTAKER'S PLACE ***




CY WHITTAKER'S PLACE


By Joseph C. Lincoln




CONTENTS


CHAPTER

I.--     THE PERFECT BOARDING HOUSE

II.--    THE WANDERER'S RETURN

III.--   “FIXIN' OVER”

IV.--    BAILEY BANGS'S EXPERIMENT

V.--     A FRONT DOOR CALLER

VI.--    ICICLES AND DUST

VII.--   CAPTAIN CY PROVES DELINQUENT

VIII.--  THE “COW LADY”

IX.--    POLITICS AND BIRTHDAYS

X.--     A LETTER AND A VISITOR

XI.--    A BARGAIN OFF

XII.--   “TOWN MEETIN'”

XIII.--  THE REPULSE

XIV.--   A CLEW

XV.--    DEBBY BEASLEY TO THE RESCUE

XVI.--   A REMARKABLE DRIVE AND WHAT FOLLOWED

XVII.--  THE CAPTAIN REMEMBERS HIS AGE

XVIII.-- CONGRESSMAN EVERDEAN

XIX.--   THE TOPPLING OF A MONUMENT

XX.--    DIVIDED HONORS

XXI.--   CAPTAIN CY'S “PICTURE”




CY WHITTAKER'S PLACE



CHAPTER I

THE PERFECT BOARDING HOUSE


It is queer, but Captain Cy himself doesn't remember whether the day was
Tuesday or Wednesday. Asaph Tidditt's records ought to settle it, for
there was a meeting of the board of selectmen that day, and Asaph has
been town clerk in Bayport since the summer before the Baptist meeting
house burned. But on the record the date, in Asaph's handwriting, stands
“Tuesday, May 10, 189-” and, as it happens, May 10 of that year fell on
Wednesday, not Tuesday at all.

Keturah Bangs, who keeps “the perfect boarding house,” says it was
Tuesday, because she remembers they had fried cod cheeks and cabbage
that day--as they have every Tuesday--and neither Mr. Tidditt nor Bailey
Bangs, Keturah's husband, was on hand when the dinner bell rang. Keturah
says she is certain it was Tuesday, because she remembers smelling the
boiled cabbage as she stood at the side door, looking up the road to
see if either Asaph or Bailey was coming. As for Bailey, he says he
remembers being late to dinner and his wife's “startin' to heave a
broadsides into him” because of it, but he doesn't remember what day it
was. This isn't surprising; Keturah's verbal cannonades are likely to
make one forgetful of trifles.

At any rate, whether Tuesday or Wednesday, it is certain that it was
quarter past twelve, according to the clock presented to the Methodist
Society by the Honorable Heman Atkins, when Asaph Tidditt came down the
steps of the townhall, after the selectmen's meeting, and saw Bailey
Bangs waiting for him on the opposite side of the road.

“Hello, Ase!” hailed Mr. Bangs. “You'll be late to dinner, if you don't
hurry. I was headin' for home, all sail sot, when I see you. What kept
you?”

“Town business, of course,” replied Mr. Tidditt, with the importance
pertaining to his official position. “What kept YOU, for the land sakes?
Won't Ketury be in your wool?”

Bailey hasn't any “wool” worth mentioning now, and he had very little
more then, but he mopped his forehead, or the extension above it, taking
off his cap to do so.

“I cal'late she will,” he said, uneasily. “Tell you the truth, Ase,
I was up to the store, and Cap'n Josiah Dimick and some more of
'em drifted in and we got talkin' about the chances of the harbor
appropriation, and one thing or 'nother, and 'twas later'n I thought
'twas 'fore I knew it.”

The appropriation from the government, which was to deepen and widen our
harbor here at Bayport, was a very vital topic among us just then. Heman
Atkins, the congressman from our district, had promised to do his best
for the appropriation, and had for a time been very sanguine of securing
it. Recently, however, he had not been quite as hopeful.

“What's Cap'n Josiah think about the chances?” asked Asaph eagerly.

“Well, sometimes he thinks 'Yes' and then again he thinks 'No,'” replied
Bailey. “He says, of course, if Heman is able to get it he will, but if
he ain't able to, he--he--”

“He won't, I s'pose. Well, _I_ can think that myself, and I don't set
up to be no inspired know-it-all, like Joe Dimick. He ain't heard from
Heman lately, has he?”

“No, he ain't. Neither's anybody else, so fur as I can find out.”

“Oh, yes, they have. _I_ have, for one.”

Mr. Bangs stopped short in his double-quick march for home and dinner,
and looked his companion in the face.

“Ase Tidditt!” he cried. “Do you mean to tell me you've had a letter
from Heman Atkins, from Washin'ton?”

Asaph nodded portentously.

“Yes, sir,” he declared. “A letter from the Honorable Heman G. Atkins,
of Washin'ton, D. C., come to me last night. I read it afore I turned
in.”

“You did! And never said nothin' about it?”

“Why should I say anything about it? 'Twas addressed to me as town
clerk, and was concernin' a matter to be took up with the board of
s'lectmen. I ain't in the habit of hollerin' town affairs through a
speakin' trumpet. Folks that vote for me town-meetin' day know that, I
guess. Angie Phinney says to me only yesterday, 'Mr. Tidditt,' says she,
'there's one thing I'll say for you--you don't talk.'”

Miss Phinney boarded with the Bangses, and Bailey was acquainted with
her personal peculiarities; for that matter so were most of Bayport's
permanent residents.

“Humph!” he snorted indignantly. “She thought 'twas a good thing not
to talk, hey? SHE did? Well, by mighty! you never get no CHANCE to talk
when she's around. Angie Phinney! Why, when that poll parrot of hers
died, Alph'us Smalley declared up and down that what killed it was
jealousy and disapp'inted ambition; he said it broke its heart tryin' to
keep up with Angie. Her ma was the same breed of cats. I remember--”

The talking proclivities of females is the one topic upon which
Keturah's husband is touchiest. Asaph knew this, but he delighted to
stir up his chum occasionally. He chuckled as he interrupted the flow of
reminiscence.

“There, there, Bailey!” he exclaimed. “I know as much about Angie's
tribe as you do, I cal'late. Ain't we a little mite off the course?
Seems to me we was talkin' about Heman's letter.”

“Is that so? I judged from what you said we wa'n't goin' to talk about
it. Aw, don't be so mean, Ase! Showin' off your importance like a young
one! What did Heman say about the appropriation? Is he goin' to get it?”

Mr. Tidditt paused before replying. Then, bending over, he whispered in
his chum's ear:

“He never said one word about the appropriation, Bailey; not one word.
He wanted to know if we'd got this year's taxes on the Whittaker place.
And, if we hadn't, what was we goin' to do about it? Bailey, between you
and me and the mizzenmast, Heman Atkins wants to get ahold of that place
the worst way.”

“He does? He DOES? For the land sakes, ain't he got property enough
already? Ain't a--a palace like that enough for one man, without wantin'
to buy a rattletrap like THAT?”

The first “that” was emphasized by a brandished but reverent left hand;
the second by a derisively pointing right. The two friends had reached
the crest of the long slope leading up from the townhall. On one side
of the road stretched the imposing frontage of the “Atkins estate,” with
its iron fence and stone posts; on the other slouched the weed-grown,
tumble-down desolation of the “Cy Whittaker place.” The contrast was
that of opulent prosperity and poverty-stricken neglect.

If our village boasted one of those horseless juggernauts, such as are
used to carry sightseers in Boston from the old North Church to the
Public Library and other points of interest--that is, if there was a
“seeing Bayport” car, it is from this hill that its occupants would be
given their finest view of the village and its surroundings. As Captain
Josiah Dimick always says: “Bayport is all north and south, like a
codfish line. It puts me in mind of Seth Higgins's oldest boy. He was so
tall and thin that when they bought a suit of clothes for him, they used
to take reefs in the sides of the jacket and use the cloth to piece onto
the bottoms of the trousers' legs.” What Captain Joe means is that
the houses in the village are all built beside three roads running
longitudinally. There is the “main road” and the “upper road”--or
“Woodchuck Lane,” just as you prefer--and the “lower road,” otherwise
known as “Bassett's Holler.”

The “upper road” is sometimes called the “depot road,” because the
railroad station is conveniently located thereon--convenient for the
railroad, that is--the station being a full mile from Simmons's “general
store,” which is considered the center of the town. The upper road
enters the main road at the corner by the store, and there also are
the Methodist meetinghouse and the schoolhouse. The townhall is in the
hollow farther on. Then comes the big hill--

“Whittaker's Hill”--and from the top of this hill you can, on a clear
day, see for miles across the salt marshes and over the bay to the
eastward, and west as far as the church steeple in Orham. If there
happens to be a fog, with a strong easterly wind, you cannot see the
marshes or the bay, but you can smell them, wet and salty and sweet. It
is a smell that the born Bayporter never forgets, but carries with him
in memory wherever he goes; and that, in the palmy days of the merchant
marine, was likely, to be far, for every male baby in the village was
born with web feet, so people said, and was predestined to be a sailor.

When Heman Atkins came back from the South Seas early in the '60's,
“rich as dock mud,” though still a young man, he promptly tore down his
father's old house, which stood on the crest of Whittaker's Hill, and
built in its place a big imposing residence. It was by far the finest
house in Bayport, and Heman made it finer as the years passed. There
were imitation brownstone pillars supporting its front porch, iron dogs
and scroll work iron benches bordering its front walk, and a pair of
stone urns, in summer filled with flowers, beside its big iron front
gate.

Heman was our leading citizen, our representative in Washington, and the
town's philanthropist. He gave the Atkins memorial window and the Atkins
tower clock to the Methodist Church. The Atkins town pump, also his
gift, stood before the townhall. The Atkins portrait in the Bayport
Ladies' Library was much admired; and the size of the Atkins fortune was
the principal subject of conversation at sewing circle, at the table of
“the perfect boarding house,” around the stove in Simmons's store, or
wherever Bayporters were used to gather. We never exactly worshipped
Heman Atkins, perhaps, but we figuratively doffed our hats when his name
was mentioned.

The “Cy Whittaker place” faced the Atkins estate from the opposite side
of the main road, but it was the general opinion that it ought to be
ashamed to face it. Almost everybody called it “the Cy Whittaker place,”
 although some of the younger set spoke of it as the “Sea Sight House.”
 It was a big, old-fashioned dwelling, gambrel-roofed and brown and
dilapidated. Originally it had enjoyed the dignified seclusion afforded
by a white picket fence with square gateposts, and the path to its
seldom-used front door had been guarded by rigid lines of box hedge.
This, however, was years ago, before the second Captain Cy Whittaker
died, and before the Howes family turned it into the “Sea Sight House,”
 a hotel for summer boarders.

The Howeses “improved” the house and grounds. They tore down the picket
fence, uprooted the box hedges, hung a sign over the sacred front door,
and built a wide veranda under the parlor windows.

They took boarders for five consecutive summers; then they gave up the
unprofitable undertaking, returned to Concord, New Hampshire, their
native city, and left the Cy Whittaker place to bear the ravages of
Bayport winters and Bayport small boys as best it might.

For years it stood empty. The weeds grew high about its foundations; the
sparrows built nests behind such of its shutters as had not been ripped
from their hinges by February no'theasters; its roof grew bald in spots
as the shingles loosened and were blown away; the swallows flew in and
out of its stone-broken windowpanes. Year by year it became more of a
disgrace in the eyes of Bayport's neat and thrifty inhabitants--for neat
and thrifty we are, if we do say it. The selectmen would have liked
to tear it down, but they could not, because it was private property,
having been purchased from the Howes heirs by the third Cy Whittaker,
Captain Cy's only son, who ran away to sea when he was sixteen years
old, and was disinherited and cast off by the proud old skipper in
consequence. Each March, Asaph Tidditt, in his official capacity as town
clerk, had been accustomed to receive an envelope with a South American
postmark, and in that envelope was a draft on a Boston banking house for
the sum due as taxes on the “Cy Whittaker place.” The drafts were signed
“Cyrus M. Whittaker.”

But this particular year--the year in which this chronicle begins--no
draft had been received. Asaph waited a few weeks and then wrote to the
address indicated by the postmark. His letter was unanswered. The taxes
were due in March and it was now May. Mr. Tidditt wrote again; then he
laid the case before the board of selectmen, and Captain Eben Salters,
chairman of that august body, also wrote. But even Captain Eben's
authoritative demand was ignored. Next to the harbor appropriation, the
question of what should be done about the “Cy Whittaker place” filled
Bayport's thoughts that spring. No one, however, had supposed that
the Honorable Heman might wish to buy it. Bailey Bangs's surprise was
excusable.

“What in the world,” repeated Bailey, “does Heman want of a shebang like
that? Ain't he got enough already?”

His friend shook his head.

“'Pears not,” he said. “I judge it's this way, Bailey: Heman, he's a
proud man--”

“Well, ain't he got a right to be proud?” broke in Mr. Bangs, hastening
to resent any criticism of the popular idol. “Cal'late you and me'd be
proud if we was able to carry as much sail as he does, wouldn't we?”

“Yes, I guess like we would. But you needn't get red in the face and
strain your biler just because I said that. I ain't finding fault with
Heman; I'm only tellin' you. He's proud, as I said, and his wife--”

“She's dead this four year. What are you resurrectin' her for?”

“Land! you're peppery as a West Injy omelet this mornin'. Let me alone
till I've finished. His wife, when she was alive, she was proud, too.
And his daughter, Alicia, she's eight year old now, and by and by she'll
be grown up into a high-toned young woman. Well, Heman is fur-sighted,
and I s'pose likely he's thinkin' of the days when there'll be young
rich fellers--senators and--and--well, counts and lords, maybe--cruisin'
down here courtin' her. By that time the Whittaker place'll be a worse
disgrace than 'tis now. I presume he don't want those swells to sit on
his front piazza and see the crows buildin' nests in the ruins acrost
the road. So--”

“Crows! Did you ever see a crow build a nest in a house? I never did!”

“Oh, belay! Crows or canary birds, what difference does it make?
SOMETHIN' 'll nest there, if it's only A'nt Sophrony Hallett's hens.
So Heman he writes to the board, askin' if the taxes is paid, if we've
heard any reason why they ain't paid, and what we're goin' to do about
it. If there's a sale for taxes he wants to be fust bidder. Then, when
the place is his, he can tear down or rebuild, just as he sees fit.
See?”

“Yes, I see. Well, I feel about that the way Joe Dimick felt when he
heard the doctor had told Elviry Pepper she must stop singin' in
the choir or lose her voice altogether. 'Whichever happens 'll be an
improvement,' says Cap'n Joe; and whatever Heman does 'll help the
Whittaker place. What did you decide at the meetin'?”

“Nothin'. We can't decide yet. We ain't sure about the law and we want
to wait a spell, anyhow. But I know how 'twill end: Atkins 'll get the
place. He always gets what he wants, Heman does.”

Bailey turned and looked back at the old house, forlorn amidst
its huddle of blackberry briers and weeds, and with the ubiquitous
“silver-leaf” saplings springing up in clusters everywhere about it and
closing in on its defenseless walls like squads of victorious soldiery
making the final charge upon a conquered fort.

“Well,” sighed Mr. Bangs, “so that 'll be the end of the old Whittaker
place, hey? Sho! things change in a feller's lifetime, don't they? You
and me can remember, Ase, when Cap'n Cy Whittaker was one of the biggest
men we had in this town. So was his dad afore him, the Cap'n Cy that
built the house. I wonder the looks of things here now don't bring them
two up out of their graves. Do you remember young Cy--'Whit' we used to
call him--or 'Reddy Whit,' 'count of his red hair? I don't know's you
do, though; guess you'd gone to sea when he run away from home.”

Mr. Tidditt shook his head.

“No, no!” he said. “I was to home that year. Remember 'Whit'? Well, I
should say I did. He was a holy terror--yes, sir! Wan't no monkey shines
or didos cut up in this town that young Cy wan't into. Fur's that goes,
you and me was in 'em, too, Bailey. We was all holy terrors then. Young
ones nowadays ain't got the spunk we used to have.”

His friend chuckled.

“That's so,” he declared. “That's so. Whit was a good-hearted boy, too,
but full of the Old Scratch and as sot in his ways as his dad, and if
Cap'n Cy wan't sot, then there ain't no sotness. 'You'll go to college
and be a parson,' says the Cap'n. 'I'll go to sea and be a sailor, same
as you done,' says Whit. And he did, too; run away one night, took the
packet to Boston, and shipped aboard an Australian clipper. Cap'n Cy
didn't go after him to fetch him home. No, sir--ee! not a fetch. Sent
him a letter plumb to Melbourne and, says he: 'You've made your bed; now
lay in it. Don't you never dast to come back to me or your ma,' he says.
And Whit didn't, he wan't that kind.”

“Pretty nigh killed the old lady--Whit's ma--that did,” mused Asaph.
“She died a little spell afterwards. And the old man pined away, too,
but he never give in or asked the boy to come back. Stubborn as all
get-out to the end, he was, and willed the place, all he had left, to
them Howes folks. And a nice mess THEY made of it. Young Cy, he--”

“Young Cy!” interrupted Bailey. “We're always callin' him 'young Cy,'
and yet, when you come to think of it, he must be pretty nigh fifty-five
now; 'most as old as you and I be. Wonder if he'll ever come back here.”

“You bet he won't!” was the oracular reply. “You bet he won't! From what
I hear he got to be a sea cap'n himself and settled down there in Buenos
Ayres. He's made all kinds of money, they say, out of hides and such.
What he ever bought his dad's old place for, _I_ can't see. He'll never
come back to these common, one-horse latitudes, now you mark my word on
that!”

It was a prophecy Mr. Tidditt was accustomed to make each year to the
crowd at the post office, when the receipt for the draft for taxes
caused him to wax reminiscent. The younger generation here in Bayport
regard their town clerk as something of an oracle, and this regard has
made Asaph a trifle vain and positive.

Bailey chuckled again.

“We WAS a spunky, dare-devil lot in the old days, wan't we, Ase?” he
said. “Spunk was kind of born in us, as you might say. And even now
we're--”

The Atkins tower clock boomed once--a solemn, dignified stroke. Mr.
Tidditt and his companion started and looked at each other.

“Godfrey scissors!” gasped Asaph. “Is that half past twelve?”

Mr. Bangs pulled a big worn silver watch from his pocket and glanced at
the dial.

“It is!” he moaned. “As sure's you're born, it is! We've kept Ketury's
dinner waitin' twenty minutes. You and me are in for it now, Ase
Tidditt! Twenty minutes late! She'll skin us alive.”

Mr. Tidditt did not pause to answer, but plunged headlong down the
hill at a race-horse gait, Bailey pounding at his heels. For “born
dare-devils,” self-confessed, they were a nervous and apprehensive pair.

The “perfect boarding house” is situated a quarter of a mile beyond
“Whittaker's Hill,” nearly opposite the Salters homestead. The sign,
hung on the pole by the front gate, reads, “Bayport Hotel. Bailey Bangs,
Proprietor,” but no one except the stranger in Bayport accepts that sign
seriously. When, owing to an unexpected change in the administration
at Washington, Mr. Bangs was obliged to relinquish his position as our
village postmaster, his wife came to the rescue with the proposal that
they open a boarding house. “'Whatsoe'er you find to do,' quoted Keturah
at sewing-circle meeting, 'do it then with all your might!' That's a
good Sabbath-school hymn tune and it's good sense besides. I intend to
make it my life work to run just as complete a--a eatin' and lodgin'
establishment as I can. If, when I'm laid to rest, they can put onto my
gravestone, 'She run the perfect boardin' house,' I'LL be satisfied.”

This remark, and subsequent similar declarations, were widely quoted,
and, therefore, though casual visitors may refer to the “Bayport Hotel,”
 to us natives the Bangs residence is always “Keturah's perfect boarding
house.” As for the sign's affirmation of Mr. Bangs proprietorship,
that is considered the cream of the joke. The idea of meek, bald-headed
little Bailey posing as proprietor of anything while his wife is on
deck, tickles Bayport's sense of humor.

The perspiring delinquents panted into the yard of the perfect boarding
house and tremblingly opened the door leading to the dining room. Dinner
was well under way, and Mrs. Bangs, enthroned at the end of the long
table, behind the silver-plated teapot, was waiting to receive them. The
silence was appalling.

“Sorry to be a little behindhand, Ketury,” stammered Asaph hurriedly.
“Town affairs are important, of course, and can't be neglected. I--”

“Yes, yes; that's so, Ketury,” cut in Mr. Bangs.

“You see--”

“Hum! Yes, I see.” Keturah's tone was several degrees below freezing.
“Hum! I s'pose 'twas town affairs kept you, too, hey?”

“Well, well--er--not exactly, as you might say, but--” Bailey squeezed
himself into the armchair at the end of the table opposite his wife, the
end which, with sarcasm not the less keen for being unintentional, was
called the “head.” “Not exactly town affairs, 'twan't that kept me,
Ketury, but--My! don't them cod cheeks smell good? You always could cook
cod cheeks, if I do say it.”

The compliment was wasted. Mrs. Bangs had a sermon to deliver, and its
text was not “cod cheeks.”

“Bailey Bangs,” she began, “when I was brought to realize that my
husband, although apparently an able-bodied man, couldn't support me as
I'd been used to be supported, and when I was forced to support HIM
by keepin' boarders, I says, 'If there's one thing that my house shall
stand for it's punctual promptness at meal times. I say nothing,' I
says, 'about the inconvenience of gettin' on with only one hired help
when we ought to have three. If Providence, in its unscrutable wisdom,'
I says, 'has seen fit to lay this burden onto me, the burden of a
household of boarders and a husband whom--'”

And just then the power referred to by Mrs. Bangs intervened to spare
her husband the remainder of the preachment. From the driveway of the
yard, beside the dining-room windows, came the rattle of wheels and
the tramp of a horse's feet. Mrs. Matilda Tripp, who sat nearest the
windows, on that side, rose and peered out.

“It's the depot wagon, Ketury,” she said. “There's somebody inside it. I
wonder if they're comin' here.”

“Transients” were almost unknown quantities at the Bayport Hotel in May.
Consequently, all the boarders and the landlady herself crowded to the
windows. The “depot wagon” had drawn up by the steps, and Gabe Lumley,
the driver, had descended from his seat and was doing his best to open
the door of the ancient vehicle. It stuck, of course; the doors of all
depot wagons stick.

“Hold on a shake!” commanded some one inside the carriage. “Wait till
I get a purchase on her. Now, then! All hands to the ropes! Heave--ho!
THERE she comes!”

The door flew back with a bang. A man sprang out upon the lower step of
the porch. The eye of every inmate of the perfect boarding house was on
him. Even the “hired help” peered from the kitchen door.

“He's a stranger,” whispered Mrs. Tripp. “I never see him before, did
you, Mr. Tidditt?”

The town clerk did not answer. He was staring at the depot wagon's
passenger, staring with a face the interested expression of which was
changing to that of surprise and amazed incredulity. Mrs. Tripp turned
to Mr. Bangs; he also was staring, open-mouthed.

“Godfrey scissors!” gasped Asaph, under his breath. “Godfrey--SCISSORS!
Bailey, I--I believe--I swan to man, I believe--”

“Ase Tidditt!” exclaimed Mr. Bangs, “am I goin' looney, or is that--is
that--”

Neither finished his sentence. There are times when language seems so
pitifully inadequate.



CHAPTER II

THE WANDERER'S RETURN


Here in Bayport, nowadays, the collecting of “antiques” is a favorite
amusement of our summer visitors. Those of us who were fortunate enough
to possess a set of nicked blue dishes, a warming pan, or a tall clock
with wooden wheels, have long ago parted with these treasures for
considerable sums. Oddly enough Sylvanus Cahoon has profited most by
this craze. Sylvanus used to be judged the unluckiest man in town; of
late this judgment has been revised.

It was Sylvanus who, confined to the house by an illness brought on by
eating too much “sugar cake” at a free sociable given by the Methodist
Society, arose in the night and drank copiously of what he supposed to
be the medicine left by the doctor. It happened to be water-bug poison,
and Sylvanus was nearly killed by the dose. He is reported as having
admitted that he “didn't mind dyin' so much, but hated to die such a dum
mean death.”

While convalescent he took to smoking in bed and was burned out of
house and home in consequence. Then it was that his kind-hearted fellow
citizens donated, for the furnishing of his new residence, all the
cast-off bits of furniture and odds and ends from their garrets.
“Charity,” observed Captain Josiah Dimick at the time, “begins at home
with us Bayporters, and it generally begins up attic, that bein' nighest
to heaven.”

Later Sylvanus sold most of the donations as “antiques” and made money
enough therefrom to buy a new plush parlor set. Miss Angeline Phinney
never called on the Cahoons after that without making her appearance at
the front door. “I'll get some good out of that plush sofy I helped to
pay for,” declared Angeline, “if it's only to wear it out by settin' on
it.”

There are two “antiques” in Bayport which have not yet been sold or even
bid for. One is Gabe Lumley's “depot wagon,” and the other is “Dan'l
Webster,” the horse which draws it. Both are very ancient, sadly in need
of upholstery, and jerky of locomotion.

Gabe was, as usual, waiting at the station when the down train arrived,
on the Tuesday--or Wednesday--of the selectmen's meeting. The train was
due, according to the time-table, at eleven forty-five. This time-table,
and the signboard of the “Bayport Hotel” are the only bits of humorous
literature peculiar to our village, unless we add the political
editorials of the Bayport Breeze.

So, at eleven forty-five, Mr. Lumley was serenely dozing on the baggage
truck, which he had wheeled to the sunny side of the platform. At five
minutes past twelve, he yawned, stretched, and looked at his watch.
Then, rolling off the truck, he strolled to the edge of the platform and
spoke authoritatively to “Dan'l Webster.”

“Hi there! stand still!” commanded Mr. Lumley.

Standing still being Dan'l's long suit, the order was obeyed. Gabe then
loafed to the door of the station and accosted the depot master, who was
nodding in his chair beside the telegraph instrument.

“Where is she now, Ed?” asked Mr. Lumley, referring to the train.

“Just left South Harniss. Be here pretty soon. What's your hurry?
Expectin' anybody?”

“Naw; nobody that I know of, special. Sophrony Hallett's gone to
Ostable, but she won't be back till to-morrow I cal'late. Hello! there
she whistles now.”

Needless to say it was the train, not the widow Hallett, that had
whistled. The depot master rose from his chair. A yellow dog, his
property, scrambled from beneath it, and rushing out of the door and
to the farther end of the platform, barked furiously. Cephas Baker, who
lives across the road from the depot, slouched down to his front gate.
His wife opened the door of her kitchen and stood there, her wet arms
wrapped in her apron. The five Baker children tore round the corner of
the house, over the back fence, and lined up, whooping joyously, on the
platform. A cloud of white smoke billowed above the clump of cedars at
the bend of the track. Then the locomotive rounded the curve and bore
down upon the station.

“Stand still, I tell you!” shouted Gabe, addressing the horse.

Dan'l Webster opened one eye, closed it and relapsed into slumber.

The train, a combination baggage car and smoker, two freight cars and
a passenger coach, rolled ponderously alongside the platform. From the
open door of the baggage car were tossed the mail sack and two express
packages. The conductor stepped from the passenger coach. Following
him came briskly a short, thickset man with a reddish-gray beard and
grayish-red hair.

“Goin' down to the village, Mister?” inquired Mr. Lumley. “Carriage
right here.”

The stranger inspected the driver of the depot wagon, inspected him
deliberately from top to toe. Then he said:

“Down to the village? Why, yes, I wouldn't wonder. Say! you're a Lumley,
ain't you?”

“Why! why--yes, I be! How'd you know that? Ain't ever seen you afore,
have I?”

“Guess not,” with a quiet chuckle. “I've never seen you, either, but
I've seen your nose. I'd know a Lumley nose if I run across it in
China.”

The possessor of the “Lumley nose” rubbed that organ in a bewildered
fashion. Recovering in a measure he laughed, rather half-heartedly, and
begged to know if the trunk, then being unloaded from the baggage car,
belonged to his prospective passenger. As the answer was an affirmative
nod, he secured the trunk check and departed, still rubbing his nose.

When he returned, with the trunk on the truck, he found the stranger,
with his hands in his pockets, standing before Dan'l Webster and gazing
at that animal with an expression of acute interest.

“Is this your--horse?” demanded the newcomer, pausing before the final
word of his question.

“It's so cal'lated to be,” replied Gabe, with dignity.

“Hum! Does he work nights?”

“Work nights? No, course he don't!”

“Oh, all right! Then you can wake him up with a clear conscience. I
didn't know but he needed the sleep. What's his record?”

“Record?”

“Yup; his trottin' record. Anybody can see he's built for speed, narrow
in the beam and sharp fore and aft. Shall I get aboard the barouche?”

The depot master, who was on hand to help with the trunk, grinned
broadly. Mr. Lumley sulkily made answer that his passenger might get
aboard if he wanted to. Apparently he wanted to, for he sprang into the
depot wagon with a bounce that made the old vehicle rock on its springs.

“Jerushy!” he exclaimed, “she rolls some, don't she? Never mind, MY
ballast 'll keep her on an even keel. Trunk made fast astern? All
right! Say! you might furl some of this spare canvas so's I can take
an observation as we go along. Don't go so fast that the scenery gets
blurred, will you? It's been some time since I made this cruise, and I'd
rather like to keep a lookout.”

The driver “furled the canvas”--that is, he rolled up the curtains at
the sides of the carryall. Then he climbed to the front seat and took up
the reins.

“Git up!” he shouted savagely. Dan'l Webster did not move.

The passenger offered a suggestion. “Why don't you try hangin' an alarm
clock in his fore-riggin'?” he asked.

“Haw! haw!” roared the depot master.

“Git up, you--you lump!” bellowed the harassed Mr. Lumley. Dan'l pricked
up one ear, then a hoof, and slowly got under way. As the equipage
passed the Baker homestead, the whole family was clustered about the
gate, staring at the occupant of the wagon. The stare was returned.

“Who lives in there?” demanded the stranger. “Who are those folks?”

“Ceph Baker's tribe,” was the sullen answer.

“Baker, hey? Humph! new folks, I presume likely. Used to be Seth Snow's
house, that did. Where'd Seth go to?”

Gabe grunted that he did not know. He believed Mr. Snow was dead, had
died years before.

“Humph! dead, hey? Then I know where he went. Do you ever smoke--or does
drivin' this horse make you too nervous?”

Mr. Lumley thawed a bit at the sight of the proffered cigar. He admitted
that he smoked occasionally and that he guessed “'twouldn't interfere
with the drivin' none.”

“Good enough! then we'll light up. I can talk better if I'm under a head
of steam. There's a new house; who built that?”

The “new” house was fifteen years old, but Gabe gave the name of its
builder. Then, thinking that the catechising had been altogether too
one-sided, he ventured an observation of his own.

“This is a pretty good cigar, Mister,” he said. “Smokes like a
Snowflake.”

“Like a what?”

“Like a Snowflake. That's about the best straight five center you can
get around here. Simmons used to keep 'em, but the drummer's cart ain't
called lately and he's all out.”

“That's a shame. I told the train boy that these smoked like somethin',
but I didn't know what to call it. Much obliged to you. Here's another;
put it in your pocket. Oh, no thanks; pleasure's all mine. Who's
Simmons?”

Gabe described the Simmons general store and its proprietor. Then he
added:

“I was noticin' that trunk of yours, mister; it's all plastered over
with labels, ain't it? Cal'late that trunk's done some travelin', hey?”

“Think so, do you?”

“Yup. Gee! I'd like to travel myself. But no! I got to stay all my life
in this dead 'n' alive hole. I wanted to go to Boston and clerk in
a store, but the old man put his foot down, and here I've stuck ever
sence. Git up, Dan'l! What's the matter with you?”

The passenger smiled, but there was a dreamy look in his gray eyes.

“Don't find fault, son,” he said. “There's worse places in the world
than old Bayport, and worse judgment than mindin' your dad. Don't forget
that or you may be sorry for it some day.” He sniffed eagerly. “Ah!” he
exclaimed, “just smell that, will you? Ain't that FINE?”

“Humph! that's the flats. You can smell 'em any time when the tide's out
and the wind's right. You see, the tide goes out pretty fur here and--”

“Don't I know it? Son, I've been waitin' thirty odd year for that smell
and here 'tis at last. Drive slow and let me fill up on it. Just blow
that--that Snowstorm of yours the other way for a spell, won't you?
Thanks.”

The request to be driven slow was so superfluous that Mr. Lumley paid
no attention to it. He puffed industriously at the Snowflake and watched
his companion, who, leaning forward on the seat, was gazing out at
the town and the bay beyond it. The “depot hill” is not as high as
Whittaker's Hill, but the view is almost as extensive.

“Excuse me, Mister,” observed Gabe, after an interval, “but you ain't
said where you're goin'.”

The passenger came out of his day dream with a start.

“Why, that's right!” he exclaimed. “So I haven't! Well, now, where would
you go, if you was me? Is there a hotel or tavern or somethin'?”

“Yup. There's the Bayport Hotel. 'Tain't exactly a hotel, neither. We
call it the perfect boardin' house 'round here. You see--”

He proceeded to tell the story of “the perfect boarding house.” His
listener seemed greatly interested, and although he laughed, did not
interrupt until the tale was ended.

“So!” he said, chuckling. “Bailey Bangs, hey? Stub Bangs! Well, well!
And he married Ketury Payson! How in time did he ever find spunk enough
to propose? And Ketury runs the perfect boardin' house! Well, that ought
to be job enough for one woman. She runs Bailey, too, on the side, I
s'pose?”

“You bet you! He don't dast to say 'boo' to a chicken when she's 'round.
I say, Mister! I don't know's I know your name, do I? I judge you've
been here afore so--”

“Yes, I've been here before. Whose is that big place up there across our
bows? The one with the cupola on the main truck?”

“That, sir,” said Mr. Lumley, oratorically, “belongs to the Honorable
Heman G. Atkins, and it's probably the finest in this county. Heman is
our representative in Washin'ton, and--Did you say anything?”

The passenger had said something, but he did not repeat it. He was
leaning from the carriage and gazing steadily up the slope ahead.
And his gaze, strange to say, was not directed at the imposing Atkins
estate, but at its opposite neighbor, the old “Cy Whittaker place.”

Slowly, laboriously, Dan'l Webster mounted the hill. At the crest he
would have paused to take breath, but the driver would not let him.

“Git along, you!” he commanded, flapping the reins.

And then Mr. Lumley suffered the shock of a surprise. The hitherto cool
and self-possessed occupant of the rear seat seemed very much excited.
His big red hand clasped Mr. Lumley's over the reins, and Dan'l was
brought to an abrupt standstill.

“Heave to!” he ordered, sharply, and the tone was that of one who has
given many orders and expects them to be obeyed. “Belay! Whoa, there!
Great land of love! look at that! LOOK at it! Who did that?”

The mate to the big red hand pointed to the front door of the Whittaker
place. Gabe was alarmed.

“Done what? Done which?” he gasped. “What you talkin' about? There ain't
nobody lives in there. That house has been empty for--”

“Where's the front fence?” demanded the excited passenger. “What's
become of the hedge? And who put up that--that darned piazza?”

The piazza had been where it now was almost since Mr. Lumley could
remember. He hastened to reply that he didn't know; he wasn't sure;
he presumed likely 'twas “them New Hampshire Howeses,” when they ran a
summer boarding house.

The stranger drew a long breath. “Well, of all the--” he began. Then
he choked, hesitated, and ordered his driver to heave ahead and run
alongside the hotel as quick as the Almighty would let him. Gabe
hastened to obey. He was now absolutely certain that his companion was
an escaped lunatic, and the sooner another keeper was appointed the
better. The remainder of the trip was made in silence.

Mrs. Bangs opened the door of the perfect boarding house and stood
majestically waiting to receive the prospective guest. Over her
shoulders peered the faces of the boarders.

“Good afternoon,” began the landlady. “I presume likely you would like
to--”

She was interrupted. The newcomer turned toward her and extended his
hand.

“Hello, Ketury!” he said. “I ain't seen you sence you wore your hair
up, but you're just as good-lookin' as ever. And ain't that Bailey? Yes,
'tis, and Asaph, too! How are you, boys? Shake!”

Mr. Bangs and his chum, the town clerk, had emerged from the doorway.
Their mouths and eyes were wide open and they seemed to be suffering
from a sort of paralysis.

“Well? What's the matter with you?” demanded the arrival. “Ain't too
stuck up to shake hands after all these years, are you?”

Bailey's mouth closed in order that it's possessor might swallow. Then
it slowly reopened.

“I swan to man!” he ejaculated. “WELL! I swan to man! I--I b'lieve
you're Cy Whittaker!”

“Course I am. Have to dye my carrot top if I want to play anybody else.
But look here, boys, you answer my question: who had the cheek to rig
up that blasted piazza on my house? It starts to come down to-morrow
mornin'!”



CHAPTER III

“FIXIN' OVER”


Miss Angeline Phinney made no less than nine calls that afternoon.
Before bedtime it was known, from the last house in Woodchuck Lane to
the fish shanties at West Bayport, that “young Cy” Whittaker had come
back; that he had come back “for good”; that he was staying temporarily
at the perfect boarding house; that he was “awful well off”--having made
lots of money down in South America; that he intended to “fix over”
 the Whittaker place, and that it was to be fixed over, not in a modern
manner, with plush parlor sets--a la Sylvanus Cahoon--nor with onyx
tables and blue and gold chairs like those adorning the Atkins mansion.
It was to be, as near as possible, a reproduction of what it had been in
the time of the late “Cap'n Cy,” young Cy's father.

“_I_ think he's out of his head,” declared Miss Phinney, in confidence,
to each of the nine females whom she favored with her calls. “Not crazy,
you understand, but sort of touched in the upper story. I says so to
Matildy Tripp, said it right out, too: 'Matildy,' I says, 'he's got a
screw loose up aloft just as sure as you're a born woman!' 'What makes
you think so?' says she. 'Well,' says I, 'do you s'pose anybody that
wan't foolish would be for spendin' good money on an old house to
make it OLDER?' I says. Goin' to tear down the piazza the fust thing!
Perfectly good piazza that cost ninety-eight dollars and sixty cents to
build; I know, because I see the bill when the Howeses had it done. And
he's goin' to set out box hedges, somethin' that ain't been the style
in this town sence Congressman Atkins pulled up his. 'What in the world,
Cap'n Whittaker,' says I to him, 'do you want of box hedges? Homely
and stiff and funeral lookin'! I might have 'em around my grave in the
buryin' ground,' I says, 'but nowheres else.' 'All right, Angie,' says
he, 'you shall have 'em there; I'll cut some slips purpose for you.
It'll be a pleasure,' he says. Now ain't that crazy talk for a grown
man?”

Miss Phinney was not the only one in our village to question Captain
Cy Whittaker's sanity during the next few months. The majority of
our people didn't understand him at all. He was generally liked, for
although he had money, he did not put on airs, but he had his own way of
doing things, and they were not Bayport ways.

True to his promise, he had a squad of carpenters busy, on the
day following his arrival, tearing down the loathed piazza. These
carpenters, and more, were kept busy throughout that entire spring
and well into the summer. Then came painters and gardeners. The piazza
disappeared; a new picket fence, exactly like the old one torn down by
the Howeses, was erected; new shutters were hung; new windowpanes were
set; the roof was newly shingled. Captain Cy, Senior, had, in his day,
cherished a New England fondness for white and green paint; therefore
the new fence was white and the house was white and the blinds a
brilliant green. Rows of box hedge, the plants brought from Boston, were
set out on each side of the front walk. The Howes front-door bell--a
clamorous gong--was removed, and a glass knob attached to a spring bell
of the old-fashioned “jingle” variety took its place. An old-fashioned
flower garden--Cap'n Cy's mother had loved posies--was laid out on
the west lawn beyond the pear trees. All these changes the captain
superintended; when they were complete he turned his attention to
interior decoration.

And now Captain Cy proceeded to, literally, astonish the natives. Among
the Howes “improvements” were gilt wall papers and modern furniture for
the lower floor of the house. The furniture they had taken with them;
the wall paper had perforce been left behind. And the captain had every
scrap of that paper stripped from the walls, and the latter re-covered
with quaint, ugly, old-fashioned patterns, stripes and roses and
flowered sprays with impossible birds flitting among them. The Bassett
decorators has pasted the gilt improvement over the old Whittaker paper,
and it was the Whittaker paper that the captain did his best to match,
sending samples here, there, and everywhere in the effort. Then, upon
the walls he hung old-fashioned pictures, such as Bayport dwellers had
long ago relegated to their attics, pictures like “From Shore to Shore,”
 “Christian Viewing the City Beautiful,” and “Signing the Declaration.”
 To these he added, bringing them from the crowded garret of the
homestead, oil paintings of ships commanded by his father and
grandfather, and family portraits, executed--which is a peculiarly
fitting word--by deceased local artists in oil and crayon.

He boarded up the fireplace in the sitting room and installed a
base-burner stove, resurrected from the tinsmith's barn. He purchased
a full “haircloth set” of parlor furniture from old Mrs. Penniman, who
never had been known to sell any of her hoarded belongings before, even
to the “antiquers,” and wouldn't have done so now, had it not been that
the captain's offer was too princely to be real, and the old lady feared
she might be dreaming and would wake up before she received the money.
And from Trumet to Ostable he journeyed, buying a chair here and a table
there, braided rag mats from this one, and corded bedsteads and “rising
sun” quilts from that. At least half of Bayport believed with Gabe
Lumley and Miss Phinney that, if Captain Cy had not escaped from a home
for the insane, he was a likely candidate for such an institution.

At the table of the perfect boarding house the captain was not inclined
to be communicative regarding his reasons and his intentions. He was a
prime favorite there, praising Keturah's cooking, joking with Angeline
concerning what he was pleased to call her “giddy” manner of dressing
and wearing “side curls,” and telling yarns of South American dress
and behavior, which would probably have shocked Mrs. Tripp--she having
recently left the Methodist church to join the “Come-Outers,” because
the Sunday services of the former were, with the organ and a paid choir,
altogether “too play-actin'”--if they had not been so interesting, and
if Captain Cy had not always concluded them with the observation: “But
there! you can't expect nothin' more from ignorant critters denied
the privileges of congregational singin' and experience meetin's; hey,
Matilda?”

Mrs. Tripp would sigh and admit that she supposed not.

“Only I do wish Mr. Daniels, OUR minister, might have a chance to preach
over 'em, poor things!”

“So do I,” with a covert wink at Mrs. Bangs, who was a stanch adherent
of the regular faith. “South America 'd be just the place for him; ain't
that so, Keturah?”

He evaded all personal questions put to him by the boarders, explaining
that he was renovating the old place just for fun--he always had had a
gang of men working for him, and it seemed natural somehow. But to the
friends of his boyhood, Asaph Tidditt and Bailey Bangs, he told the real
truth.

“I swan to man!” exclaimed Bailey, almost tearfully, as the trio
wandered through the rooms of the Cy Whittaker place, dodging paper
hangers and plasterers; “I swan to man, Whit, if it don't almost seem as
though I was a boy again. Why! it's your dad's house come back alive,
it is so! Look at this settin' room! Seem's if I could see him now
a-settin' by that ere stove, and Mrs. Whittaker, your ma, over there
a-sewin', and old Cap'n Cy--your granddad--snoozin' in that big
armchair--Why! why, whit! it's the very image of the chair he always set
in!”

Captain Cy laughed aloud.

“It's more n' that, Bailey,” he said; “it's THE chair. 'Twas up attic,
all busted and crippled, but I had it made over like new. And there's
granddad's picture, lookin' just as I remember him--only he wan't quite
so much of a frozen wax image as he's painted there. I'm goin' to hang
it where it always hung, over the mantelpiece, next to the lookin'
glass.

“Great land of love, boys!” he went on, “you fellers don't know what
this means to me. Many and many's the time I've had this old house and
this old room in my mind. I've seen 'em aboard ship in a howlin' gale
off the Horn. I've seen 'em down in Surinam of a hot night, when
there wan't a breath scurcely and the Caribs went around dressed in a
handkerchief and a paper cigar, and it made you wish you could. I've
seen 'em--but there! every time I've seen 'em I've swore that some day
I'd come back and LIVE 'em, and now, by the big dipper! here I am. Oh, I
tell you, chummies, you want to be fired OUT of a home and out of a town
to appreciate 'em! Not that I blame the old man; he and I was too
much alike to cruise in company. But Bayport I was born in, and in the
Bayport graveyard they can plant me when I'm ready for the scrap heap.
It's in the blood and--Why, see here! Don't I TALK like a Bayporter?”

“You sartin do!” replied Asaph emphatically.

“A body 'd think you'd been diggin' clams and pickin' cranberries in
Bassett's Holler all your life long, to hear you.”

“You bet! Well, that's pride; that's what that is. I prided myself
on hangin' to the Bayport twang through thick and thin. Among all the
Spanish 'Carambas' and 'Madre de Dioses' it did me good to come out with
a good old Yankee 'darn' once in a while. Kept me feelin' like a white
man. Oh, I'm a Whittaker! _I_ know it. And I've got all the Whittaker
pig-headedness, I guess. And because the old man--bless his heart, I
say now--told me I shouldn't BE a Whittaker no more, nor live like a
Whittaker, I simply swore up and down I would be one and come back here,
when I'd made my pile, to heave anchor and stay one till I die. Maybe
that's foolishness, but it's me.”

He puffed vigorously at the pipe which had taken the place of the
Snowflake cigar, and added:

“Take this old settin' room--why, here it is; see! Here's dad in his
chair and ma in hers, and, if you go back far enough, granddad in his,
just as you say, Bailey. And here's me, a little shaver, squattin' on
the floor by the stove, lookin' at the pictures in a heap of Godey's
Lady's Book. And says dad, 'Bos'n,' he says--he used to call me 'Bos'n'
in those days--'Bos'n,' says dad, 'run down cellar and fetch me up a
pitcher of cider, that's a good feller.' Yes, yes; that's this room as
I've seen it in my mind ever since I tiptoed through it the night I
run away, with my duds in a bundle under my arm. Do you wonder I was
fightin' mad when I saw what that Howes tribe had done to it?”

Superintending the making over of the old home occupied most of Captain
Cy's daylight time that summer. His evenings were spent at Simmons's
store. We have no clubs in Bayport, strictly speaking, for the sewing
circle and the Shakespeare Reading Society are exclusively feminine in
membership; therefore Simmons's store is the gathering place of those
males who are bachelors or widowers or who are sufficiently free from
petticoat government to risk an occasional evening out. Asaph Tidditt
was a regular sojourner at the store. Bailey Bangs, happening in to
purchase fifty cents' worth of sugar or to have the molasses jug filled,
lingered occasionally, but not often. Captain Cy explained Bailey's
absence in characteristic fashion.

“Variety,” observed the captain, “is the spice of life. Bailey gets talk
enough to home. What's the use of his comin' up here to get more?”

“Oh, I don't know,” said Josiah Dimick, with a grin, “we let him do some
of the talkin' himself up here. Down at the boardin' house Keturah and
Angie Phinney do it all.”

“Yes. Still, if a feller was condemned to live over a biler factory he
wouldn't hanker to get a job IN it, would he? When Bailey was a delegate
to the Methodist Conference up in Boston, him and a crowd visited the
deef and dumb asylum. When 'twas time to go, he was missin', and they
found him in the female ward lookin' at the inmates. Said that the sight
of all them women, every one of 'em not able to say a word, was the
most wonderful thing ever he laid eyes on. Said it made him feel kind of
reverent and holy, almost as if he was in Paradise. So Ase Tidditt says,
anyway; it's his yarn.”

“'Tain't nuther, Cy Whittaker!” declared the indignant Asaph. “If you
expect I'm goin' to father all your lies, you're mistaken.”

The crowd at Simmons's discuss politics, as a general thing; state
and national politics in their seasons, but county politics and local
affairs always. The question in Bayport that summer, aside from that of
the harbor appropriation, was who should be hired as downstairs teacher.
Our schoolhouse is a two-story building, with a schoolroom on each
floor. The lower room, where the little tots begin with their “C--A--T
Cat,” and progress until they have mastered the Fourth Reader, is called
“downstairs.” “Upstairs” is, of course, the second story, where the
older children are taught. To handle some of the “big boys” upstairs
is a task for a healthy man, and such a one usually fills the teacher's
position there. Downstairs being, in theory, at least, less strenuous,
is presided over by a woman.

Miss Seabury, who had been downstairs teacher for one lively term, had
resigned that spring in tears and humiliation. Her scholars had enjoyed
themselves and would have liked her to continue, but the committee and
the townspeople thought otherwise. There was a general feeling that
enjoyment was not the whole aim of education.

“Betty,” said Captain Dimick, referring to his small granddaughter, “has
done fust rate so fur's marksmanship and lung trainin' goes. I cal'late
she can hit a nail head ten foot off with a spitball three times out of
four, and she can whisper loud enough to be understood in Jericho. But,
not wishing to be unreasonable, still I should like to have her spell
'door' without an 'e.' I've always been used to seein' it spelled that
way and--well, I'm kind of old-fashioned, anyway.”

There was a difference of opinion concerning Miss Seabury's successor.
A portion of the townspeople were for hiring a graduate of the State
Normal School, a young woman with modern training. Others, remembering
that Miss Seabury had graduated from that school, were for proved
ability and less up-to-date methods. These latter had selected a
candidate in the person of a Miss Phoebe Dawes, a resident of Wellmouth,
and teacher of the Wellmouth “downstairs” for some years. The arguments
at Simmons's were hot ones.

“What's the use of hirin' somebody from right next door to us, as you
might say?” demanded Alpheus Smalley, clerk at the store. “Don't we want
our teachin' to be abreast of the times, and is Wellmouth abreast of
ANYthing?”

“It's abreast of the bay, that's about all, I will give in,” replied Mr.
Tidditt. “But, the way I look at it, we need disCIPline more 'n anything
else, and Phoebe Dawes has had the best disCIPline in her school, that's
been known in these latitudes. Order? Why, say! Eben Salters told me
that when he visited her room over there 'twas so still that he didn't
dast to rub one shoe against t'other, it sounded up so. He had to set
still and bear his chilblains best he could. And POPULAR! Why, when she
hinted that she might leave in May, her scholars more 'n ha'f of 'em,
bust out cryin'. Now you hear me, I--”

“It seems to me,” put in Thaddeus Simpson, who ran the barber shop
and was something of a politician, “it seems to me, fellers, that we'd
better wait and hear what Mr. Atkins has to say in this matter. I
guess that's what the committee 'll do, anyhow. We wouldn't want to go
contrary to Heman, none of us; hey?”

“Tad” Simpson was known to be deep in Congressman Atkins's confidence.
The mention of the great man's name was received with reverence and nods
of approval.

“That's right. We mustn't do nothin' to displease Heman,” was the
general opinion.

Captain Cy did not join the chorus. He refilled his pipe and crossed his
legs.

“Humph!” he grunted. “Heman Atkins seems to be--Give me a match, Ase,
won't you? Thanks. I understand there's a special prayer meetin' at the
church to-morrow night, Alpheus. What's it for?”

“For?” Mr. Smalley seemed surprised. “It's to pray for rain, that's
what. You know it, Cap'n, as well's I do. Ain't everybody's garden
dryin' up and the ponds so low that we shan't be able to get water
for the cranberry ditches pretty soon? There's need to pray, I should
think!”

“Humph! Seems a roundabout way of gettin' a thing, don't it? Why don't
you telegraph to Heman and ask him to fix it for you? Save time.”

This remark was received in horrified silence. Tad Simpson was the first
to recover.

“Cap'n,” he said, “you ain't met Mr. Atkins yet. When you do, you'll
feel same as the rest of us. He's comin' home next week; then you'll
see.”

A part at least of Mr. Simpson's prophecy proved true. The Honorable
Atkins did come to Bayport the following week, accompanied by his little
daughter Alicia, the housekeeper, and the Atkins servants. The Honorable
and his daughter had been, since the adjournment of Congress, on a
pleasure trip to the Yosemite and Yellowstone Park, and now they were
to remain in the mansion on the hill for some time. The big house was
opened, the stone urns burst into refulgent bloom, the iron dogs were
refreshed with a coat of black paint, and the big iron gate was swung
wide. Bayport sat up and took notice. Angeline Phinney was in her glory.

The meeting between Captain Cy and Mr. Atkins took place the morning
after the latter's return. The captain and his two chums had been
inspecting the progress made by the carpenters and were leaning over the
new fence, then just erected, but not yet painted. Down the gravel walk
of the mansion across the road came strolling its owner, silk-hatted,
side-whiskered, benignant.

“Godfrey!” exclaimed Asaph. “There's Heman. See him, Whit?”

“Yup, I see him. Seems to be headin' this way.”

“I--I do believe he's comin' across,” whispered Mr. Bangs. “Yes, he is.
He's real everyday, Cy. HE won't mind if you ain't dressed up.”

“Won't he? That's comfortin'. Well, I'll do the best I can without
stimulants, as the doctor says. If you hear my knees rattle just nudge
me, will you, Bailey?”

Mr. Tidditt removed his hat. Bailey touched his. Captain Cy looked
provokingly indifferent; he even whistled.

“Good mornin', Mr. Atkins,” hailed the town clerk, raising his voice
because of the whistle. “I'm proud to see you back among us, sir. Hope
you and Alicia had a nice time out West. How is she--pretty smart?”

Mr. Atkins smiled a bland, congressional smile. He approached the group
by the fence and extended his hand.

“Ah, Asaph!” he said; “it is you then? I thought so. And Bailey, too. It
is certainly delightful to see you both again. Yes, my daughter is well,
I thank you. She, like her father, is glad to be back in the old
home nest after the round of hotel life and gayety which we
have--er--recently undergone. Yes.”

“Mr. Atkins,” said Bailey, glancing nervously at Captain Cy, who had
stopped whistling and was regarding the Atkins hat and whiskers with an
interested air, “I want to make you acquainted with your new neighbor.
You used to know him when you was a boy, but--but--er--Mr. Atkins, this
is Captain Cyrus Whittaker. Cy, this is Congressman Atkins. You've heard
us speak of him.”

The great man started.

“Is it possible!” he exclaimed. “Is it possible that this is really my
old playmate Cyrus Whittaker?”

“Yup,” replied the captain calmly. “How are you, Heman? Fatter'n you
used to be, ain't you? Washin'ton must agree with you.”

Bailey and Asaph were scandalized. Mr. Atkins himself seemed a trifle
taken aback. Comments on his personal appearance were not usual in
Bayport. But he rallied bravely.

“Well, well!” he cried. “Cyrus, I am delighted to welcome you back among
us. I should scarcely have known you. You are older--yes, much older.”

“Well, forty year more or less, added to what you started with, is apt
to make a feller some older. Don't need any Normal School graduate to do
that sum for us. I'm within seven or eight year of bein' as old as you
are, Heman, and that's too antique to be sold for veal.”

Mr. Atkins changed the subject.

“I had heard of your return, Cyrus,” he said. “It gave me much pleasure
to learn that you were rebuilding and--er--renovating the--er--the
ancestral--er--”

“The old home nest? Yup, I'm puttin' back a few feathers. Old birds like
to roost comf'table. You've got a fairly roomy coop yourself.”

“Hum! Isn't it--er--I should suppose you would find it rather expensive.
Can you--do you--”

“Yes, I can afford it, thank you. Maybe there'll be enough left in the
stockin' to buy a few knickknacks for the yard. You can't tell.”

The captain glanced at the iron dogs guarding the Atkins gate. His tone
was rather sharp.

“Yes, yes, certainly; certainly; of course. It gives me much pleasure to
have you as a neighbor. I have always felt a fondness for the old place,
even when you allowed it--even when it was most--er--run down, if you'll
excuse the term. I always felt a liking for it and--”

“Yes,” was the significant interruption. “I judged you must have, from
what I heard.”

This was steering dangerously close to the selectmen and the
contemplated “sale for taxes.” The town clerk broke in nervously.

“Mr. Atkins,” he said, “there's been consider'ble talk in town about
who's to be teacher downstairs this comin' year. We've sort of chawed it
over among us, but naturally we wanted your opinion. What do you think?
I'm kind of leanin' toward the Dawes woman, myself.”

The Congressman cleared his throat.

“Far be it from me,” he said, “to speak except as a mere member of our
little community, an ordinary member, but, AS such a member, with the
welfare of my birthplace very near and dear to me, I confess that I
am inclined to favor a modern teacher, one educated and trained in the
institution provided for the purpose by our great commonwealth.
The Dawes--er--person is undoubtedly worthy and capable in her way,
but--well--er--we know that Wellmouth is not Bayport.”

The reference to “our great commonwealth” had been given in the voice
and the manner wont to thrill us at our Fourth-of-July celebrations and
October “rallies.” Two of his hearers, at least, were visibly impressed.
Asaph looked somewhat crestfallen, but he surrendered gracefully to
superior wisdom.

“That's so,” he said. “That's so, ain't it, Cy? I hadn't thought of
that.”

“What's so?” asked the captain.

“Why--why, that Wellmouth ain't Bayport.”

“No doubt of it. They're twenty miles apart.”

“Yes. Well, I'm glad to hear you put it so conclusive, Mr. Atkins. I can
see now that Phoebe wouldn't do. Hum! Yes.”

Mr. Atkins buttoned the frock coat and turned to go.

“Good day, gentlemen,” he said. “Cyrus, permit me once more to welcome
you heartily to our village. We--my daughter and myself--will probably
remain at home until the fall. I trust you will be a frequent caller.
Run in on us at any time. Pray do not stand upon ceremony.”

“No,” said Captain Cy shortly, “I won't.”

“That's right. That's right. Good morning.”

He walked briskly down the hill. The trio gazed after him.

“Well,” sighed Mr. Tidditt. “That's settled. And it's a comfort to know
'tis settled. Still I did kind of want Phoebe Dawes; but of course Heman
knows best.”

“Course he knows best!” snapped Bailey. “Ain't he the biggest gun in
this county, pretty nigh? I'd like to know who is if he ain't. The
committee 'll call the Normal School girl now, and a good thing, too.”

Captain Cy was still gazing at the dignified form of the “biggest gun in
the county.”

“Let's see,” he asked. “Who's on the school committee? Eben Salters, of
course, and--”

“Yes. Eben's chairman and he'll vote Phoebe, anyhow; he's that
pig-headed that nobody--not even a United States Representative--could
change him. But Darius Ellis 'll be for Heman's way and so 'll Lemuel
Myrick.

“Lemuel Myrick? Lem Myrick, the painter?”

“Sartin. There ain't but one Myrick in town.”

“Hum!” murmured the captain and was silent for some minutes.

The school committee met on the following Wednesday evening. On Thursday
morning a startling rumor spread throughout Bayport. Phoebe Dawes had
been called, by a vote of two to one, to teach the downstairs school.
Asaph, aghast, rushed out of Simmons's store and up to the hill to the
Cy Whittaker place. He found Captain Cy in the front yard. Mr. Myrick,
school committeeman and house painter, was with him.

“Hello, Ase!” hailed the captain. “What's the matter? Hasn't the tide
come in this mornin'?”

Asaph, somewhat embarrassed by the presence of Mr. Myrick, hesitated
over his news. Lemuel came to his rescue.

“Ase has just heard that we called Phoebe,” he said. “What of it? I
voted for her, and I ain't ashamed of it.”

“But--but Mr. Atkins, he--”

“Well, Heman ain't on the committee, is he? I vote the way I think
right, and no one in this town can change me. Anyway,” he added, “I'm
going to resign next spring. Yes, Cap'n Whittaker, I think three coats
of white 'll do on the sides here.”

“Lem's goin' to do my paintin' jobs,” explained Captain Cy. “His price
was a little higher than some of the other fellers, but I like his
work.”

Mr. Tidditt pondered deeply until dinner time. Then he cornered the
captain behind the Bangs barn and spoke with conviction.

“Whit,” he said, “you're the one responsible for the committee's hirin'
Phoebe Dawes. You offered Lem the paintin' job if he'd vote for her.
What did you do it for? You don't know her, do you?”

“Never set eyes on her in my life.”

“Then--then--You heard Heman say he wanted the other one. What made you
do it?”

Captain Cy grinned.

“Ase,” he said, “I've always been a great hand for tryin' experiments.
Had one of my cooks aboard put raisins in the flapjacks once, just to
see what they tasted like. I judged Heman had had his own way in this
town for thirty odd year. I kind of wanted to see what would happen if
he didn't have it.”



CHAPTER IV

BAILEY BANGS'S EXPERIMENT


Lemuel Myrick's painting jobs have the quality so prized by our village
small boys in the species of candy called “jaw breakers,” namely, that
of “lasting long.” But even Lem must finish sometime or other and, late
in July, the Cy Whittaker place was ready for occupancy. The pictures
were in their places on the walls, the old-fashioned furniture filled
the rooms, there was even a pile of old magazines, back numbers of
Godey's Lady's Book, on the shelf in the sitting room closet.

Then, when Captain Cy had notified Mrs. Bangs that the perfect boarding
house would shelter him no longer than the coming week, a new problem
arose.

“Whit,” said Asaph earnestly, “you've sartin made the place rise up out
of its tomb; you have so. It's a miracle, pretty nigh, and I cal'late
it must have cost a heap, but you've done it--all but the old folks
themselves. You can't raise them up, Cy; money won't do that. And you
can't live in this great house all alone. Who's goin' to cook for you,
and sweep and dust, and swab decks, and one thing a'nother? You'll have
to have a housekeeper, as I told you a spell ago. Have you done any
thinkin' about that?”

And the captain, taking his pipe from his lips, stared blankly at his
friend, and answered:

“By the big dipper, Ase, I ain't! I remember we did mention it, but I've
been so busy gettin' this craft off the ways that I forgot all about
it.”

The discussion which followed Mr. Tidditt's reminder was long and
serious. Asaph and Bailey Bangs racked their brains and offered numerous
suggestions, but the majority of these were not favorably received.

“There's Matildy Tripp,” said Bailey. “She'd like the job, I'm sartin.
She's a widow, too, and she's had experience keepin' house along of
Tobias, him that was her husband. But, if you do hire her, don't let
Ketury know I hinted at it, 'cause we're goin' to lose one boarder
when you quit, and that's too many, 'cordin' to the old lady's way of
thinkin'.”

“You can keep Matildy, for all me,” replied the captain decidedly.
“Come-Outer religion's all right, for those that have that kind of
appetite, but havin' it passed to me three times a day, same as I've
had it at your house, is enough; I don't hanker to have it warmed over
between meals. If I shipped Matildy aboard here she and the Reverend
Daniels would stand over me, watch and watch, till I was converted or
crazy, one or the other.”

“Well, there's Angie. She--”

“Angie!” sniffed Mr. Tidditt. “Stop your jokin', Bailey. This is a
serious matter.”

“I wan't jokin'. What--”

“There! there! boys,” interrupted the captain; “don't fight. Bailey
didn't mean to joke, Ase; he's full of what the papers call 'unconscious
humor.' I'll give in that Angie is about as serious a matter as I can
think of without settin' down to rest. Humph! so fur we haven't gained
any knots to speak of. Any more candidates on your mind?”

More possibilities were mentioned, but none of them seemed to fill the
bill. The conference broke up without arriving at a decision. Mr. Bangs
and the town clerk walked down the hill together.

“Do you know, Bailey,” said Asaph, “the way I look at it, this pickin'
out a housekeeper for Whit ain't any common job. It's somethin' to think
over. Cy's a restless critter; been cruisin' hither and yon all his
life. I'm sort of scared that he'll get tired of Bayport and quit if
things here don't go to suit him. Now if a real good nice woman--a nice
LOOKIN' woman, say--was to keep house for him it--it--”

“Well?”

“Well, I mean--that is, don't you s'pose if some such woman as that
was to be found for the job he might in time come to like her
and--and--er--”

“Ase Tidditt, what are you drivin' at?”

“Why, I mean he might come to marry her; there! Then he'd be contented
to settle down to home and stay put. What do you think of the idea?”

“Think of it? I think it's the dumdest foolishness ever I heard. I
declare if the very mention of a woman to some of you old baches
don't make your heads soften up like a jellyfish in the sun! Ain't Cy
Whittaker got money? Ain't he got a nice home? Ain't he happy?”

“Yes, he is now, I s'pose, but--”

“WELL, then! And you want him to get married! What do you know about
marryin'? Never tried it, have you?”

“Course I ain't! You know I ain't.”

“All right. Then I'd keep quiet about such things, if I was you.”

“You needn't fly up like a settin' hen. Everybody's wife ain't--”

He stopped in the middle of the sentence.

“What's that?” demanded his companion, sharply.

“Nothin'; nothin'. _I_ don't care; I was only tryin' to fix things
comf'table for Whit. Has Heman said anything about the harbor
appropriation sence he's been home? I haven't heard of it if he has.”

Mr. Bangs's answer was a grunt, signifying a negative. Congressman
Atkins had been, since his return to Bayport, exceedingly noncommittal
concerning the appropriation. To Tad Simpson and a very few chosen
lieutenants and intimates he had said that he hoped to get it; that was
all. This was a disquieting change of attitude, for, at the beginning
of the term just passed, he had affirmed that he was GOING to get it.
However, as Mr. Simpson reassuringly said: “The job's in as good hands
as can be, so what's the use of OUR worryin'?”

Bailey Bangs certainly was not troubled on that score; but the town
clerk's proposal that Captain Cy be provided with a suitable wife did
worry him. Bailey was so very much married himself and had such decided,
though unspoken, views concerning matrimony that such a proposal seemed
to him lunacy, pure and simple. He had liked and admired his friend
“Whit” in the old days, when the latter led them into all sorts of
boyish scrapes; now he regarded him with a liking that was close
to worship. The captain was so jolly and outspoken; so brave and
independent--witness his crossing of the great Atkins in the matter of
the downstairs teacher. That was a reckless piece of folly which would,
doubtless, be rewarded after its kind, but Bailey, though he professed
to condemn it, secretly wished he had the pluck to dare such things. As
it was, he didn't dare contradict Keturah.

With the exception of one voyage as cabin boy to New Orleans, a voyage
which convinced him that he was not meant for a seaman, Mr. Bangs had
never been farther from his native village than Boston. Captain Cy had
been almost everywhere and seen almost everything. He could spin yarns
that beat the serial stories in the patent inside of the Bayport Breeze
all hollow. Bailey had figured that, when the “fixin' over” was ended,
the Cy Whittaker place would be for him a delightful haven of refuge,
where he could put his boots on the furniture, smoke until dizzy without
being pounced upon, be entertained and thrilled with tales of adventure
afloat and ashore, and even express his own opinion, when he had any,
with the voice and lung power of a free-born American citizen.

And now Asaph Tidditt, who should know better, even though he was a
bachelor, wanted to bring a wife into this paradise; not a paid domestic
who could be silenced, or discharged, if she became a nuisance, but a
WIFE! Bailey guessed not; not if he could prevent it.

So he lay awake nights thinking of possible housekeepers for Captain Cy,
and carefully rejecting all those possessing dangerous attractions of
any kind. Each morning, after breakfast, he ran over the list with the
captain, taking care that Asaph was not present. Captain Cy, who was
very busy with the finishing touches at the new old house, wearied on
the third morning.

“There, there, Bailey!” he said. “Don't bother me now. I've got other
things on my mind. How do I know who all these women folks are you're
stringing off to me? Let me alone, do.”

“But you must have a housekeeper, Cy. You'll move in Monday and you
won't have nobody to--”

“Oh, dry up! I want to think who I must see this morning. There's Lem
and old lady Penniman, and--”

“But the housekeeper, Cy! Don't you see--”

“Hire one yourself, then. You know 'em; I don't.”

“Hey? Hire one myself? Do you mean you'll leave it in my hands?”

“Yes, yes! I guess so. Run along, that's a good feller.”

He departed hurriedly. Mr. Bangs scratched his head. A weighty
responsibility had been laid upon him.

Monday morning after breakfast Captain Cy's trunk was put aboard
the depot wagon, and Dan'l Webster drew it to its owner's home. The
farewells at the perfect boarding house were affecting. Mrs. Tripp said
that she had spoken to the Reverend Mr. Daniels, and he would be sure to
call the very first thing. Keturah affirmed that the captain's stay had
been a real pleasure.

“You never find fault, Cap'n Whittaker,” she said. “You're such a manly
man, if you'll excuse my sayin' so. I only wish there was more like
you,” with a significant glance at her husband. As for Miss Phinney,
she might have been saying good-by yet if the captain had not excused
himself.

Asaph accompanied his friend to the house on the hill. The trunk was
unloaded from the wagon and carried into the bedroom on the first floor,
the room which had been Captain Cy's so long ago. Gabe shrieked at Dan'l
Webster, and the depot wagon crawled away toward the upper road.

“Got to meet the up train,” grumbled the driver. “Not that anybody ever
comes on it, but I cal'late I'm s'posed to be there. Be more talk than a
little if I wan't. Git dap, Dan'l! you're slower'n the moral law.”

“So you're goin' to do your own cookin' for a spell, Cy?” observed
Asaph, a half hour later, “Well, I guess that's a good idea, till you
can find the right housekeeper. I ain't been able to think of one that
would suit you yet.”

“Nor I, either. Neither's Bailey, I judge, though for a while he was as
full of suggestions as a pine grove is of woodticks. He started to say
somethin' about it to me last night, but Ketury hove in sight and yanked
him off to prayer meetin'.”

“Yes, I know. She cal'lates to get him into heaven somehow.”

“I guess 'twouldn't BE heaven for her unless he was round to pick at.
There he comes now. How'd he get out of wipin' dishes?”

Mr. Bangs strolled into the yard.

“Hello!” he hailed. “I was on my way to Simmons's on an errand and I
thought I'd stop in a minute. Got somethin' to tell you, Whit.”

“All right. Overboard with it! It won't keep long this hot weather.”

Bailey smiled knowingly. “Didn't I hear the up train whistle as I was
comin' along?” he asked. “Seems to me I did. Yes; well, if I ain't
mistaken somebody's comin' on that train. Somebody for you, Cy
Whittaker.”

“Somebody for ME?”

“Um--hum! I can gen'rally be depended on, I cal'late, and when you says
to me: 'Bailey, you get me a housekeeper,' I didn't lose much time. I
got her.”

Mr. Tidditt gasped.

“GOT her?” he repeated. “Got who? Got what? Bailey Bangs, what in the
world have--”

“Belay, Ase!” ordered Captain Cy. “Bailey, what are you givin' us?”

“Givin' you a housekeeper, and a good one, too, I shouldn't wonder. She
may not be one of them ten-thousand-dollar prize museum beauties,” with
a scornful wink at Asaph, “but if what I hear's true she can keep house.
Anyhow she's kept one for forty odd year. Her name's Deborah Beasley,
she's a widow over to East Trumet, and if I don't miss my guess, she's
in the depot wagon now headed in this direction.”

Captain Cy whistled. Mr. Tidditt was too much surprised to do even that.

“I was speakin' to the feller that drives the candy cart,” continued
Bailey, “and I asked him if he'd run acrost anybody, durin' his trips
'round the country, who'd be likely to hire out for a housekeeper. He
thought a spell and then named over some. Among 'em was this Beasley
one. I asked some more questions and, the answers bein' satisfactory to
ME, though they might not be to some folks--” another derisive wink at
Asaph--“I set down and wrote her, tellin' what you'd pay, Cy, what she'd
have to do, and when she'd have to come. Saturday night I got a letter,
sayin' terms was all right, and she'd be on hand by this mornin's train.
Course she's only on trial for a month, but you had to have SOMEBODY,
and the candy-cart feller said--”

The town clerk slapped his knee.

“Debby Beasley!” he cried. “I know who she is! I've got a cousin in
Trumet. Debby Beasley! Aunt Debby, they call her. Why! she's old enough
to be Methusalem's grandmarm, and--”

“If I recollect right,” interrupted Bailey, with dignity, “Cy never said
he wanted a YOUNG woman--a frivolous, giddy critter, always riggin' up
and chasin' the fellers. He wanted a sot, sober housekeeper.”

“Godfrey! Aunt Debby ain't frivolous! She couldn't chase a lame
clam--and catch it. And DEEF! Godfrey--scissors! she's deefer 'n one of
them cast-iron Newfoundlands in Heman's yard! Do you mean to say, Bailey
Bangs, that you went ahead, on your own hook, and hired that old relic
to--”

“I did. And I had my authority, didn't I, Whit? You told me you'd leave
it in my hands, now didn't you?”

The captain smiled somewhat ruefully, and scratched his head. “Why,
to be honest, Bailey, I believe I did,” he admitted. “Still, I hardly
expected--Humph! is she deef, as Ase says?”

“I understand she's a little mite hard of hearin',” replied Mr. Bangs,
with dignity; “but that ain't any drawback, the way I look at it. Fact
is, I'd call it an advantage, but you folks seem to be hard to please.
I ruther imagined you'd thank me for gettin' her, but I s'pose that was
too much to expect. All right, pitch her out! Don't mind MY feelin's!
Poor homeless critter comin' to--”

“Homeless!” repeated Asaph. “What's that got to do with it? Cy ain't
runnin' the Old Woman's Home.”

“Well, well!” observed the captain resignedly. “There's no use in rowin'
about what can't be helped. Bailey says he shipped her for a month's
trial, and here comes the depot wagon now. That's her on the aft thwart,
I judge. She AIN'T what you'd call a spring pullet, is she!”

She certainly was not. The occupant of the depot wagon's rear seat was a
thin, not to say scraggy, female, wearing a black, beflowered bonnet and
a black gown. A black knit shawl was draped about her shoulders and she
wore spectacles.

“Whoa!” commanded Mr. Lumley, piloting the depot wagon to the side door
of the Whittaker house. Dan'l Webster came to anchor immediately. Gabe
turned and addressed his passenger.

“Here we be!” he shouted.

“Hey?” observed the lady in black.

“Here--we--be!” repeated Gabe, raising his voice.

“See? See what?”

“Oh, heavens to Betsey! I'm gettin' the croup from howlin'.
I--say--HERE--WE--BE! GET OUT!”

He accompanied the final bellow with an expressive pantomime indicating
that the passenger was expected to alight. She seemed to understand,
for she opened the door of the carriage and slowly descended. Mr. Bangs
advanced to meet her.

“How d'ye do, Mrs. Beasley!” he said. “Glad to see you all safe and
sound.”

Mrs. Beasley shook his hand; hers were covered, as far as the knuckles,
by black mitts.

“How d'ye do, Cap'n Whittaker?” she said, in a shrill voice. “You pretty
smart?”

Bailey hastened to explain.

“I ain't Cap'n Whittaker,” he roared. “I'm Bailey Bangs, the one that
wrote to you.”

“Hey?”

Mr. Lumley and Asaph chuckled. Bailey colored and tried again.

“I ain't the cap'n,” he whooped. “Here he is--here!”

He led her over to her prospective employer and tapped the latter on the
chest.

“How d'ye do, sir?” said the housekeeper. “I don't know's I just caught
your name.”

In five minutes or so the situation was made reasonably clear. Mrs.
Beasley then demanded her trunk and carpet bag. The grinning Lumley bore
them into the house. Then he drove away, still grinning. Bailey looked
fearfully at Captain Cy.

“She IS kind of hard of hearin', ain't she?” he said reluctantly. “You
remember I said she was.”

The captain nodded.

“Yes,” he answered, “you're a truth-tellin' chap, Bailey, I'll say that
for you. You don't exaggerate your statements.”

“Hard of hearin'!” snapped Mr. Tidditt. “If the last trump ain't a steam
whistle she'll miss Judgment Day. I'll stop into Simmons's on my way
along and buy you a bottle of throat balsam, Cy; you're goin' to need
it.”

The captain needed more than throat balsam during the fortnight which
followed. The widow Beasley's deafness was not her only failing. In fact
she was altogether a failure, so far as her housekeeping was concerned.
She could cook, after a fashion, but the fashion was so limited that
even the bill of fare at the perfect boarding house looked tempting in
retrospect.

“Baked beans again, Cy!” exclaimed Asaph, dropping in one evening after
supper. “'Tain't Saturday night so soon, is it?”

“No,” was the dismal rejoinder. “It's Tuesday, if my almanac ain't out
of joint. But we had beans Saturday and they ain't all gone yet, so I
presume we'll have 'em till the last one's swallowed. Aunt Debby's got
what the piece in the Reader used to call a 'frugal mind.' She don't
intend to waste anything. Last Thursday I spunked up courage enough to
yell for salt fish and potatoes--fixed up with pork scraps, you know,
same's we used to have when I was a boy. We had 'em all right, and if
beans of a Saturday hadn't been part of her religion we'd be warmin' 'em
up yet. I took in a cat for company 'tother day, but the critter's
run away. To see it look at the beans in its saucer and then at me was
pitiful; I felt like handin' myself over to the Cruelty to Animals'
folks.”

“Is she neat?” inquired Mr. Tidditt.

“I don't know. I guess so--on the installment plan. It takes her a week
to scrub up the kitchen, and then one end of it is so dirty she has to
begin again. Consequently the dust is so thick in the rest of the house
that I can see my tracks. If 'twan't so late in the season I'd plant
garden stuff in the parlor--nice soil and lots of shade, with the
curtains down.”

From the rooms in the rear came the words of a gospel hymn sung in a
tremulous soprano and at concert pitch.

“Music with my meals, just like a high-toned restaurant,” commented
Captain Cy.

“But what makes her sing so everlastin' LOUD?”

“Can't hear herself if she don't. I could stand her deefness, because
that's an affliction and we may all come to it; but--”

The housekeeper, still singing, entered the room and planted herself in
a chair.

“Good evenin', Mr. Tidditt,” she said, smiling genially. “Nice weather
we've been havin'.”

Asaph nodded.

“Sociable critter, ain't she!” observed the captain. “Always willin' to
help entertain. Comes and sets up with me till bedtime. Tells about
her family troubles. Preaches about her niece out West, and how set the
niece and the rest of the Western relations are to have her make 'em a
visit. I told her she better go--I thought 'twould do her good. I know
'twould help ME consider'ble to see her start.

“She's got so now she finds fault with my neckties,” he added, “says I
must be careful and not get my feet wet. Picks out what I ought to wear
so's I won't get cold. She'll adopt me pretty soon. Oh, it's all right!
She can't hear what you say. Are your dishes done?” he shrieked, turning
to the old lady.

“One? One what?” inquired Mrs. Beasley.

“They won't BE done till you go, Ase,” continued the master of the
house. “She'll stay with us till the last gun fires. T'other day
Angie Phinney called and I turned Debby loose on her. I didn't believe
anything could wear out Angie's talkin' machinery, but she did it.
Angeline stayed twenty minutes and then quit, hoarse as a crow.”

Here the widow joined in the conversation, evidently under the
impression that nothing had been said since she last spoke. Continuing
her favorable comments on the weather she observed that she was glad
there was so little fog, because fog was hard for folks with “neuralgy
pains.” Her brother's wife's cousin had “neuralgy” for years, and
she described his sufferings with enthusiasm and infinite detail. Mr.
Tidditt answered her questions verbally at first; later by nods and
shakes of the head. Captain Cy fidgeted in his chair.

“Come on outdoor, Ase,” he said at last. “No use to wait till she runs
down, 'cause she's a self-winder, guaranteed to keep goin' for a year.
Good-night!” he shouted, addressing Mrs. Beasley, and heading for the
door.

“Where you goin'?” asked the old lady.

“No. Yes. Who said so? Hooray! Three cheers for Gen'ral Scott! Come on,
Ase!” And the captain, seizing his friend by the arm, dragged him into
the open air, and slammed the door.

“Are you crazy?” demanded the astonished town clerk. “What makes you
talk like that?”

“Might as well. She wouldn't understand it any better if 'twas
Scripture, and it saves brain work. The only satisfaction I get is
bein' able to give my opinion of her and the grub without hurtin' her
feelin's. If I called her a wooden-headed jumpin' jack she'd only smile
and say No, she didn't think 'twas goin' to rain, or somethin' just as
brilliant.”

“Well, why don't you give her her walkin' papers?”

“I shall, when her month's up.”

“I wouldn't wait no month. I'd heave her overboard to-night. You hear
ME!”

Captain Cy shook his head.

“I can't, very well,” he replied. “I hate to make her feel TOO bad. When
the month's over I'll have some excuse ready, maybe. The joke of it is
that she don't really need to work out. She's got some money of her
own, owns cranberry swamps and I don't know what all. Says she took up
Bailey's offer 'cause she cal'lated I'd be company for her. I had to
laugh, even in the face of those beans, when she said that.”

“Humph! if I don't tell Bailey what I think of him, then--”

“No, no! Don't you say a word to Bailey. It's principally on his account
that I'm tryin' to stick it out for the month. Bailey did his best; he
thought he was helpin'. And he feels dreadfully because she's so deef.
Only yesterday he asked me if I believed there was anything made that
would fix her up and make it more comfortable for me. I could have
prescribed a shotgun, but I didn't. You see, he thinks her deefness
is the only trouble; I haven't told him the rest, and don't you do it,
either. Bailey's a good-hearted chap.”

“Humph! his heart may be good, but his head's goin' to seed. I'll keep
quiet if 'twill please you, though.”

“Yes. And, see here, Ase! I don't care to be the laughin' stock of
Bayport. If any of the folks ask you how I like my new housekeeper, you
tell 'em there's nothin' like her anywhere. That's no lie.”

So Mrs. Beasley stayed on at the Whittaker place and, thanks to Mr.
Tidditt, the general opinion of inquisitive Bayport was that the new
housekeeper was a grand success. Only Captain Cy and Asaph knew the
whole truth, and Mr. Bangs a part. That part, Deborah's deafness,
troubled him not a little and he thought much concerning it. As a result
of this thinking he wrote a letter to a relative in Boston. The answer
to this letter pleased him and he wrote again.

One afternoon, during the third week of Mrs. Beasley's stay, Asaph
called and found Captain Cy in the sitting room, reading the Breeze. The
captain urged his friend to remain and have supper. “We've run out of
beans, Ase,” he explained, “and are just startin' in on a course of
boiled cod. Do stay and eat a lot; then there won't be so much to warm
over.”

Mr. Tidditt accepted the invitation, also a section of the Breeze. While
they were reading they heard the back door slam.

“It's the graven image,” explained the captain. “She's been on a
cruise down town somewheres. Be a lot of sore throats in that direction
to-morrow mornin'.”

The town clerk looked up.

“There now!” he exclaimed. “I believe 'twas her I saw walkin' with
Bailey a spell ago. I thought so, but I didn't have my specs and I wan't
sure.”

“With Bailey, hey? Humph! this is serious. Hope Ketury didn't see 'em.
We mustn't have any scandal.”

The housekeeper entered the dining room. She was singing “Beulah Land,”
 but her tone was more subdued than usual. They heard her setting the
table.

“How's she gettin' along?” asked Asaph.

“Progressin' backwards, same as ever. She's no better, thank you, and
the doctor's given up hopes.”

“When you goin' to tell her she can clear out?”

“What?” Captain Cy had returned to his paper and did not hear the
question.

“I say when is she goin' to be bounced? Deefness ain't catchin', is it?”

“I wouldn't wonder if it might be. If 'tis, mine ought to be developin'
fast. What makes her so still all at once?”

“Gone to the kitchen, I guess. Wonder she hasn't sailed in and set down
with us. Old chromo! You must be glad her month's most up?”

Asaph proceeded to give his opinion of the housekeeper, raising his
voice almost to a howl, as his indignation grew. If Mrs. Beasley's ears
had been ordinary ones she might have heard the unflattering description
in the kitchen; as it was Mr. Tidditt felt no fear.

“Comin' here so's you could be company for her! The idea! Good to
herself, ain't she! Godfrey scissors! And Bailey was fool enough to--”

“There, there! Don't let it worry you, Ase. I've about decided what
to say when I let her go. I'll tell her she is gettin' too old to be
slavin' herself to death. You see, I don't want to make the old critter
cry, nor I don't want her to get mad. Judgin' by the way she used to
coax the cat outdoors with the broom handle she's got somethin' of a
temper when she gets started. I'll give her an extry month's wages,
and--”

“You will, hey? You WILL?”

The interruption came from behind the partially closed dining-room door.
Mr. Tidditt sank back in his chair. Captain Cy sprang from his and threw
the door wide open. Behind it crouched Mrs. Deborah Beasley. Her eyes
snapped behind her spectacles, her lean form was trembling all over, and
in her right hand she held a mammoth trumpet, the smaller end of which
was connected with her ear.

“You will, hey?” she screamed, brandishing her left fist, but still
keeping the ear trumpet in place with her right. “You WILL? Well, I
don't want none of your miser'ble money! Land knows how you made it,
anyhow, and I wouldn't soil my hands with it. After all I've put up
with, and the way I've done my work, and the things I've had to eat,
and--and--”

She paused for breath. Captain Cy scratched his chin. Asaph, gazing
open-mouthed at the trumpet, stirred in his chair. Mrs. Beasley swooped
down upon him like a gull on a minnow.

“And you!” she shrieked. “You! a miserable little, good-for-nothin',
lazy, ridiculous, dried-up-- . . . Oo--oo--OH! You call yourself a town
clerk! YOU do! I--I wouldn't have you clerk for a hen house! I'm an old
chromo, be I? Yes! that's nice talk, ain't it, to a woman old enough
to be--that is--er--er--'most as old as you be! You sneakin',
story-tellin', little, fat THING, you! You--oh, I can't lay my tongue to
words to tell you WHAT you are.”

“You're doin' pretty well, seems to me,” observed Captain Cy dryly. “I
wouldn't be discouraged if I was you.”

The only effect of this remark was to turn the wordy torrent in his
direction. The captain bore it for a while; then he rose to his feet and
commanded silence.

“That's enough! Stop it!” he ordered, and, strange to say, Mrs. Beasley
did stop. “I'm sorry, Debby,” he went on, “but you had no business to be
listenin' even if--” and he smiled grimly, “you have got a new fog horn
to hear with. You can go and pack your things as soon as you want to. I
made up my mind the first day you come that you and me wouldn't cruise
together long, and this only shortens the trip by a week or so. I'll pay
you for this month and for the next, and I guess, when you come to think
it over, you'll be willin' to risk soilin' your hands with the money.
It's your own fault if anybody knows that you didn't leave of your own
accord. _I_ shan't tell, and I'll see that Tidditt doesn't. Now trot!
Ase and I'll get supper ourselves.”

It was evident that the ex-housekeeper had much more which she would
have liked to say. But there was that in her late employer's manner
which caused her to forbear. She slammed out of the room, and they heard
her banging things about on the floor above.

“But where--WHERE,” repeated Mr. Tidditt, over and over, “did she get
that trumpet?”

The puzzle was solved soon after, when Bailey Bangs entered the house in
a high state of excitement.

“Well,” he demanded, expectantly. “Did they help her? Has anything
happened?”

“HAPPENED!” began Asaph, but Captain Cy silenced him by a wink.

“Yes,” answered the captain; “something's happened. Why?”

“Hurrah! I thought 'twould. She can hear better, can't she?”

“Yes, I guess it's safe to say she can.”

“Good! You can thank me for it. When I see how dreadful deef she was I
wrote my cousin Eddie T, who's an optician up to Boston--you know him,
Ase--and I says: 'Ed, you know what's good for folks who can't see?
Ain't there nothin',' says I, 'that'll help them who can't hear? How
about ear trumpets?' And Ed wrote that an ear trumpet would probably
help some, but why didn't I try a pair of them patent fixin's that are
made to put inside deef people's ears? He'd known of cases where they
helped a lot. So I sent for a pair, and the biggest ear trumpet made,
besides. And when I met Debby to-day I give 'em to her and told her to
put the patent things IN her ears and couple on the trumpet outside
'em. And not to say nothin' to you, but just surprise you. And it did
surprise you, didn't it?”

The wrathful Mr. Tidditt could wait no longer. He burst into a vivid
description of the “surprise.” Bailey was aghast. Captain Cy laughed
until his face was purple.

“I declare, Cy!” exclaimed the dejected purchaser of the “ear fixin's”
 and the trumpet. “I do declare I'm awful sorry! if you'd only told me
she was no good I'd have let her alone; but I thought 'twas just the
deefness. I--I--”

“I know, Bailey; you meant well, like the layin'-on-of-hands doctor who
rubbed the rheumatic man's wooden leg. All right; _I_ forgive you. 'Twas
worth it all to see Asaph's face when Marm Beasley was complimentin'
him. Ha! ha! Oh, dear me! I've laughed till I'm sore. But there's one
thing I SHOULD like to do, if you don't mind: I should like to pick out
my next housekeeper myself.”



CHAPTER V

A FRONT-DOOR CALLER


Mrs. Beasley departed next morning, taking with her the extra month's
wages, in spite of fervid avowals that she wouldn't touch a cent of
it. On the way to the depot she favored Mr. Lumley with sundry hints
concerning the reasons for her departure. She “couldn't stand it no
longer”; if folks only knew what she'd had to put up with she cal'lated
they'd be some surprised; she could “tell a few things” if she wanted
to, and so on. Incidentally she was kind of glad she didn't like the
place, because now she cal'lated she should go West and visit her niece;
they'd been wanting her to come for so long.

Gabe was much interested and repeated the monologue, with imaginative
additions, to the depot master, who, in turn, repeated it to his wife
when he went home to dinner. That lady attended sewing circle in the
afternoon. Next day a large share of Bayport's conversation dealt with
the housekeeper's leaving and her reasons therefor. The reasons
differed widely, according to the portion of the town in which they were
discussed, but it was the general opinion that the whole affair was not
creditable to Captain Whittaker.

Only at the perfect boarding house was the captain upheld. Miss Phinney
declared that she knew he had made a mistake as soon as she heard the
Beasley woman talk; nobody else, so Angeline declared, could “get a word
in edgeways.” Mrs. Tripp sighed and affirmed that going out of town for
a woman to do housework was ridiculous on the face of it; there were
plenty of Bayport ladies, women of capability and sound in their
religious views, who might be hired if they were approached in the right
way. Keturah gave, as her opinion, that if the captain knew when he was
well off, he would “take his meals out.” Asaph snorted and intimated
that that Debby Beasley wasn't fit to “keep house in a pigsty, and
anybody but a born gump would have known it.” Bailey, the “born gump,”
 said nothing, but looked appealingly at his chum.

As for Captain Cy, he did not take the trouble to affirm or deny the
rumors. Peace and quiet dominated the Whittaker house for the first time
in three weeks and its owner was happier. He cooked his own food and
washed his own dishes. The runaway cat ventured to return, found other
viands than beans in its saucer, and decided to remain, purring thankful
contentment. The captain made his own bed, after a fashion, when he was
ready to occupy it, but he was conscious that it might be better made.
He refused, however, to spend his time in sweeping and dusting, and
the dust continued to accumulate on the carpets and furniture. This
condition of affairs troubled him, but he kept his own counsel. Asaph
and Bailey called often, but they offered no more suggestions as to
hiring a housekeeper. Mr. Tidditt might have done so, but the captain
gave him no encouragement. Mr. Bangs, recent humiliation fresh in his
mind, would as soon have suggested setting the house on fire.

One evening Asaph happened in, on his way to Simmons's. He desired
the captain to accompany him to that gathering place of the wise and
talkative. Captain Cy was in the sitting room, a sheet of note paper in
his hand. The town clerk entered without ceremony and tossed his hat on
the sofa.

“Evenin', Ase,” observed the captain, folding the sheet of paper and
putting it into his pocket. “Glad you come. Sit down. I wanted to ask
you somethin'.”

“All right! Here I be. Heave ahead and ask.”

Captain Cy puffed at his pipe. He seemed about to speak and then to
think better of it, for he crossed his legs and smoked on in silence,
gazing at the nickel work of the “base-burner” stove. It was badly in
need of polishing.

“Well?” inquired Asaph, with impatient sarcasm. “Thinkin' of askin' me
to build a fire for you, was you? Nobody else but you would have set up
a stove in summer time, anyhow.”

“Hey? No, you needn't start a fire yet awhile. That necktie of yours 'll
keep us warm till fall, I shouldn't wonder. New one, ain't it? Where'd
you get it?”

Mr. Tidditt was wearing a crocheted scarf of a brilliant crimson hue,
particularly becoming to his complexion. The complexion now brightened
until it was almost a match for the tie.

“Oh!” he said, with elaborate indifference. “That? Yes, it's new.
Yesterday was my birthday, and Matildy Tripp she knew I needed a
necktie, so she give me this one.”

“Oh! One she knit purpose for you, then? Dear me! Look out, Ase. Widow
women are dangerous, they say; presents are one of the first baits they
heave out.”

“Don't be foolish, now! I couldn't chuck it back at her, could I? That
would be pretty manners. You needn't talk about widders--not after
Debby! Ho! ho!”

Captain Cy chuckled. Then he suddenly became serious.

“Ase,” he said, “you remember the time when the Howes folks had this
house? Course you do. Yes; well, was there any of their relations here
with 'em? A--a cousin, or somethin'?”

“No, not as I recollect. Yes, there was, too, come to think. A third
cousin, Mary Thayer her name was. I THINK she was a third cousin of
Betsy Howes, Seth Howes's second wife. Betsy's name was Ginn afore
she married, and the Ginns was related on their ma's side to a
Richards--Emily Richards, I think 'twas--and Emily married a Thayer.
Would that make this Mary a third cousin? Now let's see; Sarah Jane
Ginn, she had an aunt who kept a boardin' house in Harniss. I remember
that, 'count of her sellin' my Uncle Bije a pig. Seems to me 'twas a
pig, but I ain't sure that it mightn't have been a settin' of Plymouth
Rock hens' eggs. Anyhow, Uncle Bije KEPT hens, because I remember one
time--”

“There! there! we'll be out of sight of land in a minute. This Mary
Thayer--old, was she?”

“No, no! Just a young girl, eighteen or twenty or so. Pretty and nice
and quiet as ever I see. By Godfrey, she WAS pretty! I wan't as old as I
be now, and--”

“Ase, don't tell your heart secrets, even to me. I might get
absent-minded and mention 'em to Matildy. And then--whew!”

“If you don't stop tryin' to play smarty I'll go home. What's Matildy
Tripp to me, I'd like to know? And even when Mary Thayer was here I was
old enough to be her dad. But I remember what a nice girl she was and
how the boarders liked her. They used to say she done more than all the
Howes tribe put together to make the Sea Sight House a good hotel. Young
as she was she done most of the housekeepin' and done it well. If the
rest of 'em had been like her you mightn't have had the place yet, Whit.
But what set you to thinkin' about her?”

“Oh, I don't know! Nothin' much; that is--well, I'll tell you some other
time. What became of her?”

“She went up to New Hampshire along with the Howes folks and I ain't
seen her since. Seems to me I did hear she was married. See here, Whit,
what is it about her? Tell a feller; come!”

But Captain Cy refused to gratify his chum's lively curiosity. Also he
refused to go to Simmons's that evening, saying that he was tired and
guessed he'd stay at home and “turn in early.” Mr. Tidditt departed
grumbling. After he had gone the captain drew his chair nearer the
center table, took from his pocket a sheet of notepaper, and proceeded
to read what was written on its pages. It was a letter which he had
received nearly a month before and had not yet answered. During the past
week he had read it many times. The writing was cramped and blotted and
the paper cheap and dingy. The envelope bore the postmark of a small
town in Indiana, and the inclosure was worded as follows:


CAPTAIN CYRUS WHITTAKER.

DEAR SIR: I suppose you will be a good deal surprised to hear from me,
especially from way out West here. When you bought the old house of
Seth, he and I was living in Concord, N. H. He couldn't make a go of his
business there, so we came West and he has been sick most of the time
since. We ain't well off like you, and times are hard with us. What I
wanted to write you about was this. My cousin Mary Thomas, Mary Thayer
that was, is still living in Concord and she is poor and needs help,
though I don't suppose she would ask for it, being too proud. False
pride I call it. Me and Seth would like to do something for her, but we
have a hard enough job to keep going ourselves. Mary married a man
by the name of Henry Thomas, and he turned out to be a miserable
good-for-nothing, as I always said he would. She wouldn't listen to
me though. He run off and left her seven year ago last April, and I
understand was killed or drowned somewheres up in Montana. Mary and
[several words scratched out here] got along somehow since, but I don't
know how. While we lived in Concord Seth sort of kept an eye on her, but
now he can't of course. She's a good girl, or woman rather, being most
forty, and would make a good housekeeper if you should need one as I
suppose likely you will. If you could help her it would be an act of
charity and you will be rewarded Above. Seth says why not write to her
and tell her to come and see you? He feels bad about her, because he is
so sick I suppose. And he knows you are rich and could do good if you
felt like it. Her father's name was John Thayer. I wouldn't wonder if
you used to know her mother. She was Emily Richards afore she married
and they used to live in Orham.

Yours truly,

ELIZABETH HOWES.

P.S.--Mary's address is Mrs. Mary Thomas, care Mrs. Oliver, 128 Blank
Street, Concord, N. H.

N.B.--Seth won't say so, but I will: we are very hard up ourselves and
if you could help him and me with the loan of a little money it would be
thankfully received.


Captain Cy read the letter, folded it, and replaced it in his pocket.
He knew the Howes family by reputation, and the reputation was that
of general sharpness in trade and stinginess in money matters. Betsy's
personal appeal did not, therefore, touch his heart to any great extent.
He surmised also that for Seth Howes and his wife to ask help for some
person other than themselves premised a darky in the woodpile somewhere.
But for the daughter of Emily Richards to be suggested as a possible
housekeeper at the Cy Whittaker place--that was interesting, certainly.

When the captain was not a captain--when he was merely “young Cy,” a
boy, living with his parents, a dancing school was organized in Bayport.
It was an innovation for our village, and frowned upon by many of the
older and stricter inhabitants. However, most of the captain's
boy friends were permitted to attend; young Cy was not. His father
considered dancing a waste of time and, if not wicked, certainly
frivolous and nonsensical. So the boy remained at home, but, in spite of
the parental order, he practiced some of the figures of the quadrilles
and the contra dances in his comrades' barns, learning them at second
hand, so to speak.

One winter there was to be a party in Orham, given by the Nickersons,
wealthy people with a fifteen-year-old daughter. It was to be a grand
affair, and most of the boys and girls in the neighboring towns were
invited. Cy received an invitation, and, for a wonder, was permitted to
attend. The Bayport contingent went over in a big hayrick on runners and
the moonlight ride was jolly enough. The Nickerson mansion was crowded
and there were music and dancing.

Young Cy was miserable during the dancing. He didn't dare attempt it, in
spite of his lessons in the barn. So, while the rest of his boy friends
sought partners for the “Portland Fancy” and “Hull's Victory” he sat
forlorn in a corner.

As he sat there he was approached by a young lady, radiant in muslin
and ribbons. She was three or four years older than he was, and he had
worshipped her from afar as she whirled up and down the line in the
Virginia Reel. She never lacked partners and seemed to be a great
favorite with the young men, especially one good-looking chap with a
sunburned face, who looked like a sailor.

They were forming sets for “Money Musk”; it was “ladies' choice,” and
there was a demand for more couples. The young lady came ever to Cy's
corner and laughingly dropped him a courtesy.

“If you please,” she said, “I want a partner. Will you do me the honor?”

Cy blushingly avowed that he couldn't dance any to speak of.

“Oh, yes, you can! I'm sure you can. You're the Whittaker boy, aren't
you? I've heard about your barn lessons. And I want you to try this
with me. Please do. No, John,” she added, turning to the sunburned young
fellow who had followed her across the room; “this is my choice and here
is my partner. Susie Taylor is after you and you mustn't run away. Come,
Mr. Whittaker.”

So Cy took her arm and they danced “Money Musk” together. He made but
a few mistakes, and these she helped him to correct so easily that none
noticed. His success gave him courage and he essayed other dances; in
fact, he had a very good time at the party after all.

On the way home he thought a great deal about the pretty young lady,
whose name he discovered was Emily Richards. He decided that if she
would only wait for him, he might like to marry her when he grew up.
But he was thirteen and she was seventeen, and the very next year she
married John Thayer, the sailor in the blue suit. And two years after
that young Cy ran away to be a sailor himself.

In spite of his age and his lifetime of battering about the world,
Captain Cy had a sentimental streak in his makeup; his rejuvenation of
the old home proved that. Betsy's letter interested him. He had made
guarded inquiries concerning Mary Thayer, now Mary Thomas, of others
besides Asaph, and the answers had been satisfactory so far as they
went; those who remembered her had liked her very much. The captain
had even begun a letter to Mrs. Thomas, but laid it aside unfinished,
having, since Bailey's unfortunate experience with the widow Beasley, a
prejudice against experiments.

But this evening, before Mr. Tidditt called, he had been thinking that
something would have to be done and done soon. The generally shiftless
condition of his domestic surroundings was getting to be unbearable.
Dust and dirt did not fit into his mental picture of the old home as
it used to be and as he had tried to restore it. There had been neither
dust nor dirt in his mother's day.

He meditated and smoked for another hour. Then, his mind being made up,
he pulled down the desk lid of the old-fashioned secretary, resurrected
from a pile of papers the note he had begun to Mrs. Thomas, dipped a
sputtering pen into the ink bottle and proceeded to write.

His letter was a short one and rather noncommittal. As Mrs. Thomas no
doubt knew he had come back to live in his father's house at Bayport. He
might possibly need some one to keep house for him. He understood that
she, Mary Thayer that was, was a good housekeeper and that she was open
to an engagement if everything was mutually satisfactory. He had known
her mother slightly when the latter lived in Orham. He thought an
interview might be pleasant, for they could talk over old times if
nothing more. Perhaps, on the whole, she might care to risk a trip
to Bayport, therefore he inclosed money for her railroad fare. “You
understand, of course,” so he wrote in conclusion, “that nothing may
come of our meeting at all. So please don't say a word to anybody when
you strike town. You've lived here yourself, and you know that three
words hove overboard in Bayport will dredge up gab enough to sink a
dictionary. So just keep mum till the business is settled one way or the
other.”

He put on his hat and went down to the post office, where he dropped
his letter in the slot of the box fastened to the front door. Then he
returned home and retired at exactly eleven o'clock. In spite of his
remarks to Asaph, he had not “turned in” so early after all.

If the captain expected a prompt reply to his note he was disappointed.
A week passed and he heard nothing. Then three more days and still no
word from the New Hampshire widow. Meanwhile fresh layers of dust spread
themselves over the Whittaker furniture, and the gaudy patterns of the
carpets blushed dimly beneath a grimy fog. The situation was desperate;
even Matilda Tripp, Come-Outer sermons and all, began to be thinkable as
a possibility.

The eleventh day began with a pouring rain that changed, later on, to a
dismal drizzle. The silver-leaf tree in the front yard dripped, and the
overflowing gutters gurgled and splashed. The bay was gray and lonely,
and the fish weirs along the outer bar were lost in the mist. The
flowers in the Atkins urns were draggled and beaten down. Only the iron
dogs glistened undaunted as the wet ran off their newly painted backs.
The air was heavy, and the salty flavor of the flats might almost be
tasted in it.

Captain Cy was in the sitting room, as usual. His spirits were as gray
as the weather. He was actually lonesome for the first time since his
return home. He had kindled a wood fire in the stove, just for the
sociability of it, and the crackle and glow behind the isinglass panes
only served to remind him of other days and other fires. The sitting
room had not been lonesome then.

He heard the depot wagon rattle by and, peering from the window, saw
that, except for Mr. Lumley, it was empty. Not even a summer boarder had
come to brighten our ways and lawns with reckless raiment and the newest
slang. Summer boarding season was almost over now. Bayport would soon be
as dull as dish water. And the captain admitted to himself that it WAS
dull. He had half a mind to take a flying trip to Boston, make the round
of the wharves, and see if any of the old shipowners and ship captains
whom he had once known were still alive and in harness.

“JINGLE! Jingle! JINGLE! Jingle! Jingle! Jing! Jing! Jing!”

Captain Cy bounced in his chair. That was the front-door bell. The
FRONT-door bell! Who on earth, or, rather, who in Bayport, would come to
the FRONT door?

He hurried through the dim grandeur of the best parlor and entered the
little dark front hall. The bell was still swinging at the end of its
coil of wire. The dust shaken from it still hung in the air. The captain
unbolted and unlocked the big front door.

A girl was standing on the steps between the lines of box hedge--a
little girl under a big “grown-up” umbrella. The wet dripped from the
umbrella top and from the hem of the little girl's dress.

Captain Cy stared hard at his visitor; he knew most of the children
in Bayport, but he didn't know this one. Obviously she was a stranger.
Portuguese children from “up Harniss way” sometimes called to peddle
huckleberries, but this child was no “Portugee.”

“Hello!” exclaimed the captain wonderingly.

“Did you ring the bell?”

“Yes, sir,” replied the girl.

“Humph! Did, hey? Why?”

“Why? Why, I thought--Isn't it a truly bell? Didn't it ought to ring? Is
anybody sick or dead? There isn't any crape.”

“Dead? Crape?” Captain Cy gasped. “What in the world put that in your
head?”

“Well, I didn't know but maybe that was why you thought I hadn't ought
to have rung it. When mamma was sick they didn't let people ring our
bell. And when she died they tied it up with crape.”

“Did, hey? Hum!” The captain scratched his chin and gazed at the small
figure before him. It was a self-poised, matter-of-fact figure for such
a little one, and, out there in the rain under the tent roof of the
umbrella, it was rather pitiful.

“Please, sir,” said the child, “are you Captain Cyrus Whittaker?”

“Yup! That's me. You've guessed it the first time.”

“Yes, sir. I've got a letter for you. It's pinned inside my dress. If
you could hold this umbrella maybe I could get it out.”

She extended the big umbrella at arm's length, holding it with both
hands. Captain Cy woke up.

“Good land!” he exclaimed, “what am I thinkin' of? You're soakin' wet
through, ain't you?”

“I guess I'm pretty wet. It's a long ways from the depot, and I tried to
come across the fields, because a boy said it was nearer, and the bushes
were--”

“Across the FIELDS? Have you walked all the way from the depot?”

“Yes, sir. The man said it was a quarter to ride, and auntie said I must
be careful of my money because--”

“By the big dipper! Come in! Come in out of that this minute!”

He sprang down the steps, furled the umbrella, seized her by the arm and
led her into the house, through the parlor and into the sitting room,
where the fire crackled invitingly. He could feel that the dress sleeve
under his hand was wet through, and the worn boots and darned stockings
he could see were soaked likewise.

“There!” he cried. “Set down in that chair. Put your feet up on that
h'ath. Sakes alive! Your folks ought to know better than to let you stir
out this weather, let alone walkin' a mile--and no rubbers! Them shoes
ought to come off this minute, I s'pose. Take 'em off. You can dry your
stockings better that way. Off with 'em!”

“Yes, sir,” said the child, stooping to unbutton the shoes. Her
wet fingers were blue. It can be cold in our village, even in early
September, when there is an easterly storm. Unbuttoning the shoes was
slow work.

“Here, let me help you!” commanded the captain, getting down on one knee
and taking a foot in his lap. “Tut! tut! tut! you're wet! Been some
time sence I fussed with button boots; lace or long-legged cowhides come
handier. Never wore cowhides, did you?”

“No, sir.”

“I s'pose not. I used to when I was little. Remember the first pair I
had. Copper toes on 'em--whew! The copper was blacked over when they
come out of the store and that wouldn't do, so we used to kick a stone
wall till they brightened up. There! there she comes. Humph! stockin's
soaked, too. Wish I had some dry ones to lend you. Might give you a pair
of mine, but they'd be too scant fore and aft and too broad in the beam,
I cal'late. Humph! and your top-riggin's as wet as your hull. Been on
your beam ends, have you?”

“I don't know, sir. I fell down in the bushes coming across. There were
vines and they tripped me up. And the umbrella was so heavy that--”

“Yes, I could see right off you was carryin' too much canvas. Now take
off your bunnit and I'll get a coat of mine to wrap you up in.”

He went into his bedroom and returned with a heavy “reefer” jacket.
Ordering his caller to stand up he slipped her arms into the sleeves
and turned the collar up about her neck. Her braided “pigtail” of yellow
hair stuck out over the collar and hung down her back in a funny
way. The coat sleeves reached almost to her knees and the coat itself
enveloped her like a bed quilt.

“There!” said Captain Cy approvingly. “Now you look more as if you was
under a storm rig. Set down and toast your toes. Where's that letter you
said you had?”

“It's inside here. I don't know's I can get at it; these sleeves are so
long.”

“Reef 'em. Turn 'em up. Let me show you. That's better! Hum! So you come
from the depot, hey? Live up that way?”

“No, sir! I used to live in Concord, but--”

“Concord? CONCORD? Concord where?”

“Concord, New Hampshire. I came on the cars. Auntie knew a man who was
going to Boston, and he said he'd take care of me as far as that and
then put me on the train to come down here. I stopped at his folks'
house in Charlestown last night, and this morning we got up early and he
bought me a ticket and started me for here. I had a box with my things
in it, but it was so heavy I couldn't carry it, so I left it up at the
depot. The man there said it would be all right and you could send for
it when--”

“I could SEND for it? _I_ could? What in the world--Say, child, you've
made a mistake in your bearin's. 'Taint me you want to see, it's some of
your folks, relations, most likely. Tell me who they are; maybe I know
'em.”

The girl sat upright in the big chair. Her dark eyes opened wide and her
chin quivered.

“Ain't you Captain Cyrus Whittaker?” she demanded. “You said you was.”

“Yes, yes, I am. I'm Cy Whittaker, but what--”

“Well, auntie told me--”

“Auntie! Auntie who?”

“Auntie Oliver. She isn't really my auntie, but mamma and me lived in
her house for ever so long and so--”

“Wait! wait! wait! I'm hull down in the fog. This is gettin' too thick
for ME. Your auntie's name's Oliver and you lived in Concord, New
Hampshire. For--for thunder sakes, what's YOUR name?”

“Emily Richards Thomas.”

“Em--Emily--Richards--Thomas”

“Yes, sir.”

“Emily Richards Thomas! What was your ma's name?”

“Mamma was Mrs. Thomas. Her front name was Mary. She's dead. Don't you
want to see your letter? I've got it now.”

She lifted one of the flapping coat sleeves and extended a crumpled,
damp envelope. Captain Cy took it in a dazed fashion and drew a long
breath. Then he tore open the envelope and read the following:


DEAR CAPTAIN WHITTAKER:

The bearer of this is Emily Richards Thomas. She is seven, going on
eight, but old for her years. Her mother was Mary Thomas that used to
be Mary Thayer. It was her you wrote to about keeping house for you, but
she had been dead a fortnight before your letter come. She had bronchial
pneumonia and it carried her off, having always been delicate and
with more troubles to bear than she could stand, poor thing. Since her
husband, who I say was a scamp even if he is dead, left her and the
baby, she has took rooms with me and done sewing and such. When she
passed away I wrote to Seth Howes, a relation of hers out West, and, so
far as I know, the only one she had. I told the Howes man that Mary had
gone and Emmie was left. Would they take her? I wrote. And Seth's wife
wrote they couldn't, being poorer than poverty themselves. I was afraid
she would have to go to a Home, but when your letter came I wrote the
Howeses again. And Mrs. Howes wrote back that you was rich, and a sort
of far-off relation of Mary's, and probably you would be glad to take
the child to bring up. Said that she had some correspondence with you
about Mary before. So I send Emmie to you. Somebody's got to take care
of her and I can't afford it, though I would if I could, for she's a
real nice child and some like her mother. I do hope she can stay with
you. It seems a shame to send her to the orphan asylum. I send along
what clothes she's got, which ain't many.

Respectfully yours,

SARAH OLIVER.


Captain Cy read the letter through. Then he wiped his forehead.

“Well!” he muttered. “WELL! I never in my life! I--I never did! Of
all--”

Emily Richards Thomas looked up from the depths of the coat collar.

“Don't you think,” she said, “that you had better send to the depot for
my box? I can get dry SOME this way, but mamma always made me change my
clothes as soon as I could. She used to be afraid I'd get cold.”



CHAPTER VI

ICICLES AND DUST


Captain Cy did not reply to the request for the box. It is doubtful if
he even heard it. Mrs. Oliver's astonishing letter had, as he afterwards
said, left him “high and dry with no tug in sight.” Mary Thomas was
dead, and her daughter, her DAUGHTER! of whose very existence he had
been ignorant, had suddenly appeared from nowhere and been dropped at
his door, like an out-of-season May basket, accompanied by the modest
suggestion that he assume responsibility for her thereafter. No wonder
the captain wiped his forehead in utter bewilderment.

“Don't you think you'd better send for the box?” repeated the child,
shivering a little under the big coat.

“Hey? What say? Never mind, though. Just keep quiet for a spell, won't
you. I want to let this soak in. By the big dipper! Of all the solid
brass cheek that ever I run across, this beats the whole cargo! And
Betsy Howes never hinted! 'Probably you would be glad to take--' Be
GLAD! Why, blast their miserable, stingy--What do they take me for? I'LL
show 'em! Indiana ain't so fur that I can't--Hey? Did you say anything,
sis?”

The girl had shivered again. “No, sir,” she replied. “It was my teeth, I
guess. They kind of rattled.”

“What? You ain't cold, are you? With all that round you and in front of
that fire?”

“No, sir, I guess not. Only my back feels sort of funny, as if somebody
kept dropping icicles down it. Those bushes and vines were so wet that
when I tumbled down 'twas most like being in a pond.”

“Sho! sho! That won't do. Can't have you laid up on my hands. That would
be worse than--Humph! Tut, tut! Somethin' ought to be done, and I'm
blessed if I know what. And not a woman round the place--not even that
Debby. Say, look here, what's your name--er--Emmie, hadn't I better get
the doctor?”

The child looked frightened.

“Why?” she cried, her big eyes opening. “I'm not sick, am I?”

“Sick? No, no! Course not, course not. What would you want to be sick
for? But you ought to get warm and dry right off, I s'pose, and your
duds are all up to the depot. Say, what does--what did your ma used to
do when you felt--er--them icicles and things?”

“She changed my clothes and rubbed me. And, if I was VERY wet she put me
to bed sometimes.”

“Bed? Sure! why, yes, indeed. Bed's a good place to keep off icicles.
There's my bedroom right in there. You could turn in just as well
as not. Bunk ain't made yet, but I can shake it up in no time.
Say--er--er--you can undress yourself, can't you?”

“Oh, yes, sir! Course I can! I'm most eight.”

“Sure you are! Don't act a mite babyish. All right, you set still till I
shake up that bunk.”

He entered the chamber, his own, opening from the sitting room, and
proceeded, literally, to “shake up” the bed. It was not a lengthy
process and, when it was completed, he returned to find his visitor
already divested of the coat and standing before the stove.

“I guess perhaps you'll have to help undo me behind,” observed the young
lady. “This is my best dress and I can't reach the buttons in the middle
of the back.”

Captain Cy scratched his head. Then he clumsily unbuttoned the wet
waist, glancing rather sheepishly at the window to see if anyone was
coming.

“So this is your best dress, hey?” he asked, to cover his confusion.
It was obviously not very new, for it was neatly mended in one or two
places.

“Yes, sir.”

“So. Where'd you buy it--up to Concord?”

“No, sir. Mamma made it, a year ago.”

There was a little choke in the child's voice. The captain was mightily
taken back.

“Hum! Yes, yes,” he muttered hurriedly. “Well, there you are. Now you
can get along, can't you?”

“Yes, sir. Shall I go in that room?”

“Trot right in. You might--er--maybe you might sing out when you're
tucked up. I--I'll want to know if you're got bedclothes enough.”

Emily disappeared in the bedroom. The door closed. Captain Cy, his hands
in his pockets, walked up and down the length of the sitting room. The
expression on his face was a queer one.

“I haven't got any nightgown,” called a voice from the other room. The
captain gasped.

“Good land! so you ain't,” he exclaimed. “What in the world--Humph! I
wonder--”

He went to the lower drawer of a tall “highboy” and, from the tumbled
mass of apparel therein took one of his own night garments.

“Here's one,” he said, coming back with it in his hand. “I guess you'll
have to make this do for now. It'll fit you enough for three times to
once, but it's all I've got.”

A small hand reached 'round the edge of the door and the nightshirt
disappeared. Captain Cy chuckled and resumed his pacing.

“I'm tucked up,” called Miss Thomas. The captain entered and found her
in bed, the patchwork points and diamonds of the “Rising Sun” quilt
covering her to the chin and her head denting the uppermost of the two
big pillows. Captain Cy liked to “sleep high.”

“Got enough over you?” he asked.

“Yes, sir, thank you.”

“That's good. I'll take your togs out and dry 'em in the kitchen. Don't
be scared; I'll be right back.”

In the kitchen he sorted the wet garments and hung them about the
cook stove. It was a strange occupation for him and he shook his head
whimsically as he completed it. Then he took a flat iron, one of Mrs.
Beasley's purchases, from the shelf in the closet and put it in the oven
to heat. Soon afterwards he returned to the bedroom, bearing the iron
wrapped in a dish towel.

“My ma always used to put a hot flat to my feet when I was a young one
and got chilled,” he explained. “I ain't used one for some time, but I
guess it's a good receipt. How do you feel now? Any more icicles?”

“No, sir. I'm ever so warm. Isn't this a nice bed?”

“Think so, do you? Glad of it. Well, now, I'm goin' to leave you in it
while I step down street and see about havin' your box sent for. I'll be
back in a shake. If anybody comes to the door while I'm gone don't you
worry; let 'em go away again.”

He put on his hat and left the house, walking rapidly, his head down and
his hands in his pockets. At times he would pause in his walk, whistle,
shake his head, and go on once more. Josiah Dimick met him, and his
answers to Josiah's questions were so vague and irrelevant that Captain
Dimick was puzzled, and later expressed the opinion that “Whit's cookin'
must be pretty bad; acted to me as if he had dyspepsy of the brain.”

Captain Cy stopped at Mr. Lumley's residence to leave an order for the
delivery of the box. Then he drifted into Simmons's and accosted Alpheus
Smalley.

“Al,” he said, “what's good for a cold?”

“Why?” asked Mr. Smalley, in true Yankee fashion. “You got one?”

“Hey? Oh, yes! Yes, I've got one.” By way of proof he coughed until the
lamp chimneys rattled on the shelf.

“Judas! I should think you had! Well, there's 'Pine Bark Oil' and
'Sassafras Elixir' and two kinds of sass'p'rilla--that's good for most
everything--and--Is your throat sore?”

“Hey? Yes, I guess so.”

“Don't you KNOW? If you've got sore throat there ain't nothin' better'n
'Arabian Balsam.' But what in time are you doin' out in this drizzle
with a cold and no umbrella? Do you want to--”

“Never mind my umbrella. I left it in the church entry t'other Sunday
and somebody got out afore I did. This 'Arabian Balsam'--seems to me I
remember my ma's usin' that on me. Wet a rag with it, don't you, and tie
it round your neck?”

“Yup. Be sure and use a flannel rag, and red flannel if you've got it;
that acts quicker'n the other kinds. Fifteen cent bottle?”

“I guess so. Might's well give me some sass'p'rilla, while you're about
it; always handy to have in the house. And--er--say, is that canned soup
you've got up on that shelf?”

The astonished clerk admitted that it was.

“Well, give me a can of the chicken kind.”

Mr. Smalley, standing on a chair to reach the shelf where the soup was
kept, shook his head.

“Now, that's too bad, Cap'n,” he said, “but we're all out of chicken
just now. Fact is, we ain't got nothin' but termatter and beef broth.
Yes, and I declare if the termatter ain't all gone.”

“Humph! then I guess I'll take the beef. Needn't mind wrappin' it up. So
long.”

He departed bearing his purchases. When Mr. Simmons, proprietor of
the store, returned, Alpheus told him that he “cal'lated” Captain Cy
Whittaker was preparing to “go into a decline, or somethin'.”

“Anyhow,” said Alpheus, “he bought sass'p'rilla and 'Arabian Balsam,'
and I sold him a can of that beef soup you bought three year ago last
summer, when Alicia Atkins had the chicken pox.”

The captain entered the house quietly and tiptoed to the door of the
bedroom. Emily was asleep, and the sight of the childish head upon the
pillow gave him a start as he peeped in at it. It looked so natural,
almost as if it belonged there. It had been in a bed like that and in
that very room that he had slept when a boy.

Gabe, brimful of curiosity, brought the box a little later. His
curiosity was ungratified, Captain Cyrus explaining that it was a
package he had been expecting. The captain took the box to the bedroom,
and, finding the child still asleep, deposited it on the floor and
tiptoed out again. He went to the kitchen, poked up the fire, and set
about getting dinner.

He was warming the beef broth in a saucepan on the stove when Emily
appeared. She was dressed in dry clothes from the box and seemed to be
feeling as good as new.

“Hello!” exclaimed Captain Cy. “You're on deck again, hey? How's
icicles?”

“All gone,” was the reply. “Do you do your own work? Can't I help? I can
set the table. I used to for Mrs. Oliver.”

The captain protested that he could do it himself just as well, but
the girl persisting, he showed her where the dishes were kept. From the
corner of his eye he watched her as she unfolded the tablecloth.

“Is this the only one you've got?” she inquired. “It's awful dirty.”

“Hum! Yes, I ain't tended up to my washin' and ironin' the way I'd ought
to. I'll lose my job if I don't look out, hey?”

Before they sat down to the meal Captain Cy insisted that his guest
take a tablespoonful of the sarsaparilla and decorate her throat with
a section of red flannel soaked in the 'Arabian Balsam.' The perfume of
the latter was penetrating and might have interfered with a less healthy
appetite than that of Miss Thomas.

“Have some soup? Some I bought purpose for you. Best thing goin' for
folks with icicles,” remarked the captain, waving the iron spoon he had
used to stir the contents of the saucepan.

“Yes, sir, thank you. But don't you ask a blessing?”

“Hey?”

“A blessing, you know. Saying that you're thankful for the food now set
before us.”

“Hum! Why, to tell you the truth I've kind of neglected that, I'm
afraid. Bein' thankful for the grub I've had lately was most too much of
a strain, I shouldn't wonder.”

“I know the one mamma used to say. Shall I ask it for you?”

“Sho! I guess so, if you want to.”

The girl bent her head and repeated a short grace. Captain Cy watched
her curiously.

“Now, I'll have some soup, please,” observed Emily. “I'm awful hungry.
I had breakfast at five o'clock this morning and we didn't have a chance
to eat much.”

A good many times that day the captain caught himself wondering if he
wasn't dreaming. The whole affair seemed too ridiculous to be an actual
experience. Dinner over, he and Emmie attended to the dishes, he washing
and she wiping. And even at this early stage of their acquaintance her
disposition to take charge of things was apparent. She found fault with
the dish towels; they were almost as bad as the tablecloth, she said.
Considering that the same set had been in use since Mrs. Beasley's
departure, the criticism was not altogether baseless. But the young lady
did not stop there--her companion's skill as a washer was questioned.

“Excuse me,” she said, “but don't you think that plate had better be
done over? I guess you didn't see that place in the corner. Perhaps
you've forgot your specs. Auntie Oliver couldn't see well without her
specs.”

Captain Cy grinned and admitted that a second washing wouldn't hurt the
plate.

“I guess your auntie was one of the particular kind,” he said.

“No, sir, 'twas mamma. She couldn't bear dirty things. Auntie used to
say that mamma hunted dust with a magnifying glass. She didn't, though;
she only liked to be neat. I guess dust doesn't worry men so much as it
does women.”

“Why?”

“Oh, 'cause there's so much of it here; don't you think so? I'll help
you clean up by and by, if you want to.”

“YOU will?”

“Yes, sir. I used to dust sometimes when mamma was out sewing. And once
I swept, but I did it so hard that auntie wouldn't let me any more. She
said 'twas like trying to blow out a match with a tornado.”

Later on he found her standing in the sitting room, critically
inspecting the mats, the furniture, and the pictures on the walls. He
stood watching her for a moment and then asked:

“Well, what are you lookin' for--more dust? 'Twon't be hard to find it.
'Dust thou art and unto dust thou shalt return.' Every time I go outdoor
and come in again I realize how true that is.”

Emily shook her head.

“No, sir,” she said; “I was only looking at things and thinking.”

“Thinkin', hey? What about? or is that a secret?”

“No, sir. I was thinking that this room was different from any I've ever
seen.”

“Humph! Yes, I presume likely 'tis. Don't like it very much, do you?”

“Yes, sir, I think I do. It's got a good many things in it that I never
saw before, but I guess they're pretty--after you get used to 'em.”

Captain Cy laughed aloud. “After you get used to 'em, hey?” he repeated.

“Yes, sir. That's what mamma said about Auntie Oliver's new bonnet that
she made herself. I--I was thinking that you must be peculiar.”

“Peculiar?”

“Yes, sir. I like peculiar people. I'm peculiar myself. Auntie used to
say I was the most peculiar child she ever saw. P'raps that's why I came
to you. P'raps God meant for peculiar ones to live together. Don't you
think maybe that was it?”

And the captain, having no answer ready, said nothing.

That evening when Asaph and Bailey, coming for their usual call, peeped
in at the window, they were astounded by the tableau in the Whittaker
sitting room. Captain Cy was seated in the rocking chair which had been
his grandfather's. At his feet, on the walnut cricket with a haircloth
top, sat a little girl turning over the leaves of a tattered magazine,
a Godey's Lady's Book. A pile of these magazines was beside her on the
floor. The captain was smiling and looking over her shoulder. The cat
was curled up in another chair. The room looked more homelike than it
had since its owner returned to it.

The friends entered without knocking. Captain Cy looked up, saw them,
and appeared embarrassed.

“Hello, boys!” he said. “Glad to see you. Come right in. Clearin' off
fine, ain't it?”

Mr. Tidditt replied absently that he wouldn't be surprised if it was.
Bailey, his eyes fixed upon the occupant of the cricket, said nothing.

“We--we didn't know you had company, Whit,” said Asaph. “We been up to
Simmons's and Alpheus said you was thin and peaked and looked sick. Said
you bought sass'p'rilla and all kind of truck. He was afraid you had
fever and was out of your head, cruisin round in the rain with no
umbrella. The gang weren't talkin' of nothin' else, so me and Bailey
thought we'd come right down.”

“That's kind of you, I'm sure. Take your things off and set down. No,
I'm sorry to disappoint Smalley and the rest, but I'm able to be up
and--er--make my own bed, thank you. So Alpheus thought I looked thin,
hey? Well, if I had to live on that soup he sold me, I'd be thinner'n I
am now. You tell him that canned hot water is all right if you like it,
but it seems a shame to put mud in it. It only changes the color and
don't help the taste.”

Mr. Bangs, who was still staring at Emily, now ventured a remark.

“Is that a relation of yours, Cy?” he asked.

“That? Oh! Well, no, not exactly. And yet I don't know but she is.
Fellers, this is Emmie Thomas. Can't you shake hands, Emmie?”

The child rose, laid down the magazine, which was open at the colored
picture of a group of ladies in crinoline and chignons, and, going
across the room, extended a hand to Mr. Tidditt.

“How do you do, sir?” she said.

“Why--er--how d'ye do? I'm pretty smart, thank you. How's yourself?”

“I'm better now. I guess the sass'parilla was good for me.”

“'Twan't the sass'p'rilla,” observed the captain, with conviction.
“'Twas the 'Arabian Balsam.' Ma always cured me with it and there's
nothin' finer.”

“But what in time--” began Bailey. Captain Cy glanced at the child and
then at the clock.

“Don't you think you'd better turn in now, Emmie?” he said hastily,
cutting off the remainder of the Bangs query. “It's after eight, and
when I was little I was abed afore that.”

Emily obediently turned, gathered up the Lady's Books and replaced them
in the closet. Then she went to the dining room and came back with a
hand lamp.

“Good night,” she said, addressing the visitors. Then, coming close to
the captain, she put her face up for a kiss.

“Good night,” she said to him, adding, “I like it here ever so much. I'm
awful glad you let me stay.”

As Bailey told Asaph afterwards, Captain Cy blushed until the ends of
the red lapped over at the nape of his neck. However, he bent and kissed
the rosy lips and then quickly brushed his own with his hand.

“Yes, yes,” he stammered. “Well--er--good night. Pleasant dreams to you.
See you in the mornin'.”

The girl paused at the chamber door. “You won't have to unbutton my
waist now,” she said. “This is my other one and it ain't that kind.”

The door closed. The captain, without looking at his friends, led the
way to the dining room.

“Come on out here,” he whispered. “We can talk better here.”

Naturally, they wanted to know all about the girl, who she was and where
she came from. Captain Cy told as much of the history of the affair as
he thought necessary.

“Poor young one,” he concluded, “she landed on to me in the rain,
soppin' wet, and ha'f sick. I COULDN'T turn her out then--nobody could.
Course it's an everlastin' outrage on me and the cheekiest thing ever I
heard of, but what could I do? I was fixed a good deal like an English
feller by the name of Gatenby that I used to know in South America. He
woke up in the middle of the night and found a boa constrictor curled on
the foot of his bed. Next day, when a crowd of us happened in, there
was Gatenby, white as a sheet, starin' down at the snake, and it sound
asleep. 'I didn't invite him,' he says, 'but he looked so bloomin'
comf'table I 'adn't the 'eart to disturb 'im.' Same way with me;
the child seemed so comf'table here I ain't had the heart to disturb
her--yet.”

“But she said she was goin' to stay,” put in Bailey. “You ain't goin' to
KEEP her, are you?”

The captain's indignation was intense.

“Who--me?” he snorted. “What do you think I am? I ain't runnin' an
orphan asylum. No, sir! I'll keep the young one a day or so--or maybe a
week--and then I'll pack her off to Betsy Howes. I ain't so soft as they
think I am. I'LL show 'em!”

Mr. Tidditt looked thoughtful.

“She's a kind of cute little girl, ain't she?” he observed.

Captain Cy's frown vanished and a smile took its place.

“That's so,” he chuckled. “She is, now that's a fact! I don't know's I
ever saw a cuter.”



CHAPTER VII

CAPTAIN CY PROVES DELINQUENT


A week isn't a very long time even in Bayport. True, there was once a
drummer for a Boston “notion” house who sprained his ankle on the icy
sidewalk in front of Simmons's, and was therefore obliged to remain in
the front bedroom of the perfect boarding house for seven whole days. He
is quoted as saying that next time he hoped he might break his neck.

“Brother,” asked the shocked Rev. Mr. Daniels, who was calling upon the
stranger, “are you prepared to face eternity?”

“What?” was the energetic reply. “After a week in this town, and in this
bedroom? Look here, Mister, if you want to scare me about the future you
just hint that they'll put me on a straw tick in an ice chest. Anything
hot and lively 'll only be tempting after this.”

But to us, who live here throughout the year, a week soon passes. And
the end of the week following Emily Thomas's arrival at the Cy Whittaker
place found the little girl still there and apparently no nearer being
shipped to Indiana than when she came. Not so near, if Mr. Tidditt's
opinion counts for anything.

“Gone?” he repeated scoffingly in reply to Bailey Bangs's question.
“Course she ain't gone! And, what's more, she ain't goin' to go. Whit's
got so already that he wouldn't part with her no more'n he'd cut off his
hand.”

“But he keeps SAYIN' she's got to go. Only yesterday he was tellin' how
Betsy'd feel when the girl landed on her with his letter in her pocket.”

“Sayin' don't count for nothin'. Zoeth Cahoon keeps SAYIN' he's goin' to
stop drinkin', but he only stops long enough to catch his breath. Cy's
tellin' himself fairy yarns and he hopes he believes 'em. Man alive!
can't you SEE? Ain't he gettin' more foolish over the young one every
day? Don't she boss him round like the overseer on a cranberry swamp?
Don't he look more contented than he has sence he got off the cars? I
tell you, Bailey, that child fills a place in Whit's life that's been
runnin' to seed and needed weedin'. Nothin' could fill it better--unless
'twas a nice wife.”

“WIFE! Oh, DO be still! I believe you're woman-struck and at an age when
it hadn't ought to be catchin' no more'n whoopin' cough.”

Mr. Bangs and the town clerk were the only ones, except Captain Cy, who
knew the whole truth concerning the little girl. Not that the child's
arrival wasn't noted and vigorously discussed by a large portion of the
townspeople. Emily had not been in the Whittaker house two days before
Angeline Phinney called, hot on the trail of gossip and sensation. But,
persistent as Angeline was, she departed knowing not quite as much as
when she came. The interview between Miss Phinney and the captain must
have been interesting, judging by the lady's account of it.

“I never see such a man in my born days,” declared Angie disgustedly.
“You couldn't get nothin' out of him. Not that he wan't pleasant and
sociable; land sakes! he acted as glad to see me as if I was his rich
aunt come on a visit. And he was willin' to talk, too. That's the
trouble; he done ALL the talkin'. I happened to mention, just as a sort
of starter, you know, somethin' about the cranb'ry crop this fall; and
after that all he could say was 'cranb'ries, cranb'ries, cranb'ries!'
'Hear you've got comp'ny,' says I. 'Did you?' says he. 'Now ain't it
strange how things'll get spread around? Only yesterday I heard that Joe
Dimick's swamp was just loaded down with “early blacks.” And yet when
I went over to look at it there didn't seem to be so many. There ain't
much better cranb'ries anywhere than our early blacks,' he says. 'You
take 'em--' And so on, and so on, and so on. _I_ didn't care nothin'
about the dratted early blacks, but he didn't seem to care for nothin'
else. He talked cranb'ries steady for an hour and a half and I left
that house with my mouth all puckered up; it's tasted sour ever sence. I
never see such a man!”

When Captain Cy was questioned by Asaph concerning the acid
conversation, he grinned.

“I didn't know you was so interested in cranb'ries,” observed Tidditt.

“I ain't,” was the reply; “but I'm more interested in 'em than I am in
Angie. I see she was sufferin' from a rush of curiosity to the head
and I cured her by homeopath doses. Every time she opened her mouth I
dropped an 'early black' into it. It's a good receipt; you tell Bailey
to try it on Ketury some time.”

To his chums the captain was emphatic in his orders that secrecy be
preserved. No one was to be told who the child was or where she came
from. “What they don't know won't hurt 'em any,” declared Captain Cy.
And Emily's answer to inquiring souls who would fain have delved into
her past was to the effect that “Uncle Cyrus” didn't like to have her
talk about herself.

“I don't know's I'm ashamed of anything I've done so far,” said the
captain; “but I ain't braggin', either. Time enough to talk when I send
her back to Betsy.”

That time, apparently, was not in the near future. The girl stayed on
at the Whittaker place and grew to be more and more a part of it. At the
end of the second week Captain Cy began calling her “Bos'n.”

“A bos'n's a mighty handy man aboard ship,” he explained, “and you're
so handy here that it fits in first rate. And, besides, it sounds so
natural. My dad called me 'Bos'n' when I was little.”

Emily accepted the title complacently. She was quite contented to be
called almost anything, so long as she was permitted to stay with her
new friend. Already the bos'n had taken charge of the deck and the rest
of the ship's company; Captain Cy and “Lonesome,” the cat, obeyed her
orders.

On the second Sunday morning after her arrival “Bos'n” suggested that
she and Captain Cy go to church.

“Mother and I always went at home,” she said. “And Auntie Oliver used to
say meeting was a good thing for those that needed it.”

“Think I need it, do you?” asked the captain, who, in shirt sleeves and
slippers, had prepared for a quiet forenoon with his pipe and the Boston
Transcript.

“I don't know, sir. I heard what you said when Lonesome ate up the
steak, and I thought maybe you hadn't been for a long time. I guess
churches are different in South America.”

So they went to church and sat in the old Whittaker pew. The captain had
been there once before when he first returned to Bayport, but the sermon
was more somnolent than edifying, and he hadn't repeated the experiment.
The pair attracted much attention. Fragments of a conversation, heard
by Captain Cy as they emerged into the vestibule, had momentous
consequences.

“Kind of a pretty child, ain't she?” commented Mrs. Eben Salters,
patting her false front into place under the eaves of her Sunday bonnet.

“Pretty enough in the face,” sniffed Mrs. “Tad” Simpson, who was wearing
her black silk for the first time since its third making-over. “Pretty
enough that way, I s'pose. But, my land! look at the way she's
rigged. Old dress, darned and patched up and all outgrown! If I had
Cy Whittaker's money I'd be ashamed to have a relation of mine come to
meetin' that way. Even if her folks was poorer'n Job's off ox I'd spend
a little on my own account and trust to getting it back some time. I'd
have more care for my own self-respect. Look at Alicia Atkins. See how
nice she looks. Them feathers on her hat must have cost somethin', I bet
you. Howdy do, 'Licia, dear? When's your pa comin' home?”

The Honorable Heman had left town on a business trip to the South.
Alicia was accompanied by the Atkins housekeeper and, as usual, was
garbed regardless of expense.

Mrs. Salters smiled sweetly upon the Atkins heir and then added, in a
church whisper: “Don't she look sweet? I agree with you, Sarah; it is
strange how Captain Whittaker lets his little niece go. And him rich!”

“Niece?” repeated Mrs. Simpson eagerly. “Who said 'twas his niece? I
heard 'twas a child he'd adopted out of a home. There's all sorts of
queer yarns about. I--Oh, good mornin', Cap'n Cyrus! How DO you do?”

The captain grunted an answer to the effect that he was bearing up
pretty well, considering. There was a scowl on his face, and he spoke
little as, holding Emily by the hand, he led the way home. That evening
he dropped in at the perfect boarding house and begged to know if Mrs.
Bangs had any “fashion books” around that she didn't want.

“I mean--er--er--magazines with pictures of women's duds in 'em,” he
stammered, in explanation. “Bos'n likes to look at 'em. She's great on
fashion books, Bos'n is.”

Keturah got together a half dozen numbers of the Home Dressmaker and
other periodicals of a similar nature. The captain took them under his
arm and departed, whispering to Mr. Tidditt, as he passed the latter in
the hall:

“Come up by and by, Ase. I want to talk to you. Bring Bailey along, if
you can do it without startin' divorce proceedings.”

Later, when the trio gathered in the Whittaker sitting room, Captain Cy
produced the “fashion books” and spoke concerning them.

“You see,” he said, “I--I've been thinkin' that Bos'n--Emily, that
is--wan't rigged exactly the way she ought to be. Have you fellers
noticed it?”

His friends seemed surprised. Neither was ready with an immediate
answer, so the captain went on.

“Course I don't mean she ain't got canvas enough to cover her spars,” he
explained; “but what she has got has seen consider'ble weather, and it
seemed to me 'twas pretty nigh time to haul her into dry dock and refit.
That's why I borrowed these magazines of Ketury. I've been lookin' them
over and there seems to be plenty of riggin' for small craft; the only
thing is I don't know what's the right cut for her build. Bailey, you're
a married man; you ought to know somethin' about women's clothes. What
do you think of this, now?”

He opened one of the magazines and pointed to the picture of a young
girl, with a waspy waist and Lilliputian feet, who, arrayed in flounces
and furbelows, was toddling gingerly down a flight of marble steps. She
carried a parasol in one hand, and the other held the end of a chain to
which a long-haired dog was attached.

The town clerk and his companion inspected the young lady with
deliberation and interest.

“Well, what do you say?” demanded Captain Cy.

“I don't care much for them kind of dogs,” observed Asaph thoughtfully.

“Good land! you don't s'pose they heave the dog in with the clothes, for
good measure, do you? Bailey, what's your opinion?”

Mr. Bangs looked wise.

“I should say--” he said, “yes, sir, I should say that was a real
stylish rig-out. Only thing is, that girl is consider'ble less
fleshy than Emily. This one looks to me as if she was breakin' in two
amidships. Still, I s'pose likely the duds don't come ready made, so
they could be let out some, to fit. What's the price of a suit like
that, Whit?”

The captain looked at the printed number beneath the fashion plate and
then turned to the description in the text.

“'Afternoon gown for miss of sixteen,'” he read. “Humph! that settles
that, first crack. Bos'n ain't but half of sixteen.”

“Anyway,” put in Asaph, “you need somethin' she could wear forenoons, if
she wanted to. What's this one? She looks young enough.”

The “one” referred to turned out to be a “coat for child of four.”
 It was therefore scornfully rejected. One after another the different
magazines were examined and the pictures discussed. At length a “costume
for miss of eight years” was pronounced to be pretty nearly the thing.

“Godfrey scissors!” exclaimed the admiring Mr. Tidditt. “That's mighty
swell, ain't it? What's the stuff goes into that, Cy?”

“'Material, batiste, trimmed with embroidered batiste.' What in time is
batiste?”

“I don't know. Do you, Bailey?”

“No; never heard of it. Ketury never had nothin' like that, I'm sure.
French, I shouldn't wonder. Well, Ketury's down on the French ever sence
she read about Napoleon leavin' his fust wife to take up with another
woman. Does it say any more?”

“Let's see. 'Makes a beautiful gown for evening or summer wear.' Summer!
Why, by the big dipper, we're aground again! Bos'n don't want summer
clothes. It's comin' on winter.”

He threw the magazine on the floor, rubbed his forehead, and then burst
into a laugh.

“For goodness sake, don't tell anybody about this business, boys!” he
said. “I guess I must be havin' an early spring of second childhood. But
when I heard those women at the meetin' house goin' on about how pretty
'Licia Atkins was got up and how mean and shabby Bos'n looked, it made
me bile. And, by the big dipper, I WILL show 'em somethin' afore I get
through, too! Only, dressin' little girls is some off my usual course.
Bailey, does Ketury make her own duds?”

“Why, no! Course she helps and stands by for orders, but Effie Taylor
comes and takes the wheel while the riggin's goin' on. Effie's a
dressmaker and--”

“There! See, Ase? It IS some good to have a married man aboard, after
all. A dressmaker's what we want. I'll hunt up Effie to-morrow.”

And hunt her up he did, with the result that Miss Taylor came to the
Whittaker place each day during the following week and Emily was, as
the captain said, “rigged out fresh from main truck to keelson.” In this
“rigging” Captain Cy and his two partners--Josiah Dimick had already
christened the pair “The Board of Strategy”--took a marked interest.
They were on hand when each new garment was tried on, and they approved
or criticised as seemed to them best.

“Ain't that kind of sober lookin' for a young one like Bos'n?” asked the
captain, referring to one of the new gowns. “I don't want her to look as
if she was dressed cheap.”

“Land sakes!” mumbled Miss Taylor, her mouth full of pins. “There ain't
anything cheap about it, and you'll find it out when you get the bill.
That's a nice, rich, sensible suit.”

“I know, but it's so everlastin' quiet! Don't you think a little yellow
and black or some red strung along the yards would sort of liven it
up? Why! you ought to see them Greaser girls down in South America of a
Sunday afternoon. Color! and go! Jerushy! they'd pretty nigh knock your
eye out.”

The dressmaker sniffed disdain.

“Cap'n Whittaker,” she retorted, “if you want this child to look like an
Indian squaw or a barber's pole you'll have to get somebody else to do
it. I'm used to dressing Christians, not yeller and black heathen women.
Red strung along a skirt like that! I never did!”

“There, there, Effie! Don't get the barometer fallin'. I was only
suggestin', you know. What do you think, Bos'n?”

“Why, Uncle Cyrus, I don't believe I should like red very much; nor the
other colors, either. I like this just as it is.”

“So? Well, you're the doctor. Maybe you're right. I wouldn't want you
to look like a barber's pole. Don't love Tad Simpson enough to want to
advertise his business.”

Miss Taylor's coming had other results besides the refitting of “Bos'n.”
 She found much fault with the captain's housekeeping. It developed that
her sister Georgiana, who had been working in a Brockton shoe shop, was
now at home and might be engaged to attend to the household duties
at the Whittaker establishment, provided she was allowed to “go home
nights.” Georgiana was engaged, on trial, and did well. So that problem
was solved.

School in Bayport opens the first week in October. Of late there has
been a movement, headed by some of the townspeople who think city ways
are best, to have the term begin in September. But this idea has little
chance of success as long as cranberry picking continues to be our
leading industry. So many of the children help out the family means by
picking cranberries in the fall that school, until the picking season
was over, would be slimly attended.

The last week in September found us all discussing the coming of the new
downstairs teacher, Miss Phoebe Dawes. Since it was definitely settled
that she was to come, the opposition had died down and was less
openly expressed; but it was there, all the same, beneath the surface.
Congressman Atkins had accepted the surprising defiance of his wish with
calm dignity and the philosophy of the truly great who are not troubled
by trifles. His lieutenant, Tad Simpson, quoted him as saying that, of
course, the will of the school committee was paramount, and he, as all
good citizens should, bowed to their verdict. “Far be it from me,” so
the great man proclaimed, “to desire that my opinion should carry more
weight than that of the humblest of my friends and neighbors. Speaking
as one whose knowledge of the world was, perhaps--er--more extensive
than--er--others, I favored the Normal School candidate. But the persons
chosen to select thought--or appeared to think--otherwise. I therefore
say nothing and await developments.”

This attitude was considered by most of us to reflect credit upon Mr.
Atkins. There were a few scoffers, however. When the proclamation was
repeated to Captain Cy he smiled.

“Alpheus,” he said to Mr. Smalley, his informant, “you didn't use to
know Deacon Zeb Clark, who lived up by the salt works in my granddad's
time, hey? No, course you didn't! Well, the deacon was a great believer
in his own judgment. One time, it bein' Saturday, his wife wanted him to
pump the washtub full and take a bath. He said, no; said the cistern
was awful low and 'twould use up all the water. She said no such thing;
there was water a-plenty. To prove she was wrong he went and pried the
cistern cover off to look, and fell in. Mrs. Clark peeked down and saw
him there, standin' up to his neck.

“'Tabby,' says he, 'you would have your way and I'm takin' the bath.
But you can see for yourself that we'll have to cart water from now on.
However, _I_ ain't responsible; throw me down the soap and towel.'”

“Humph!” grunted Smalley, “I don't see what that's got to do with it.
Heman ain't takin' no bath.”

“I don't know's it's got anything to do with it. But he kind of made me
think of Zeb, all the same.”

The first day of school was, of course, a Monday. On Sunday afternoon
Captain Cy and Bos'n went for a walk. These walks had become a regular
part of the Sabbath programme, the weather, of course, permitting. After
church the pair came home for dinner. The meal being eaten, the captain
would light a cigar--a pipe was now hardly “dressed-up” enough for
Sunday--and, taking his small partner by the hand, would lead the way
across the fields, through the pines and down by the meadow “short
cut” to the cemetery. The cemetery is a favorite Sabbath resort for the
natives of Bayport, who usually speak of it as the graveyard. It is a
pleasant, shady spot, and to visit it is considered quite respectable
and in keeping with the day and a due regard for decorum. The ungodly,
meaning the summer boarders and the village no-accounts, seem to
prefer the beach and the fish houses, but the cemetery attracts the
churchgoers. One may gossip concerning the probable cost of a new
tombstone and still remain faithful to the most rigid creed.

Captain Cy was not, strictly speaking, a religious man, according to
Bayport standards. Between his attendance to churchly duties and that of
the Honorable Heman Atkins there was a great gulf fixed. But he rather
liked to visit the graveyard on Sunday afternoons. His mother had been
used to stroll there with him, in his boyhood, and it pleased him to
follow in her footsteps.

So he and Bos'n walked along the grass-covered paths, between the
iron-fenced “lots” of the well-to-do and the humble mounds and simple
slabs where the poor were sleeping; past the sumptuous granite shaft of
the Atkins lot and the tilted mossy stone which told how “Edwin Simpson,
our only son,” had been “accidentally shot in the West Indies”; out
through the back gate and up the hill to the pine grove overlooking the
bay. Here, on a scented carpet of pine needles, they sat them down to
rest and chat.

Emily, her small knees drawn up and encircled by her arms, looked out
across the flats, now half covered with the rising tide. It was a mild
day, more like August than October, and there was almost no wind. The
sun was shining on the shallow water, and the sand beneath it showed
yellow, checkered and marbled with dark green streaks and patches where
the weed-bordered channels wound tortuously. On the horizon the sand
hills of Wellmouth notched the blue sky. The girl drew a long breath.

“Oh!” she exclaimed. “Isn't this just lovely! I do like the sea an awful
lot.”

“That's natural enough,” replied her companion. “There's a big streak
of salt water in your blood on your ma's side. It pulls, that kind of a
streak does. There's days when I feel uneasy every minute and hanker for
a deck underneath me. The settin' room floor stays altogether too quiet
on a day like that; I'd like to feel it heavin' over a ground swell.”

“Say, Bos'n,” he said a few minutes later; “I've been thinkin' about
you. You've been to school, haven't you?”

“Course I have,” was the rather indignant answer. “I went two years in
Concord. Mamma used to help me nights, too. I can read almost all the
little words. Don't I help you read your paper 'most every night?”

“Sartin you do! Yes, yes! Well, our school opens to-morrer and I've been
thinkin' that maybe you'd better go. There's a new teacher comin', and I
hear she's pretty good.”

“Don't you KNOW? Why, Mr. Tidditt said you was the one that got her to
come here!”

“Yes; well, Asaph says 'most everything but his prayers. Still, he ain't
fur off this time; I cal'late I was some responsible for her bein' voted
in. Yet I don't really know anything about her. You see, I--well, never
mind. What do you think? Want to go?”

Bos'n looked troubled.

“I'd like to,” she said. “Course I want to learn how to read the big
words, too. But I like to stay at home with you more.”

“You do, hey? Sho, sho! Well, I guess I can get along between times.
Georgiana's there to keep me straight and she'll see to the dust and the
dishes. I guess you'd better go to-morrer mornin' and see how you like
it, anyhow.”

The child thought for a moment.

“I think you're awful good,” she said. “I like you next to mamma; even
better than Auntie Oliver. I printed a letter to her the other day. I
told her you were better than we expected and I had decided to live with
you always.”

Captain Cy was startled. Considering that, only the day before, he
had repeated to Bailey the declaration that the arrangement was but
temporary, and that Betsy Howes was escaping responsibility only for a
month or so, he scarcely knew what to say.

“Humph!” he grunted. “You've decided it, have you? Well, we'll see. Now
you trot around and have a good time. I'm goin' to have another smoke.
I'll be here when you get back.”

Bos'n wandered off in search of late golden rod. The captain smoked and
meditated. By and by the puffs were less frequent and the cigar went
out. It fell from his fingers. With his back against a pine tree Captain
Cy dozed peacefully.

He awoke with a jump. Something had awakened him, but he did not know
what. He blinked and gazed about him. Then he heard a faint scream.

“Uncle!” screamed Bos'n. “O--o--o--h! Uncle Cyrus, help me! Come quick!”

The next moment the captain was plunging through the scrub of
huckleberry and bayberry bushes, bumping into pines and smashing the
branches aside as he ran in the direction of the call.

Back of the pine grove was a big inclosed pasture nearly a quarter of
a mile long. Its rear boundary was the iron fence of the cemetery. The
other three sides were marked by rail fences and a stone wall. As the
captain floundered from the grove and vaulted the rail fence he swore
aloud.

“By the big dipper,” he groaned, “it's that cussed heifer! I forgot her.
Keep dodgin', Bos'n girl! I'm comin'.”

The pasture was tenanted by a red and white cow belonging to Sylvanus
Cahoon. Whether or not the animal had, during her calfhood days, been
injured by a woman is not known; possibly her behavior was due merely
to innate depravity. At any rate, she cherished a mortal hatred toward
human beings of her own sex. With men and boys she was meek enough, but
no person wearing skirts, and alone, might venture in that field without
being chased by that cow. What would happen if the pursued one was
caught could only be surmised, for, so far, no female had permitted
herself to be caught. Few would come even so near as the other side of
the pasture walls.

Bos'n had forgotten the cow. She had gone from one golden-rod clump to
another until she had traversed nearly the length of the field. Then the
vicious creature had appeared from behind a knoll in the pasture and,
head down and bellowing wickedly, had rushed upon her. When the captain
reached the far-off fence, the little girl was dodging from one dwarf
pine to the next, with the cow in pursuit. The pines were few and Bos'n
was nearly at the end of her defenses.

“Help!” she screamed. “Oh, uncle, where are you? What shall I do?”

Captain Cy roared in answer.

“Keep it up!” he yelled. “I'm a-comin'! Shoot you everlastin' critter!
I'll break your back for you!”

The cow didn't understand English it seemed, even such vigorous English
as the captain was using. Emily dodged to the last pine. The animal was
close upon her. Her rescuer was still far away.

And then the cemetery gate opened and another person entered the
pasture. A small person--a woman. She said nothing, but picking up her
skirts, ran straight toward the cow, heedless of the latter's reputation
and vicious appearance. One hand clutched the gathered skirts. In the
other she held a book.

“Don't be scared, dear,” she called reassuringly. Then to the cow: “Stop
it! Go away, you wicked thing!”

The animal heard the voice and turned. Seeing that the newcomer was only
a woman, she lowered her head and pawed the ground.

“Run for the gate, little girl,” commanded the rescuer. “Run quick!”
 Bos'n obeyed. She made a desperate dash from her pine across the open
space, and in another moment was safe inside the cemetery fence.

“Scat! Go home!” ordered the lady, advancing toward the cow and shaking
the book at her, as if the volume was some sort of deadly weapon.
“Aren't you ashamed of yourself! Go away! You needn't growl at me! I'm
not a bit afraid of you.”

The “growling” was the muttered bellow with which the cow was wont
to terrorize her feminine victims. But this victim refused to be
terrorized. Instead of screaming and running she continued to advance,
brandishing the book and repeating her orders that the creature “go
home” at once. The cow did not know what to make of it. Before she could
decide whether to charge or retreat, a good-sized stick descended
upon her back with a “whack” that settled the question. Captain Cy had
reached the scene of battle.

Then the rescuer's courage seemed to desert her, for she ran back to
the cemetery even faster than she had run from it. When the indignant
captain, having pursued and chastised the cow until the stick was but
a splintered remnant, reached the haven behind the iron fence, he found
her soothing the frightened Bos'n who was sobbing and hysterical.

Emily saw her “Uncle Cyrus” coming and rushed into his arms. He picked
her up and, holding her with a grip which testified to the nerve strain
he had been under, stepped forward to meet the stranger, whose coming
had been so opportune.

And she WAS a stranger. The captain knew most of Bayport's inhabitants
by this time, or thought he did, but he did not know her. She was a
small woman, quietly dressed, and her hair, under a neat black and white
hat, was brown. The hat was now a trifle to one side and the hair was
the least bit disarranged, an effect not at all unbecoming. She was
tucking in the stray wisps as the captain, with Bos'n in his arms, came
up.

“Well, ma'am!” puffed Captain Cy. “WELL, ma'am! I must say that was
the slickest, pluckiest thing ever I saw anywheres. I don't know what
would--I--I declare I don't know how to thank you.”

The lady looked at him a moment before replying. Then she began to
laugh, a jolly laugh that was pleasant to hear.

“Don't try, please,” she said chokingly. “It wasn't anything. Oh, mercy
me! I'm all out of breath. You see, I had been warned about that cow
when I started to walk this afternoon. So when I saw her chasing your
poor little girl here I knew right away what was the matter. It must
have been foolish enough to look at. I'm used to dogs and cats, but I
haven't had many pet cows. I told her to 'go home' and to 'scat' and
all sorts of things. Wonder I didn't tell her to lie down! And the way I
shook that ridiculous book at her was--”

She laughed again and the captain and Bos'n joined in the laugh, in
spite of the fright they both had experienced.

“That book was dry enough to frighten almost anything,” continued the
lady. “It was one I took from the table before I left the place where
I'm staying, and a duller collection of sermons I never saw. Oh, dear!
. . . there! Is my hat any more respectable now?”

“Yes'm. It's about on an even keel, I should say. But I must tell you,
ma'am, you done simply great and--”

“Seems to me the people who own that cow must be a poor set to let her
make such a nuisance of herself. Did your daughter run away from you?”

“Well, you see, ma'am, she ain't really my daughter. Bos'n here--that's
my nickname for her, ma'am--she and I was out walkin'. I set down in the
pines and I guess I must have dozed off. Anyhow, when I woke up she was
gone, and the first thing I knew of this scrape was hearin' her hail.”

The little woman's manner changed. Her gray eyes flashed indignantly.

“You dozed off?” she repeated. “With a little girl in your charge, and
in the very next lot to that cow? Didn't you know the creature chased
women and girls?”

“Why, yes; I'd heard of it, but--”

“It wasn't Uncle Cyrus's fault,” put in Bos'n eagerly. “It was mine. I
went away by myself.”

Beyond shifting her gaze to the child the lady paid no attention to this
remark.

“What do you think her mother 'll say when she sees that dress?” she
asked.

It was Emily's best gown, the finest of the new “rig out” prepared by
Miss Taylor. The girl and Captain Cy gazed ruefully at the rents and
pitch stains made by the vines and pine trees.

“Well, you see,” replied the abashed captain, “the fact is, she ain't
got any mother.”

“Oh! I beg your pardon. And hers, too, poor dear. Well, if I were you I
shouldn't go to sleep next time I took her walking. Good afternoon.”

She turned and calmly walked down the path. At the bend she spoke again.

“I should be gentle with her, if I were you,” she said. “Her nerves are
pretty well upset. Besides, if you'll excuse my saying so, I don't think
she is the one that needs scolding.”

They thought she had gone, but she turned once more to add a final
suggestion.

“I think that dress could be fixed,” she said, “if you took it to some
one who knew about such things.”

She disappeared amidst the graveyard shrubbery. Captain Cy and Bos'n
slowly followed her. From the pasture the red and white cow sent after
them a broken-spirited “Moo!”

Bos'n was highly indignant. During the homeward walk she sputtered like
a damp firecracker.

“The idea of her talking so to you, Uncle Cyrus!” she exclaimed. “It
wasn't your fault at all.”

The captain smiled one-sidedly.

“I don't know about that, shipmate,” he said. “I wouldn't wonder if she
was more than half right. But say! she was all business and no frills,
wasn't she! Ha, ha! How she did spunk up to that heifer! Who in the
dickens do you cal'late she is?”



CHAPTER VIII

THE “COW LADY”


That question was answered the very next day. Bos'n, carefully dressed
by Georgianna under the captain's supervision, and weighted down with
advice and counsel from the latter, started for the schoolhouse at a
quarter to nine. Only a sense of shame kept Captain Cy from walking
to school with her. He spent a miserable forenoon. They were quite the
longest three hours in his varied experience. The house was dreadfully
lonely. He wandered from kitchen to sitting room, worried Georgianna,
woke up the cat, and made a complete nuisance of himself. Twelve o'clock
found him leaning over the gate and looking eagerly in the direction of
the schoolhouse.

Bos'n ran all the way home. She was in a high state of excitement.

“What do you think, Uncle Cyrus?” she cried. “What DO you think? I've
found out who the cow lady is!”

“The cow lady? Oh, yes, yes! Have you? Who is she?”

“She's teacher, that's who she is!”

The captain was astonished.

“No!” he exclaimed. “Phoebe Dawes? You don't say so! Well, well!”

“Yes, sir. When I went into school and found her sitting there I was
so surprised I didn't know what to do. She knew me, too, and said good
morning, and was I all right again and was my dress really as bad as it
looked to be? I told her that Georgianna thought she could fix it, and
if she couldn't, her sister could. She said that was nice, and then
'twas time for school to begin.”

“Did she say anything about me?” inquired Captain Cy when they were
seated at the dinner table.

“Oh, yes! I forgot. She must have found out who you are, 'cause she said
she was surprised that a man who had made his money out of hides should
have been so careless about the creatures that wore 'em.”

“Humph! How'd she get along with the young ones in school?”

It appeared that she had gotten along very well with them. Some of the
bigger boys in the back seats, cherishing pleasant memories of the “fun”
 they had under Miss Seabury's easy-going rule, attempted to repeat their
performances of the previous term. But the very first “spitball” which
spattered upon the blackboard proved a disastrous missile for its
thrower.

“She made him clean the board,” proclaimed Bos'n, big-eyed and
awestruck, “and then he had to stand in the corner. He was Bennie
Edwards, and he's most thirteen. Miss Seabury, they said, couldn't do
anything with him, but teacher said 'Go,' as quiet as could be and just
looked at him, and he went. And he's most as tall as she is. He did look
so silly!”

The Edwards youth was not the only one who was made to “look silly”
 by little Miss Dawes during the first days of her stay in Bayport. She
dealt with the unruly members of her classes as bravely as she had
faced the Cahoon cow, and the results were just as satisfactory. She
was strict, but she was impartial, and Alicia Atkins found, to her great
surprise, that the daughter of a congressman was expected to study as
faithfully and behave herself as well as freckled-faced Noah Hamlin,
whose father peddled fish and whose everyday costume was a checkered
“jumper” and patched overalls.

The school committee, that is, the majority of it, was delighted with
the new teacher. Lemuel Myrick boasted loudly of his good judgment
in voting for her. But Tad Simpson and Darius Ellis and others of the
Atkins following still scoffed and hinted at trouble in the future.

“A new broom sweeps fine,” quoted Mr. Simpson. “She's doin' all
right now, maybe. Anyway, the young ones are behavin' themselves, but
disCIPline ain't the whole thing. Heman told me that the teacher he
wanted could talk French language and play music and all kinds
of accomplishments. Phoebe--not findin' any fault with her, you
understand--don't know no more about music than a hen; my wife says she
don't even sing in church loud enough for anybody to hear her. And as
for French! why everybody knows she uses the commonest sort of United
States, just as easy to understand as what I'm sayin' now.”

Miss Dawes boarded at the perfect boarding house. There opinion was
divided concerning her. Bailey and Mr. Tidditt liked her, but the
feminine boarders were not so favorably impressed.

“I think she's altogether too pert about what don't concern her,”
 commented Angeline Phinney. “Sarah Emma Simpson dropped in t'other
day to dinner, and we church folks got to talkin' about the minister's
preachin' such 'advanced' sermons. And Sarah Emma told how she'd heard
he said he'd known some real moral Universalists in his time, or some
such unreligious foolishness. And I said I wondered he didn't get a new
tail coat; the one he preached in Sundays was old as the hills and so
outgrown it wouldn't scurcely button acrost him. 'A man bein' paid
nine hundred a year,' I says, 'ought to dress decent, anyhow.' And that
Phoebe Dawes speaks up, without bein' asked, and says for her part she'd
ruther hear a broad man in a narrer coat than t'other way about. 'Twas a
regular slap in the face for me, and Sarah Emma and I ain't got over it
yet.”

Captain Cy heard the gossip concerning the new teacher and it rather
pleased him. She appeared to be independent, and he liked independence.
He met her once or twice on the street, but she merely bowed and passed
on. Once he tried to thank her again for her part in the cow episode,
but she would not listen to him.

Bos'n was making good progress with her studies. She was naturally a
bright child--not the marvel the captain and the “Board of Strategy”
 considered her, but quick to learn. She was not a saint, however, and
occasionally misbehaved in school and was punished for it. One afternoon
she did not return at her usual hour. Captain Cy was waiting at the gate
when Asaph Tidditt happened along. Bailey, too, was with him.

“Waitin' for Bos'n, was you?” asked the town clerk. “Well, you'll have
to wait quite a spell, I cal'late. She's been kept after school.”

“Yes; and she's got to write fifty lines of copy,” added Bailey.

Captain Cy was highly indignant.

“Get out!” he cried. “She ain't neither.”

“Yes, she has, too. One of the Salters young ones told me. I knew you'd
be mad, though I s'pose folks that didn't know her's well's we do would
say she's no different from other children.”

This was close to heresy, according to the captain's opinion.

“She ain't!” he cried. “I'd like to know why not! If she ain't twice as
smart as the run of young ones 'round here then--Humph! And she's
kept after school! Well, now; I won't have it! There's enough time for
studyin' without wearin' out her brains after hours. Oh, I guess you're
mistaken.”

“No, we ain't. I tell you, Whit, if I was you I'd make a fuss about
this. She's a smart child, Bos'n is; I never see a smarter. And she
ain't any too strong.”

“That's so, she ain't.” The idea that Emily's health was “delicate” had
become a fixed fact in the minds of the captain and the “Board.” It made
a good excuse for the systematic process of “spoiling” the girl, which
the indulgent three were doing their best to carry on.

“I wouldn't let her be kept, Cy,” urged Bailey. “Why don't you go right
off and see Phoebe and settle this thing? You've got a right to talk to
her. She wouldn't be teacher if it wasn't for you.”

Asaph added his arguments to those of Mr. Bangs. Captain Cy, carried
away by his firm belief that Bos'n was a paragon of all that was
brilliant and good, finally yielded.

“All right!” he exclaimed. “Come on! That poor little thing shan't be
put upon by nobody.”

The trio marched majestically down the hill. As they neared the
schoolhouse Bailey's courage began to fail. Miss Dawes was a boarder
at his house, and he feared consequences should Keturah learn of his
interference.

“I--I guess you don't need me,” he stammered. “The three of us 'll scare
that teacher woman most to death. And she's so little and meek, you
know. If I should lose my temper and rare up I might say somethin' that
would hurt her feelin's. I'll set on the fence and wait for you and Ase,
Whit.”

Mr. Tidditt's scornful comments concerning “white feathers” and
“backsliders” had no effect. Mr. Bangs perched himself on the fence.

“Give it to her, fellers!” he called after them.

“Talk Dutch to her! Let her know that there's one child she can't
abuse.”

At the foot of the steps Asaph paused.

“Say, Cy,” he whispered, “don't you think I better not go in? It ain't
really my business, you know, and--and--Well, I'm on the s'lectmen and
she might be frightened if she see me pouncin' down on her. 'Tain't as
if I was just a common man. I'll go and set along of Bailey and you go
in and talk quiet to her. She'd feel so sort of ashamed if there was
anyone else to hear the rakin' over--hey?”

“Now, see here, Ase,” expostulated the captain, “I don't like to do this
all by myself! Besides, 'twas you chaps put me up to it. You ain't goin'
to pull out of the race and leave me to go over the course alone, are
you? Come on! what are, you afraid of?”

His companion hotly denied that he was “afraid” of anything. He had
all sorts of arguments to back his decision. At last Captain Cy lost
patience.

“Well, BE a skulk, if you want to!” he declared. “I've set out to see
this thing through, and I'm goin' to do it. Only,” he muttered, as he
entered the downstairs vestibule, “I wish I didn't feel quite so much as
if I was stealin' hens' eggs.”

Miss Dawes herself opened the door in response to his knock.

“Oh, it's you, Cap'n Whittaker,” she said. “Come in, please.”

Captain Cy entered the schoolroom. It was empty, save for the teacher
and himself and one little girl, who, seated at a desk, was writing
busily. She looked up and blushed a vivid red. The little girl was
Bos'n.

“Sit down, Cap'n,” said Miss Phoebe, indicating the visitor's chair.
“What was it you wanted to see me about?”

The captain accepted the invitation to be seated, but he did not
immediately reply to Miss Dawes's question. He dropped his hat on the
floor, crossed his legs, uncrossed them, and then observed that it was
pretty summery weather for so late in the fall. The teacher admitted the
truth of his assertion and waited for him to continue.

“I--I s'pose school's pretty full, now that cranb'ryin' 's over,” said
Captain Cy.

“Yes, pretty full.”

“Gettin' along first rate with the scholars, I hear.”

“Yes.”

This was a most unpromising beginning, really no beginning at all. The
captain cleared his throat, set his teeth, and, without looking at his
companion, dove headlong into the business which had brought him there.

“Miss Dawes,” he said, “I--I s'pose you know that Bos'n--I mean Emily
there--is livin' at my house and that I'm taking care of her for--for
the present.”

The lady smiled.

“Yes,” she said. “I gathered as much from what you said when we first
met.”

She herself had said one or two things on that occasion. Captain Cy
remembered them distinctly.

“Yes, yes,” he said hastily. “Well, my doin's that time wasn't exactly
the best sample of the care, I will say. Wan't even a fair sample,
maybe. I try to do my best with the child, long as she stays with me,
and--er--and--er--I'm pretty particular about her health.”

“I'm glad to hear it.”

“Yes. Now, Miss Phoebe, I appreciate what you did for Bos'n and me that
Sunday, and I'm thankful for it. I've tried to thank--”

“I know. Please don't say any more about it. I imagine there is
something else you want to say, isn't there?”

“Why, yes, there is. I--I heard that Emmie had been kept after school. I
didn't believe it, of course, but I thought I'd run up and see what--”

He hesitated. The teacher finished the sentence for him.

“To see if it was true?” she said. “It is. I told her to stay and write
fifty lines.”

“You did? Well, now that's what I wanted to speak to you about. Course
I ain't interferin' in your affairs, you know, but I just wanted to
explain about Bos'n--Emmie, I mean. She ain't a common child; she's got
too much head for the rest of her. If you'd lived with her same as I
have you'd appreciate it. Her health's delicate.”

“Is it? She seems strong enough to me. I haven't noticed any symptoms.”

“Course not, else you wouldn't have kept her in. But _I_ know, and I
think it's my duty to tell you. Never mind if she can't do quite so
much writin'. I'd rather she wouldn't; she might bust a blood vessel
or somethin'. Such things HAVE happened, to extry smart young ones. You
just let her trot along home with me now and--”

“Cap'n Whittaker,” Miss Dawes had risen to her feet with a determined
expression on her face.

“Yes, ma'am,” said the captain, rising also.

“Cap'n Whittaker,” repeated the teacher, “I'm very glad that you called.
I've been rather expecting you might, because of certain things I have
heard.”

“You heard? What was it you heard--if you don't mind my askin'?”

“No, I don't, because I think we must have an understanding about Emily.
I have heard that you allow her to do as she pleases at home; in other
words, that you are spoiling her, and--”

“SPOILIN' her! _I_ spoilin' her? Who told you such an unlikely yarn as
that? I ain't the kind to spoil anybody. Why, I'm so strict that I'm
ashamed of myself sometimes.”

He honestly believed he was. Miss Phoebe calmly continued.

“Of course, what you do at home is none of my business. I shouldn't
mention it anyhow, if you hadn't called, because I pay very little
attention to town talk, having lived in this county all my life and
knowing what gossip amounts to. I like Emily; she's a pretty good little
girl and well behaved, as children go. But this you must understand. She
can't be spoiled here. She whispered this afternoon, twice. She has been
warned often, and knows the rule. I kept her after school because she
broke that rule, and if she breaks it again, she will be punished again.
I kept the Edwards boy two hours yesterday and--”

“Edwards boy! Do you mean to compare that--that young rip of a Ben
Edwards with a girl like Bos'n? I never heard--”

“I'm not comparing anybody. I'm trying to be fair to every scholar in
this room. And, so long as Emily behaves herself, she shall be
treated accordingly. When she doesn't, she shall be punished. You must
understand that.”

“But Ben Edwards! Why, he's a wooden-head, same as his dad was a fore
him! And Emmie's the smartest scholar in this town.”

“Oh, no, she isn't! She's a good scholar, but there are others just as
good and even quicker to learn.”

This was piling one insult upon another. Other children as brilliant as
Bos'n! Captain Cy was bursting with righteous indignation.

“Well!” he exclaimed. “Well! for a teacher that we've called to--”

“And that's another thing,” broke in Miss Dawes quickly. “I've been told
that you, Cap'n Whittaker, are the one directly responsible for my
being chosen for this place. I don't say that you are presuming on that,
but--”

“I ain't! I never thought of such a thing!”

“But if you are you mustn't, that's all. I didn't ask for the position
and, now that I've got it, I shall try to fill it without regard to one
person more than another. Emily stays here until her lines are written.
I don't think we need to say any more. Good day.”

She opened the door. Captain Cy picked up his hat, swallowed hard, and
stepped across the threshold. Then Miss Phoebe added one more remark.

“Cap'n,” she said, “when you were in command of a ship did you allow
outsiders to tell you how to treat the sailors?”

The captain opened his mouth to reply. He wanted to reply very much, but
somehow he couldn't find a satisfying answer to that question.

“Ma'am,” he said, “all I can say is that if you'd been in South America,
same as I have, and seen the way them half-breed young ones act,
you'd--”

The teacher smiled, in spite of an apparent effort not to.

“Perhaps so,” she said, “but this is Massachusetts. And--well, Emily
isn't a half-breed.”

Captain Cy strode through the vestibule. Just before the door closed
behind him he heard a stifled sob from poor Bos'n.

The Board of Strategy was waiting at the end of the yard. Its members
were filled with curiosity.

“Did you give it to her good?” demanded Asaph. “Did you let her
understand we wouldn't put up with such cruelizin'?”

“Where's Bos'n?” asked Mr. Bangs.

Their friend's answers were brief and tantalizingly incomplete. He
walked homeward at a gait which caused plump little Bailey to puff
in his efforts to keep up, and he would say almost nothing about the
interview in the schoolroom.

“Well,” said Mr. Tidditt, when they reached the Whittaker gate, “I guess
she knows her place now; hey, Cy? I cal'late she'll be careful who she
keeps after school from now on.”

“Didn't use no profane language, did you, Cy?” asked Bailey. “I hope
not, 'cause she might have you took up just out of spite. Did she ask
your pardon for her actions?”

“No!” roared the captain savagely. Then, banging the gate behind him, he
strode up the yard and into the house.

Bos'n came home a half hour later. Captain Cy was alone in the sitting
room, seated in his favorite rocker and moodily staring at nothing in
particular. The girl gazed at him for a moment and then climbed into his
lap.

“I wrote my fifty lines, Uncle Cyrus,” she said. “Teacher said I'd done
them very nicely, too.”

The captain grunted.

“Uncle Cy,” whispered Bos'n, putting her arms around his neck, “I'm
awful sorry I was so bad.”

“Bad? Who--you? You couldn't be bad if you wanted to. Don't talk that
way or I'll say somethin' I hadn't ought to.”

“Yes, I could be bad, too. I was bad. I whispered.”

“Whispered! What of it? That ain't nothin'. When I was a young one in
school I used to whis-- . . . Hum! Well, anyhow, don't you think any
more about it. 'Tain't worth while.”

They rocked quietly for a time. Then Bos'n said:

“Uncle Cyrus, don't you like teacher?”

“Hey? LIKE her? Well, if that ain't a question? Yes, I like her about as
well as Lonesome likes Eben Salter's dog.”

“I'm sorry. I like her ever so much.”

“You DO? Go 'long! After the way she treated you, poor little thing!”

“She didn't treat me any worse than she does the other girls and boys
when they're naughty. And I did know the rule about whispering.”

“Well, that's different. Comparin' you with that Bennie Edwards--the
idea! And then makin' you cry!”

“She didn't make me cry.”

“Did, too. I heard you.”

The child looked up at him and then hid her face in his waistcoat.

“I wasn't crying about her,” she whispered. “It was you.”

“ME!” The captain gasped. “Good land!” he muttered. “It's just as I
expected. She's studied too hard and it's touchin' her brain.”

“No, sir, it isn't. It isn't truly. I did cry about you because I didn't
like to hear you talk so. And I was so sorry to have you come there.”

“You WAS!”

“Yes, sir. Other children's folks don't come when they're bad. And I
kept feeling so sort of ashamed of you.”

“Ashamed of ME?”

Bos'n nodded vigorously.

“Yes, sir. Everything teacher said sounded so right, and what you said
didn't. And I like to have you always right.”

“Do, hey? Hum!” Captain Cy didn't speak again for some few minutes, but
he held the little girl very tight in his arms. At length he drew a long
breath.

“By the big dipper, Bos'n!” he exclaimed. “You're a wonder, you are.
I wouldn't be surprised if you grew up to be a mind reader, like that
feller in the show we went to at the townhall a spell ago. To tell you
the honest Lord's truth, I've been ashamed of myself ever since I come
out of that schoolhouse door. When that teacher woman sprung that on me
about my fo'mast hands aboard ship I was set back about forty fathom. I
never wanted to answer anybody so bad in MY life, and I couldn't 'cause
there wasn't anything to say. I cal'late I've made a fool of myself.”

Bos'n nodded again.

“We won't do so any more, will we?” she said.

“You bet we won't! _I_ won't, anyhow. You haven't done anything.”

“And you'll like teacher?”

The captain stamped his foot.

“No, SIR!” he declared. “She may be all right in her way--I s'pose she
is; but it's too Massachusettsy a way for me. No, sir! I don't like her
and I WON'T like her. No, sir-ee, never! She--she ain't my kind of a
woman,” he added stubbornly. “That's what's the matter! She ain't my
kind of a woman.”



CHAPTER IX

POLITICS AND BIRTHDAYS


“Town meeting” was called for the twenty-first of November.

With the summer boarders gone, the cranberry picking finished, state
election over, school begun and under way, and real winter not yet upon
us, Bayport, in the late fall, distinctly needs something to enliven
it. The Shakespeare Reading Society and the sewing circle continue, of
course, to interest the “women folks,” there is the usual every evening
gathering at Simmons's, and the young people are looking forward to the
“Grand Ball” on Thanksgiving eve. But for the men, on week days,
there is little to do except to “putter” about the house, banking
its foundations with dry seaweed as a precaution against searching
no'theasters, whitewashing the barns and outbuildings, or fixing things
in the vegetable cellar where the sticks of smoked herring hang in rows
above the barrels of cabbages, potatoes, and turnips. The fish weirs,
most of them, are taken up, lest the ice, which will be driven into the
bay later on, tear the nets to pieces. Even the hens grow lazy and
lay less frequently. Therefore, away back in the “airly days,” some
far-sighted board of selectmen arranged that “town meeting” should be
held during this lackadaisical season. A town meeting--and particularly
a Bayport town meeting, where everything from personal affairs to
religion is likely to be discussed--can stir up excitement when nothing
else can.

This year there were several questions to be talked over and settled at
town meeting. Two selectmen, whose terms expired, were candidates for
re-election. Lem Myrick had resigned from the school committee, not
waiting until spring, as he had announced that he should do. Then
there was the usual sentiment in favor of better roads and the usual
opposition to it. Also there was the ever-present hope of the government
appropriation for harbor improvement.

Mr. Tidditt was one of the selectmen whose terms expired. In his dual
capacity as selectman and town clerk Asaph felt himself to be a very
important personage. To elect some one else in his place would be, he
was certain, a calamity which would stagger the township. Therefore
he was a busy man and made many calls upon his fellow citizens, not to
influence their votes--he was careful to explain that--but just, as
he said, “to see how they was gettin' along,” and because he
“thought consider'ble of 'em” and “took a real personal interest, you
understand,” in their affairs.

To Captain Cy he came, naturally, for encouragement and help, being--as
was his habit at such times--in a state of gloom and hopeless despair.

“No use, Whit,” he groaned. “'Tain't no use at all. I'm licked. I'm
gettin' old and they don't want me no more. I guess I'd better get right
up afore the votin' begins and tell 'em my health ain't strong enough to
be town clerk no longer. It's better to do that than to be licked. Don't
you think so?”

“Sure thing!” replied his friend, with sarcasm. “If I was you I'd be
toted in on a bed so they can see you're all ready for the funeral.
Might have the doctor walkin' ahead, wipin' his eyes, and the joyful
undertaker trottin' along astern. What's the particular disease that's
got you by the collar just now--facial paralysis?”

“No. What made you think of that?”

“Oh, nothin'! Only I heard you stopped in at ten houses up to the west
end of the town yesterday, and talked three quarters of an hour steady
at everyone. That would fit me for the scrap heap inside of a week,
and you've been goin' it ever since September nearly. What does ail
you--anything?”

“Why, no; nothin' special that way. Only there don't seem to be any
enthusiasm for me, somehow. I just hint at my bein' a candidate and
folks say, 'Yes, indeed. Looks like rain, don't it?' and that's about
all.”

“Well, that hadn't ought to surprise you. If anybody came to me and
says, 'The sun's goin' to rise to-morrer mornin',' I shouldn't dance
on my hat and crow hallelujahs. Enthusiasm! Why, Ase, you've been a
candidate every two years since Noah got the ark off the ways, or along
there. And there ain't been any opposition to you yet, except that time
when Uncle 'Bial Stickney woke up in the wrong place and hollered 'No,'
out of principle, thinkin' he was to home with his wife. If I was you
I'd go and take a nap. You'll read the minutes at selectmen's meetings
for another fifty year, more or less; take my word for it. As for the
school committee, that's different. I ain't made up my mind about that.”

There had been much discussion concerning the school committee. Who
should be chosen to replace Mr. Myrick on the board was the gravest
question to come before the meeting. Many names had been proposed at
Simmons's and elsewhere, but some of those named had refused to run, and
others had not, after further consideration, seemed the proper persons
for the office. In the absence of Mr. Atkins, Tad Simpson was our leader
in the political arena. But Tad so far had been mute.

“Wait a while,” he said. “There's some weeks afore town meetin' day.
This is a serious business. We can't have no more--I mean no unsuitable
man to fill such an important place as that. The welfare of our
posterity,” he added, and we all recognized the quotation, “depends upon
the choice that's to be made.”

A choice was made, however, on the very next day but one after this
declaration. A candidate announced himself. Asaph and Bailey hurried
to the Cy Whittaker place with the news. Captain Cy was in the woodshed
building a doll house for Bos'n. “Just for my own amusement,” he hastily
explained. “Somethin' for her to take along when she goes out West to
Betsy.”

Mr. Tidditt was all smiles.

“What do you think, Cy?” he cried. “The new school committee man's as
good as elected. 'Lonzo Snow's goin' to take it.”

The captain laid down his plane.

“'Lonzo Snow!” he repeated. “You don't say! Humph! Well, well!”

“Yes, sir!” exclaimed Bailey. “He's come forward and says it's his duty
to do so. He--”

“Humph! His duty, hey? I wonder who pointed it out to him?”

“Well, I don't know. But even Tad Simpson's glad; he says that he knows
Heman will be pleased with THAT kind of a candidate and so he won't have
to do any more huntin'. He thinks 'Lonzo's comin' out by himself this
way is a kind of special Providence.”

“Yes, yes! I shouldn't wonder. Did you ever notice how dead sure Tad and
his kind are that Providence is workin' with 'em? Seems to me 'twould
be more satisfactory if we could get a sight of the other partner's
signature to the deed.”

Showing first 200,000 characters. Full text: gutenberg.org/ebooks/3281