The Cruise of the Shining Light, Norman Duncan [epub e ink reader .txt] 📗

bewildering thing to deny him. I could not make it out: but wished, in the breeze and sunlight of that day, that the wound had not been dealt. 'Twas an unkind thing in Judith, thinks I; 'twas a thing most cruel--thus to coquette with the friendship of John Cather.

"Ah, Judy," I pleaded, "leave un have his way!"

She picked at the moss.

"Will ye not, maid?"

"I'm afraid!" she whispered in my ear.

"An' you'd stop for that!" I chided, not knowing what she meant: as how should a lad?

It seemed she would.

"'Tis an unkind thing," says I, "t' treat John Cather so. He've been good," says I, "t' _you_, Judy."

"Dannie!" she wailed.

"Don't, Dannie!" Cather entreated.

"I'd have ye listen, Judy," said I, in earnest, kind reproach, "t' what John Cather says. I'd have ye heed his words. I'd have ye care for him." Being then a lad, unsophisticated in the wayward, mercilessly selfish passion of love, ignorant of the unmitigated savagery of the thing, I said more than that, in my folly. "I'd have ye love John Cather," says I, "as ye love me." 'Tis a curious thing to look back upon. That I should snarl the threads of our destinies! 'Tis an innocency hard to credit. But yet John Cather and I had no sensitive intuition to warn us. How should we--being men? 'Twas for Judith to perceive the inevitable catastrophe; 'twas for the maid, not misled by reason, schooled by feeling into the very perfection of wisdom, to control and direct the smouldering passion of John Cather and me in the way she would, according to the power God gives, in infinite understanding of the hearts of men, to a maid to wield. "I'd have ye love John Cather," says I, "as ye love me." It may be that a lad loves his friend more than any other. "I'd have ye t' know, Judy," says I, gently, "that John Cather's my friend. I'd have ye t' know--"

"Dannie," Cather interrupted, putting an affectionate hand on my shoulder, "you don't know what you're saying."

Judith turned.

"I do, John Cather," says I. "I knows full well."

Judith's eyes, grown all at once wide and grave, looked with wonder into mine. I was made uneasy--and cocked my head, in bewilderment and alarm. 'Twas a glance that searched me deep. What was this? And why the warning? There was more than warning. 'Twas pain I found in Judith's great, blue eyes. What had grieved her? 'Twas reproach, too--and a flash of doubt. I could not read the riddle of it. Indeed, my heart began to beat in sheer fright, for the reproach and doubt vanished, even as I stared, and I confronted a sparkling anger. But presently, as often happened with that maid, tears flushed her eyes, and the long-lashed lids fell, like a curtain, upon her grief: whereupon she turned away, troubled, to peer at the sea, breaking far below, and would not look at me again. We watched her, John Cather and I, for an anxious space, while she sat brooding disconsolate at the edge of the cliff, a sweep of cloudless sky beyond. The slender, sweetly childish figure--with the tawny hair, I recall, all aglow with sunlight--filled the little world of our thought and vision. There was a patch of moss and rock, the green and gray of our land--there was Judith--there was an infinitude of blue space. John Cather's glance was frankly warm; 'twas a glance proceeding from clear, brave, guileless eyes--springing from a limpid soul within. It caressed the maid, in a fashion, thinks I, most brotherly. My heart warmed to the man; and I wondered that Judith should be unkind to him who was our friend.

'Twas a mystery.

"You will not listen, Judith?" he asked. "'Tis a very pretty thing I want to say."

Judith shook her head.

A flash of amusement crossed his face. "Please do!" he coaxed.

"No!"

"I'm quite proud of it," says he, with a laugh in his fine eyes. He leaned forward a little, and made as if to touch her, but withdrew his hand. "I did not know," says he, "that I was so clever. I have it all ready. I have every word in place. I'd like to say it--for my own pleasure, if not for yours. I think it would be a pity to let the pretty words waste themselves unsaid. I--I--hope you'll listen. I--I--really hope you will. And you will not?"

"No!" she cried, sharply. "No, no!"

"Why not?"

"No!" she repeated; and she slipped her hand into mine, and hid them both snugly in the folds of her gown, where John Cather could not see. "God wouldn't like it, John Cather," says she, her little teeth all bare, her eyes aflash with indignation, her long fingers so closely entwined with mine that I wondered. "He wouldn't _'low_ it," says she, "an He knowed."

I looked at John Cather in vague alarm.


[5] This Sir Harry Airworthy, K.C.M.G., I must forthwith explain, was
that distinguished colonial statesman whose retirement to
the quiet and bizarre enjoyments of life was so sincerely
deplored at the time. His taste for the picturesque characters
of our coast was discriminating and insatiable. 'Twas no
wonder, then, that he delighted in my uncle, whose familiar
companion he was in St. John's. I never knew him, never
clapped eyes on him, that I recall; he died abroad before I
was grown presentable. 'Twas kind in him, I have always
thought, to help my uncle in his task of transforming me, for
'twas done with no personal responsibility whatsoever in the
matter, but solely of good feeling. I owed him but one
grudge, and that a short-lived one, going back to the year
when I was seven: 'twas by advice o' Sir Harry that I was made
to tub myself, every morning, in the water of the season, be
it crusted with ice or not, with my uncle listening at the
door to hear the splash and gasp.



XVII

RUM AND RUIN

In these days at Twist Tickle, his perturbation passed, my uncle was most blithe: for the _Shining Light_ was made all ready for sea, with but an anchor to slip, sails to raise, for flight from an army of St. John's constables; and we were a pleasant company, well fallen in together, in a world of fall weather. And, says he, if the conduct of a damned little Chesterfieldian young gentleman was a labor t' manage, actin' accordin' t' that there fashionable ol' lord of the realm, by advice o' Sir Harry, whatever the lad in the case, whether good or bad, why, then, a maid o' the place, ecod! was but a pastime t' rear, an' there, says he, you had it! 'Twas at night, when he was come in from the sea, and the catch was split, and we sat with him over his rum, that he beamed most widely. He would come cheerily stumping from his mean quarters above, clad in the best of his water-side slops, all ironed and brushed, his great face glossy from soap and water, his hair dripping; and he would fall into the arms of his great-chair by the fire with a genial grunt of satisfaction, turning presently to regard us, John Cather and Judy and me, with a grin so wide and sparkling and benevolently indulgent and affectionate--with an aspect so patriarchal--that our hearts would glow and our faces responsively shine.

"Up with un, Dannie!" says he.

I would lift the ailing bit of timber to the stool with gingerly caution.

"Easy, lad!" groans he. "Ouch! All ship-shape," says he. "Is you got the little brown jug o' water?"

'Twould surely be there.

"Green pastures!" says he, so radiantly red, from his bristling gray stubble of hair to the folds of his chin, that I was reminded of a glowing coal. "There you haves it, Dannie!" cries he. "I knowed they was some truth in that there psa'm. Green pastures! '_He maketh me t' lie down in green pastures._' Them ol' bullies was wise as owls.... Pass the bottle, Judy. Thank 'e, maid. Ye're a wonderful maid t' blush, thank God! for they's nothin' so pretty as that. I'm a old, old man, Judy; but t' this day, maid, 'tis fair painful t' keep from kissin' red cheeks, whenever I sees un. Judy," says he, with a wag, his hand on the bottle, "I'd rather be tempted by mermaids or angels--I cares not which--than by a mortal maid's red cheeks! 'Twould be wonderful easy," says he, "t' resist a angel.... Green pastures! Eh, Dannie, b'y? Times is changed, isn't they? Not like it used t' be, when you an' me sot here alone t' drink, an' you was on'y a wee little lad. I wisht ye was a wee little lad again, Dannie; but Lord love us!" cries he, indignant with the paradox, "when ye _was_ a wee little lad I wisht ye was growed. An' there you haves it!" says he, dolefully. "There you haves it!... I 'low, Dannie," says he, anxiously, his bottle halted in mid-air, "that _you'd_ best pour it out. I'm a sight too happy, the night," says he, "t' be trusted with a bottle."

'Tis like he would have gone sober to bed had I not been there to measure his allowance.

"Ye're not so wonderful free with the liquor," he pouted, "as ye used t' be."

'Twas Judy who had put me up to it.

"Ye might be a _drop_ more free!" my uncle accused.

'Twas reproachful--and hurt me sore. That I should deny my uncle who had never denied me! I blamed the woman. 'Tis marvellous how this frailty persists. That Judith, Twist Tickle born, should deliberately introduce the antagonism--should cause my uncle to suffer, me to regret! 'Twas hard to forgive the maid her indiscretion. I was hurt: for, being a lad, not a maid of subtle perceptions, I would not have my uncle go lacking that which comforted his distress and melancholy. Faith! but I had myself been looking forward with a thirsty gullet to the day--drawn near, as I thought--when I should like a man drink hard liquor with him in the glow of our fire: as, indeed, had he, by frank confession, indiscreetly made when he was grown horrified or wroth with my intemperance with ginger-ale.

"God save ye, Dannie!" he would expostulate, most heartily, most piously; "but I _wisht_ ye'd overcome the bilge-water habit."

I would ignore him.

"'Tis on'y a matter o' _will_," says he. "'Tis nothin' more than that. An' I'm fair ashamed," he groaned, in sincere emotion, "to think ye're shackled, hand an' foot, to a bottle o' ginger-ale. For shame, lad--t' come t' such a pass." He was honest in his expostulation; 'twas no laughing matter--'twas an anxiously grave concern for my welfare. He disapproved of the beverage--having never tasted it. "_You_," cries he, with a pout and puff of scorn, "an' your bilge-water! In irons with a bottle o' ginger-ale! Could ye but see yourself, Dannie, ye'd quit quick enough. 'Tis a ridiculous picture ye make--you an' your bottle. 'Twould not be hard t' give it up, lad," he would plead. "Ye'll manage it, Dannie, an ye'd but put your mind to it. Ye'd be nervous, I've no doubt, for a spell. But what's that? Eh,