Part 22

No one but a fisherman, born and bred to the world-old cruelty of the sea, could have coaxed his boat once more near the disabled one, fighting inch by inch nearer to the reef, the roar of its waters beating in his ears and the driven spray striking against his face like flying needles. Only a fisherman, fighting desperately for the life of another, would have dared swing his boat in until for one ghastly moment it stood poised on the crest of a giant wave, directly above the one which wallowed helplessly in the trough beneath. It slipped, clung to the wall of water for the eternity of a second, then plunged, barely missing the other. In the moment he shot past, Pettishall flung the rope outward. As it was caught and made fast he saw the girl’s white face and knew who it was he had come out to rescue.

Blinding torrents of rain had begun to fall, drawing a swirling white curtain across the water. Presently the rain would cease and the sea grow calm, but there could be still no question of rounding the Head. He would have to take Emily ashore with him instead of bringing her home.

Towing the crippled boat as far back of him as the length of his painter permitted, Pettishall at last gained shelter. After making his own boat fast to its mooring he drew in the other.

Emily looked up and made a brave attempt to smile. Glancing sharply at her blue lips and haggard face, the boy swept her into his arms and put her down in the dory.

“Hev ye ashore in a minute.” Swiftly he moored the second boat and then dropped into the dory with her. When they reached the dock he asked anxiously, “S’pose ye kin go up the ladder?”

“Sure I kin.” She stood up, swayed, and would have fallen had he not caught her.

“I kin walk now,” she told him when he had climbed with her to the dock, and went slowly beside him along the path to the house.

In the living room the fire still burned. Orin threw an armful of wood on it.

“Set up here close an’ git yerself good an’ warm,” he said. “Maw left a dress here the day she come over ter clean fer me. I’ll fetch it fer ye.”

When he returned a second time, after leaving oilskins and seaboots in the kitchen, Emily looked up and smiled.

“I’m a’ right now,” she told him. “I wuz jes’--jes’ kinder upset.”

“Yes,” he returned grimly, “sh’dn’t wonder ef ye wuz. What wuz ye doin’ out in ’at boa-at? Ye might ’a’ been--ef I hedn’t happened ter see ye--” The words stuck in his throat.

“I’d ’a’ been drownded,” she said soberly, “ef ye hedn’t come out. I’d ’a’ struck the ledge in no time. I wuz comin’ here,” she explained simply. “I hed ter see ye.”

“Comin’ ter see me?” he echoed incredulously. “Comin’ here?”

She nodded. “I hed somethin’ ter tell ye--somethin’ ’at made me want ter git here fast ez ever I c’d. Set down here by me. I kin tell it plainer ef ye do.” She nestled her cold fingers in his.

“It’s what Grammy Tagel tol’ me,” she began, “’bout this house an’ the grave out yan an’ how they happened ter be. She wuz only a young ’un when it happened, but she says ’at she minds the awful storm an’ hearin’ folks tell ’bout how Captain Beath’s vessel wuz wrecked on Ol’ Man Ledge an’ nobody saved, only jes’ him. Seven men in the crew an’ only him saved, an’ he wouldn’t ’a’ been ef it hedn’t been fer one uv the men. Him an’ Captain Beath hed gone ter school tergether an’ they’d allus been friends, Grammy says.

“They wuz hangin’ onto the dory, jes’ the two uv ’em. The vessel was bustin’ up an’ they wa’n’t no trace uv the other men. Twict Captain Beath wuz washed off, but the other feller got him both times an’ fetched him up. The las’ time he says, ‘Ye got ter hang onto the plug-strap. It’s yer turn,’ he says, but Captain Beath allus said arterwards ’at it wuzn’t his turn.

“Grammy says ’at when the captain come ter hisself he wuz layin’ on the beach here. The storm wuz over an’ the sea wuz all shinin’ an’ blue. He got up onto his feet an’ called fer his friend an’ then went ’round lookin’ fer him, but they wa’n’t nobody else thar--only the shinin’ water an’ the white beach an’ the tide comin’ in. They never found no sign uv the other feller, never--”

“The other feller,” Orin asked in a hushed voice, “who wuz he?”

“Arter a while the captain built him a house here, so’s he c’d allus see the place whar him an’ his friend wuz tergether fer the las’ time. Grammy says ’at when folks made him see ’at his friend hadn’t been saved it wuz then he put up the gravestun--kinder so’s they c’d be tergether like they’d allus been. He uster tend it an’ put flowers on it an’ got inter the habit uv settin’ out thar an’ talkin’.

“They wa’n’t never nothin’ in the grave, nothin’! Grammy says ’at’s the way things often is--’at folks makes trouble an’ sorrer fer tharselves an’ fer others over things ’at wa’n’t never thar in the fust place--like--like I done--” The words were lost in a passion of tears.

The boy swept her into his arms, murmuring broken words: “It’s a’ right! They wa’n’t never nothin’ wrong, Em’ly. It’s a’right!”

Emily stood up at length, wiping the tears from her eyes. “Look,” she said, “the storm’s breakin’.”

The rain, which had been pattering steadily on the old roof, had ceased. A broad band of sunlight streamed through the western window, flooding across the quiet old room like a benediction.

“Come on,” the girl said in a low voice, “it’ll be a good time arter the rain ter pull weeds. We got ter git all the weeds ’way f’om ’round the grave. I’m glad they’s lots uv lilies still so’s I kin trim it up nice. Arter a while they’ll be bayberry an’ maple leaves fer me ter put on it--an’ in winter they’ll be pine.”

FOOTNOTES:

[15] Copyright, 1925, by The Pictorial Review Company. Copyright, 1926, by May Stanley.

SIX DOLLARS[16]

By WILBUR DANIEL STEELE

(From _The Pictorial Review_)

When Tansy Snow was a young man of eighteen or nineteen he went one night to the Stone Fold. The Stone Fold is an islet lying about two miles to the southeast of us. There is a house on it built of stones, and a sheep-shelter, and toward the southern end three thorn trees.

Tansy took his father’s skiff and steered straight through the shoals that lie that way, guided by the lamp in the garret of the house. Donna, who had been in town with her father two days before, told him she would put it there when the old man was asleep and the dogs shut up.

Donna Salisbury wasn’t pretty. And she would have been better for a mother’s care; better to look at. As you’d expect, living with only a shepherd father, her clothes were heavy, stout things, fitted mostly by guess, and none too clean, and her hair was thick and untended, and the color of her father’s sheep. But she was strong, stronger than a boy, and if her face had a dull look, there was something behind the dullness that would make a fellow stop to look again, especially when stars were bright enough to cast shadows among the rocks and the gray grass.

Tansy couldn’t understand why he should want to have anything to do with her. He’d been to the Academy and now he had a position in the new bank; he had to wear decent clothes every day, clean collars, and polished boots; it went deeper than that: he had every day to be a decent _man_ and wear a clean conscience; otherwise the pointing finger of the banking business would find him out--bound to--in the long run of a man’s life.

He had been to the Stone Fold three times, steering by the light. This time he was coming simply to say he wasn’t coming. It would be awkward telling the girl. For a day and a night he had been busy trying to think up something humane, but at the same time final. Finished. Chopped off.

He hadn’t guessed how awkward it would be, after all. They couldn’t talk there on the beach on account of the dogs; they had to go along a way. Occasional clouds, great fluffs of things, sailed over the sky, and in the dark when they covered the stars Donna led him, taking his fingers in her strong, dull, warm, eager hand.

He would have said it at the first turn of the shore, but the surf on the bar there was too loud; he didn’t want to shout. He would have said it when they started inland toward the thorn-trees, but now they had got into the wind, the full weight of the wind that came in from the open sea and bore the great clouds among the stars and made a living sound among the grasses. He would have said it under the thorn tree, but under the thorn tree was Donna.

It was half-past two when he left the island, and he hadn’t said it yet. What he _had_ said he could hardly remember. Sometimes words, fragments of sentences, promises, will come from a man’s mouth as if it were some one else speaking: things he doesn’t mean at all.

He pushed the skiff off the sand, holding it by the painter.

“When’ll you be again?” she whispered.

Now was the time to tell her. She might have seen how pale he was; might have helped him by saying something. But she was a dumb young thing and she hadn’t a word. Of a sudden he reached into his pocket and pulled out the money he had there and thrust it into her hands.

She was a dumb one, and she couldn’t make it out.

“What’s this?”

“I want you should buy yourself some present or other.”

“Huh?”

The dogs in the sheepfold began to bark. Tansy jumped into the skiff and pushed off, leaving Donna to stand there, dumber than ever.

He had a fair wind back and put up the sail.

It was six dollars he had given her, a lot of money, the whole of his first week’s wages. There were things he could have bought with that: a new tire for his bicycle, and a Young People’s Union pin to give Elsie Baker on her birthday. But it was all right. Better to start off clear--not a debt outstanding--no matter what the cost might be.

Even yet, though, he didn’t feel quite right. When he got home and up to his room he had three hours to sleep, but he couldn’t sleep. He was disgusted with himself. His memory reviewed the night with shame and loathing. He saw the path down which he had started, and even if he had got out of it now, it was disgusting to remember.

All next day he felt drugged and haggard. He made mistakes with figures, so that Mr. Matheson had to speak to him. But what was it? He’d paid, hadn’t he? Squared up? Given everything he had to the girl?

Yes, but how about the Lord God? Slowly, as the day went by, he saw this. You can’t pay God with money.

There was a sociable at Center Church that night. He had asked to see Elsie Baker home. He looked so ill at supper time that his mother advised him to stay in. To her surprise he acquiesced without trouble. He went upstairs. When he was half undressed for bed, however, he couldn’t do it. Getting dressed again, he stole out the back way and went and stood behind a tree near the church and watched the people going in.

The windows were bright and there were sounds of a good time, a hymn, then after a decent interval laughter and runnings about, games. Tansy walked across the street and stood at the steps.

He had given the girl everything he had. Can you give more than you have? And, anyway, any girl that would do that!

Yes, yes; but how about the Lord God?

He went around to the wagon-shed, and in the dark there he fell on his knees. “O, Heavenly Father, I’ve walked in evil; I’ve committed a grievous sin; I beg Thee to forgive me in Thy mercy. I repent. O God, I repent; I do, I do, honestly! Honestly, God, honestly----”

In the church they were singing “My Country, ’Tis of Thee.”

Tansy got up and brushed off his knees. His weariness was gone, like a heavy coat he might have taken off and left there in the shed. In its place there was a sense of security and well-being, such as comes after a bath at the end of a sweaty day. He slipped back to his room and put on his blacks, and, coming down the front way, he said he thought he would go to the sociable. There was no turning him.

Actually he didn’t go in, but waited on the steps. There was something about his feelings that would no more have mixed with the romping and the din than oil will mix with water. Yet it was marvelous just to sit apart and listen to it, especially when the organ struck into some familiar air, and all sang, soprano and alto, tenor and bass. It was marvelous to be whiter than snow, one with God, a little child.

He saw Elsie home, after all. It was only a couple of hundred yards, down the shore street and up London Lane, but he would never forget it. It was the first time he’d known that love and reverence could be one and the same thing. Earthly love and religious reverence.

Elsie was so pretty, so enchanting in ribbons and laces, so pure, as pure as a flower on which God’s sun shines and God’s rain falls unfailing, as if He were saying in the sun and rain: “Of such is the portion of them that think none but healthy thoughts and dream none but wholesome dreams; yea, even to the third and the fourth generation.”

Elsie’s great-grandfather it was who gave the land for the Atheneum. Her grandfather rescued the missionaries in Paul Straits, and founded the “Light in Darkness.” Her father and mother were in the forefront of everything for decency and right living, and they were well-to-do.

The forefathers of that girl on the Stone Fold--what could they have been? By what steps of wrong thinking, of evil impulses given way to and higher impulses denied, must that strain have come down?

But now, because something had been changed in him, Tansy could think of her with nothing but pity.

In London Lane the lights, shining up under the willows, made it seem the nave of some dim cathedral, in which a boy and a girl walked together. And then Elsie was up on her stoop and he stood at the foot of the steps.

“W-e-l-l?” she said. The light from the two long panes flanking the door fell softly on either side of her figure.

“Elsie,” he said, “excepting for my father and mother there’s nobody in the world but you amounts to _that_, with me.”

“What _are_ you saying, you silly?”

She came back down the steps to read the silly’s eyes. She was so good she didn’t guess the risk. He could have grabbed her and kissed her.

But not he; not now! He kept his hands behind him.

“Elsie, you wait and see. Some day I shall be the biggest man in this town.” It wasn’t like boasting. “For your sake,” he might have said.

He marveled as he walked homeward. On one side there were loveliness, niceness, world’s goods; on the other unloveliness, a hard living, the scorn of friends. Yet did God ask him to choose the stony way? By a miracle, no. God asked him to choose the way it would have been the part of even the worldly-wise to choose.

Marveling so, as he crossed above the White Boys’ place he spied a pin-prick of light away out beyond the Point. It was as though it rested on the low neck of sand, a fallen star.

“_Tonight?_” He felt angry. “She’s got her cheek, I must say!”

On impulse he went down to his father’s wharf, cast off the skiff’s painter, and got in. He would finish _that_ off. He would tell Donna what was what. Straight from the shoulder! Then, before he had got the oars out, he realized that it was only the devil tempting him, weaving any arguments at all, just to get him out there to the Stone Fold again.

He made the boat fast and went home. His parents were still up. He shook his father’s hand and kissed his mother on the brow. She eyed him with a knowing little smile. “Been seeing Elsie Baker home?”

Tansy stood with his jaw out.

“I’ve made a decision to-night,” he said. “Some day I shall be the biggest man in this town.”

He married Elsie Baker on the day he was made assistant cashier at the bank. Within three months he was cashier.

People trusted him. “No need to count your money when it’s Tansy passes it out of the till.” His word was as good as a bond; better, for bonds can be lost or burned or stolen.

Old man Baker bought the Dow residence in the Brick Walk, had it renovated, and gave it to the couple as a wedding-present. Nothing could have been fitter. It was the smallest of the big houses built at the height of the California days, brick for walls, slate for roofing, and a wrought-iron grill around the turf-plot. Four-square with the street, a house of strength and dignity. It was not too large, and that was fit, too. In the great-grandfather’s family there were eleven children; in the grandfather’s, fourteen; in the father’s, three. Elsie herself had none.

It was a town house, pure and simple; the Dows had always been shorefolks, lawyers and doctors and the like. From the windows of the guest-chamber upstairs, full of leafy boughs and neighboring gables, you might have been a thousand miles from the nearest salt; the sewing-room was the same, and so was the west-chamber, that had always been known as “the children’s room.” Yet it is a hard thing to find a house in Urkey without some peep of the water; even at Gramma Pilot’s, about as thoroughly shut in as any in town, you’ve but to climb to the garret to get a sight of blue under the rod of the drug-store chimney. We may wear Brockton shoes, but we’re a web-footed race for all that.

And so it was from the “used chamber” in the new Snow home.

The first time they slept there after their wedding-tour to Boston Elsie awoke in the middle of the night. For a moment she couldn’t say why. It was too queer. She didn’t stir; simply lay there trying to think what it was could be wrong. It wasn’t for instants that she recollected where she was, that she was married, that her husband was there beside her. She slid a hand over his pillow to touch his head. There was no head to touch. She was so startled she didn’t know what to do or think. She went cold. Then, of course, when she began to paw around, her hand found Tansy’s back. He was sitting up in bed; that was all.

“What _is_ the _matter_?” she demanded, she was so upset.

“Nothing. Why, nothing at all.” And he lay back on the pillow.

But by and by, when he thought her asleep, he was up again, on an elbow, looking at the window over the foot of the bed. Like burglars.

You know the feeling of that. Up went Elsie without a word, staring at that window too. And there was nothing there. Nothing but the rear corner of Center Church, one side, and the corner of the Nickerson house, the other, and their one outlook on the harbor in the slit between. By day there would have been a bit of the harbor, a segment of the Point, and out to sea. Now there was nothing but the spark of a chance light; it might have been at the masthead of some vessel at anchor; it was too low for a star.

She was provoked. “What _are_ you _gawping_ at?”

“Nothing. Why, nothing in the world. What makes you think I----”

“Is it that light?”

“Wha--what light?”

“Well, I’m all afidget now.”

He lay back and comforted her. They were young.

Next morning, at the chamber-work, Elsie made a discovery.

“You remember that light last night, Tansy?” she laughed at supper-time. “Well, ’twas nothing but old Cabe Sal’sbury’s light in his house over to the Stone Fold; you can see how it ranges in daylight. Must be some one sick.”

“Or else Cabe’s a great student,” she modified it when, at bedtime, she saw the lamp burning again in the window on the Stone Fold.

“What you say to closing those blinds?” Tansy suggested. “I vow there’s a tang in the air to-night.”

No, Elsie wouldn’t listen to that.

“The best doctors nowadays say all the air you can have in your bedroom is none too much, even in winter-time. I’d suffocate.”

It was the following day that Tansy began to seem restless. To begin with, he didn’t see where they were going to expect much company, overnight, all their friends being local people, with houses of their own. So why didn’t they shift into the front chamber, which was roomier, with two closets; and as for air, certainly there was as much air coming up the Brick Walk as there was in the church back yard.

“My _spare_ chamber?” was all Elsie could gasp.

“Or even the west chamber----”

“The _children’s_ room?”

Elsie went straight to her mother about it. Her mother smiled. Phidela Baker had been a young woman once, with a new young husband and a new house of her own. “They’re all the same; Providence made ’em so. Ever notice a dog that’s made up his mind to lie down in a certain spot? Made up or no, he’s got to wander and fidget a dozen times around it first, before he settles down. Don’t you take on.”

“But over and above everything,” was the parting advice, “don’t you start out by humoring him too much. Be cheery, but put your foot down.”

So when Elsie found Tansy at work one of those days, surreptitiously, trying to get the bureau switched for the bed, and the carpet in a tangle with it, she put her foot down. He looked foolish to be caught so. His face got redder and redder.

“Light shines in my eyes. That is--in the mornings.”

“Can you _imagine_ how this room would _look_?” She demolished him ruthlessly, but all the while with a smile.

That smile of Elsie Snow’s grew famous. No matter if this went bad and that worse, Tansy Snow’s wife always had a smile, always seemed to be saying, like her mother before her: “Don’t you take on; God will provide.”