 | The Sparrowgrass papers, or, Living in the
country |  |
CAPTAIN BELGRAVE.
1. I.
“My eyes make pictures when they are shut.
In one of those villages peculiar to our Eastern
coast, whose long lines of pepper-and-salt stone-fences
indicate laborious, if not profitable farming,
and where the saline breath of the ocean has the
effect of making fruit-trees more picturesque than
productive, in a stone chunk of a house, whose
aspect is quite as interesting to the geologist as to
the architect, lives Captain Belgrave.
The Captain, as he says himself, “is American
clean through, on the father's side, up to Plymouth
Rock, and knows little, and cares less, of what is
beyond that.” To hear him talk, you would suppose
Adam and Eve had landed there from the
May-Flower, and that the Garden of Eden was
located within rifle distance of that celebrated
stands upon unequal legs; for, on his mother's side
he is part German and part Irishman. I mention
this for the benefit of those who believe that certain
qualities in men are hereditary. Of course it
will be easy for them to assign those of Captain
Belgrave to their proper source.
The house is square, and would not be remarkable
but for a stone turret on one corner. This,
rising from the ground some forty feet, embroidered
with ivy, and pierced with arrow-slits, has rather a
feudal look. It stands in a by-lane, apart from the
congregated village. On the right side of the
road is a plashy spring, somewhat redolent of mint
in the summer. Opposite to this, in a clump of
oaks, surrounded with a picket-fence, is the open
porch, with broad wooden benches, and within is
an ample hall, looking out upon well-cultivated
fields, and beyond—blue water! This is the
“Oakery,” as Captain Belgrave calls it. Here
he lives with his brother Adolphus—bachelors
both.
His title is a mystery. There is a legend in the
village, that during the last war Belgrave was
enrolled in the militia on some frontier. One night
in front of the General's quarters. It was midnight;
the camp was asleep, and the moon was just sinking
behind a bank of clouds. Belgrave heard a footstep
on the stairs at the foot of the piazza. “Who
goes there?” No answer. Another step. “Who
goes there?” he repeated, and his heart began to
fail him. No answer—but another step. He cocked
his musket. Step! step! step! and then between
him and the sinking moon appeared an enormous
head, decorated with diabolical horns. Belgrave
drew a long breath and fired. The next instant
the spectre was upon him; he was knocked down;
the drums beat to arms; the guard turned out, and
found the sentinel stretched upon the floor, with
an old he-goat, full of defiance and odor, standing
on him. From that time he was called “Captain.”
No place, though it be a paradise, is perfect
without one of the gentler sex. There is a lady at
the Oakery. Miss Augusta Belgrave is a maiden
of about—let me see; her age was formerly
inscribed on the fly-leaf of the family Bible
between the Old and New Testaments; but the
page was torn out, and now it is somewhere in the
Apocrypha. No matter what her age may be; if
you were to see her, you would say she was safe
a spinster sister, living alone: it is not infrequent
in old families. The rest of the household may be
embraced in Hannah, the help, who is also “a
maiden all forlorn,” and Jim, the stable-boy. Jim
is a unit, as well as the rest. Jim has been a
stable-boy all his life, and now, at the age of sixty,
is only a boy ripened. His chief pride and glory
is to drive a pair of bob-tailed bay trotters that are
(traditionally) fast! Adolphus, who has a turn for
literature, christened the off-horse “Spectator;”
but the near horse came from a bankrupt wine-broker,
who named him “Chateau Margaux.”
This the Captain reduced to “Shatto,” and the
village people corrupted to “Shatter.”
There was something bold and jaunty in the way
the Captain used to drive old Shatter on a dog-trot
through the village (Spectator rarely went with his
mate except to church on Sundays), with squared
elbows, and whip depending at a just angle over
the dash-board. “Talk of your fast horses!” he
would say. “Why, if I would only let him out,”
pointing his whip, like a marshal's baton, toward
Shatter, “you would see time!” But he never
lets him out.
The square turret rises considerably above the
see a light shining through its narrow loop-holes.
There are loop-holes in the room below, and strong
casements of ordinary size in the rooms adjoining.
In the one next to the tower Miss Augusta sleeps,
as all the village knows, for she is seen at times looking
out of the window. Next to that is another room,
in which Adolphus sleeps. He is often seen looking
out of that window. Next, again, to that is the
vestal chamber of Hannah, on the south-west
corner of the house. She is sometimes seen looking
out of the window on either side. Next to
that again is the dormitory of Jim, the stable-boy.
Jim always smells like a menagerie, and so does
his room, no doubt. He never looks out of his
window except upon the Fourth of July, when
there is too much noise in the village to risk driving
Spec and Shat. No living person but the
occupants has ever been in that story of the house.
No living person understands the mystery of the
tower. The light appears at night through the
loop-holes in the second story, then flashes upward,
shines again through the slits in the lofty part of
the turret, burns steadily half an hour or so, and
then vanishes. Who occupies that lonely turret?
Let us take the author-privilege and ascend the
stairs. First we come to Jim's room; we pass
through that into Hannah's apartment. There is
a bolt on the inside of her door; we pass on into
the room of Adolphus; it, too, has a bolt on the
inside. Now all the virtues guide and protect us,
for we are in the sleeping-apartment of the spinster
sister! It, too, has a bolt on the inside; and here
we are in the tower: the door, like the rest, is
bolted. There is nothing in the room but the
carpet on the floor; no stair-case, but a trap-door
in the ceiling. It is but a short flight for fancy to
reach the upper story. The trap is bolted in the
floor; there is a ladder standing beside it; here
are chairs, a bureau, a table, with an extinguished
candle, and the moonlight falls in a narrow strip
across the features of Captain Belgrave, fast asleep,
and beside him a Bible, and an enormous horse-pistol,
loaded.
Nowhere but in the household of some old
bachelor could such discipline exist as in the
Oakery. At night the Captain is the first to
retire; Miss Augusta follows with a pair of candlesticks
and candles; then metaphysical Adolphus
with his mind in a painful state of fermentation;
then Jim, the stable-boy, who usually waits
until the company is on the top-stair, when he
makes a false start, breaks, pulls himself up, and
gets into a square trot just in time to save being distanced
at the landing. Adolphus and Jim are not
trusted with candles. Miss Augusta is rigorous on
that point. She permits the Captain to have one
because he is careful with it; besides he owns the
house and everything in it; the land and everything
on it; and supports the family; therefore his
sister indulges him. We now understand the
internal arrangement of the Oakery. It is a fort,
a castle, a citadel, of which Augusta is the scarp,
Jim the glacis, Hannah the counter-scarp, and
Adolphus the ditch. The Captain studied the
science of fortification after his return from the
wars.
The Belgraves are intimate with only one family
in the village, and they are new acquaintances—
the Mewkers. There is Mr. Mewker, Mrs. Mewker,
Mrs. Lasciver, formerly Miss Mewker, and six or
seven little Mewkers. Mewker has the reputation
of being a good man, but unfortunately his
appearance is not prepossessing. He has large
a sunken chest, a hollow cavity under the
waistcoat, little, weak eyes that seem set in bladders,
straggling hair, rusty whiskers, black, and
yellow teeth, and long, skinny, disagreeable fingers;
beside, he is knock-kneed, shuffling in gait, and
always leans on one side when he walks. Uncharitable
people say he leans on the side where his
interests lie, but Captain Belgrave will not believe
a word of it. Oh! no; Mewker is a different man
from that. He is a member of the church, and
sings in the choir. He is executor of several
estates, and of course takes care of the orphans
and widows. He holds the church money in trust,
and of course handles it solely to promote its
interests. And then he is so deferential, so polite,
so charitable. “Never,” says the Captain, “did I
hear him speak ill of anybody, but he lets me
into the worst points of my neighbors by jest teching
on 'em, and then he excuses their fibles, as if
he was a kind o' sorry for 'em; but I keeps my eye
onto 'em after the hints he give me, and he can't
blind me to them.”
Harriet Lasciver, formerly Miss Mewker, is a
widow, perfectly delicious in dimples and dimity,
birds, and camelias. Captain Belgrave has a great
fancy for the charming widow. This is a secret,
however. You and I know it, and so does Mewker.
2. II.
It is Sunday in Little-Crampton—a summer
Sunday. The old-fashioned flowers are blooming
in the old-fashioned gardens, and the last vibration
of the old rusty bell in the century-old belfry seems
dying off, and melting away in fragrance. Outside,
the village is quiet, but within the church
there is an incessant plying of fans and rustling of
dresses. The Belgraves are landed at the porch,
and Spec and Shat whirl the family carriage into
the grave-yard. The Mewkers enter with due
decorum. Adolphus drops his hymn-book into the
pew in front, as he always does. The little flatulent
organ works through the voluntary. The sleek
head of the Rev. Mr. Spat is projected toward the
audience out of the folds of his cambric handkerchief;
and after doing as much damage to the
simple and beautiful service as he can by reading
it, flourishes through the regular old Spatsonian
with the same old rising and falling inflections, the
same old tremulous tone toward the end, as if he
were crying; the same old recuperative method by
which he recovers his lost voice in the last sentence,
when it was all but gone; and the same old gesture
by which the audience understand that his labors
(and theirs) are over for the morning. Then the
congregation departs with the usual accompaniments
of dresses rustling, and pew-doors slamming;
and Mr. Mewker descends from the choir and sidles
up the aisle, nursing his knobs of elbows in his
skinny fingers, and congratulates the Rev. Mr.
Spat upon the excellent discourse he had delivered,
and receives the customary quid pro quo in the
shape of a compliment upon the excellent singing
in the choir. This account adjusted, Mr. Mewker
shuffles home beside the lovely widow; and Mrs.
Mewker and the small fry of members follow in
their wake.
“I have looked into the records in the county
clerk's office,” Mewker says in a whisper, to his
sister, “and the property is all right. That old
Thing, (unconscious Augusta Belgrave, rolling
home behind Spec and Shat, do you hear this?)
(Adolphus) can be packed off after the wedding,
and then we can arrange matters between us.
Spat understands me in this, and intends to be
hand and glove with Belgrave, so as to work upon
him. He will, he must do it, for he knows that his
remaining in this church depends upon me.” Here
Mr. Mewker was interrupted by one of the young
Mewkers, who came running up, hat in hand.
“Oh! pa, look there! see those beautiful climbing
roses growing all over that old tree!” “Jacob,”
said Mewker, catching him by the hair, and rapping
his head with his bony knuckles until the tears
came, “haven't I told you not to speak of such
trivial things on the Sabbath? How dare you
(with a repetition of raps) think of climbing roses
so soon after church? Go (with a fresh clutch in
the scalp of Mewker, Junior), go to your mother,
and when I get home I will punish you.” Mr.
Mewker resumed the whispered conversation.
“Belgrave is ruled entirely by his sister, but
between Spat and me, she can be blinded, I think.
If she should suspect, now, she would interfere, of
course, and Belgrave would not dare to disobey
her. But if we can get him committed once in
be entirely in my power. Dear,” he said aloud to
Mrs. M., “how did you like the sermon?” Angelic,”
replies Mrs. Mewker. “That's my opinion,
too,” responds Mewker. “Angelic, angelic. Spat
is a lovely man, my dear. What is there for
dinner?”
If there were some feminine meter by which
Harriet Lasciver's soul could be measured, it
would indicate “good” pretty high up on the
scale. Yet she had listened to this after-church
discourse of her brother not only with complacency,
but with a full and unequivocal assent to all
he had proposed. So she would have listened, so
assented to anything, no matter what, proposed by
him; and all things considered, it was not surprising.
Even as continued attrition wears the angles
of the flint until it is moulded into the perfect pebbles,
so had her nature been moulded by her
brother. He had bullied her in her childhood
and in her womanhood, except when there was a
purpose in view which he could better accomplish
by fawning; and her natural good disposition, so
indurated by these opposed modes of treatment,
had become as insensible to finer emotions as her
one element in his composition which at times had
cast a gloss upon his actions. It was his piety! God
help us! that any one should allude to that but
with reverence and love! Nor do I here speak of
it but as a profession, an art, or specious showing
forth of something that was not real, but professed,
in order to accomplish other ends. What profited
her own experience, when Harriet Lasciver was so
far imposed upon as to believe her brother's professions
sincere? What though all his life he had
been a crooked contriver and plotter, malicious in
his enmity, and false in his friendship; and she
knew it? Yet, as she could not reconcile it with his
affected sanctity, she could not believe it. That
wonderful power which men seldom, and women
never analyze—hypocrisy, held her entangled in
its meshes, and she was his instrument to be guided
as he chose. Every noble trait true woman possesses—pity,
tenderness, love, and high honor—
were commanded by an influence she could not
resist. Her reason, nay, her feelings were dormant,
but her faith slept securely upon her brother's
religion!
In this instance there was another consideration
widow, it must be added. She really admired the
Captain; but that makes no great difference. A
widow must love somebody. Those delicate
tendrils of affection which put forth with the
experiences of the young wife, die not in the widow,
but survive, and must have some support. Even
if the object be unworthy or unsightly, as it happens
sometimes, still will they bind, and bloom,
and cling, and blossom around it, like honey-suckles
around a pump.
3. III.
The windows at the Oakery are open, and the
warm air of a Sunday summer evening pours in,
as Augusta pours out the tea. The Captain burns
his mouth with the first cup, turns the tea into the
saucer, blows it to cool it, drinks it off hastily,
takes a snap at the thin, white slice of bread on
his plate, takes another snap at a radish somewhat
overcharged with salt, wipes his mouth, goes to the
window and calls out “Jim!” Jim appears at the
stable-door with a wisp of straw and a curry-comb.
“Put in the hosses!” Jim telegraphs with the
Adolphus, and Adolphus brushes the metaphysical
films from his eyes, and, for once, seems wide
awake. The Captain takes his seat and a fresh
snap at the bread. Augusta looks at him steadily.
“Why, brother, where are you going with the
horses on Sunday afternoon?” The Captain squints
at the bread, and answers, “To Mewker's.”
“Mewker's!” repeats Augusta; “Mewker's! why,
brother, you're crazy; they never receive company
on Sunday. You know how strictly pious
Mr. Mewker is, and he would look at you with
amazement. To see you riding, too! why—I—
never!”
The Captain, however, said nothing, but waited,
with some impatience, until Spec and Shat turned
out with the carriage from the stable. Then he
took the ribbons, stopped, threw them down, went
up into the tower, came back with a clean shirt on,
climbed into the seat, and drove off.
“He'll come back from there in a hurry, I
guess,” said Augusta to the wondering Adolphus.
But the Captain did not return until eleven that
night, and then somewhat elevated with wine.
“Augushta,” said he, as the procession formed as
heesha clever feller, heesha dev'lish clever feller;
heesh fond of talking on church matters, and sho
'mi. His shister, sheesha another clever feller,
she's a chump! I asked'em to come to-morrow to
tea, and shaid they would.”
“Why, brother, to-morrow is Monday, washing-day!”
replied the astonished spinster.
“Tha's a fac, Gushta, fac,” answered the Captain,
as he took the candle from his sister at the tower-door;
“but, wash or no wash, musht come. When
I ask'em to come, musht come. Goo-ni!”
The bolts are closed on the several doors, scarp
and counterscarp, ditch and glacis are wrapped in
slumber; but the Captain lies wide awake, looking
through the slits in the tower casement at the
Great Bear in the sky, and thinking rapturously of
the lovely Lasciver.
Never did the old family carriage have such a
polishing as on that Monday morning. Never did
Jim so bestir himself with the harness as on that
day under the eye of Belgrave. The Captain
neglects to take his accustomed ride to the village
in the morning, that Spec and Shat may be in condition
for the afternoon. At last the carriage rolls
box, and the Captain retires to dress for company. In
due course the carriage returns with Spec and Shat
somewhat blown with an over-load; for all the
young Mewkers are piled up inside, on the laps of
Mrs. Mewker and the lovely Lasciver. Then
Augusta hurries into the kitchen to tell Hannah,
the help, to cut more bread for the brats; and Adolphus
is hurried out into the garden to pull more
radishes; and the young Mewker tribe get into his
little library, and revel in his choice books, and
quarrel over them, and scatter some leaves and
covers on the floor as trophies of the fight. Then
the tea is brought on, and the lovely Lasciver tries
in vain to soften the asperity of Augusta; and then
Mewker takes her in hand, and does succeed, and
in a remarkable degree, too. Meanwhile the
ciphers of the party, Mrs. Mewker and Adolphus,
drink and eat in silence. Then they adjourn to
the porch, and Mewker sits beside Augusta, and
entertains her with an account of the missions in
Surinam, to which she turns an attentive ear-Then
Mrs. Mewker says it is time to go, “on
account of the children,” at which Mewker
darts a petrifying look at her, and turns with a
says “she, too, thinks it is best for the young ones
to go to bed early. Then Jim is summoned from
the stable, and Spec and Shat; and the Mewkers
take leave, and whirl along the road again toward
home.
It was long before the horses returned, for Jim
drove back slowly. There was not a tenderer
heart in the world than the one which beat in the
bosom of that small old boy of sixty. He sat
perched upon the box, calling out, “Gently, soho!”
to Spec and Shat, when they advanced beyond a
walk, and held a talk with himself in this wise:
“I don't want to carry that old carcase agin. He
gits in and praises up the Cap'n so as I can hear
him, and then asks me if I won't lay the whip on
the hosses. Says I, `Mr. Mewker, them hosses has
been druv.' Says he, `Yes, James, but you can
give'em a good rubbin' down when you get to
hum, and that will fetch'em all right.' Now, I
want to know if you take a man, and lay a whip
onto him, and make him travel till he's sore, whether
rubbin' down is a-goin' to make him all right?
No, Sir. Then he calls me James. I don't want
no man to call me James; my name's Jim. There
coax out of me all I'd saved up for more'n twenty
years, and then busted? There was Deacon
Cotton; didn't he come in over the Captain with
that pork? He called me James, too. And there
was that psalm-singin' pedlar that got Miss Augusty
to lend him the colt; he called me James. Did he
bring the colt back? No, Sir; at least not yit, and
it's more'n three years ago. When a man calls me
James, I take my eye and places it onto him. I
hearn him when he tells Miss Mewker not to give
beggars nothin'. I hearn him. He sez they may
be impostors! Well, 'spose they be? When a feller-creetur'
gits so low as to beg, haven't they got
low enough? Aint they ragged, dirty, despised?
Don't they run a chance of starvin', impostors or
not, if every body drives 'em off? And what great
matter is it if they do get a-head of you, for a crumb
or a cent? When I see a feller-creatur' in rags,
beggin', I say human natur' has got low enough;
it's in rags! it begs! it's 'way down, and it don't
make much difference if it's actin' or not. Them
aint impostors that will do much harm. Them aint
impostors like old Midgely, and Deacon Cotton,
and that old psalm-singin' pedlar that borrowed the
they don't happen to be impostors, arter all?
Whar's that account to be squared? I guess I'd
rayther be the beggar than the other man when
that account is squared. I guess when that account
is squared, it will kind a-look as if the impostor
wasn't the one that asked for the stale bread, but
the one that wouldn't give it. Seems as if I've
heard 'em tell about a similar case somewhere.”
A good rubbing down, indeed, for Spec and Shat
that night, and a well-filled manger too. When
Jim picked up his stable-lantern, he gave each
horse a pat on the head, and a parting hug, and
then backed out, with his eyes still on them.
“Spec!” said he at the door. Spec gave a whinny
in reply. “Shat!” Shat responded also. “Good-night,
old boys! Old Jim aint a-goin' to lay no
whip onto you. If old Jim wants to lay a whip
onto something, it won't be onto you, that's been
spavined and had the bots, and he's cured 'em, and
they know it, hey! No, Sir. His 'tipathy works
outside into another quarter. Is my name James?
Well, it aint. It's Jim, isn't it? Yes, Sir!”
4. IV.
From that night, however, the halcyon days of
Spec and Shat were at an end. The Mewkers
loved to ride, but they had no horses: the only
living thing standing upon four legs belonging to
Mr. Mewker was an ugly, half-starved, cross-grained,
suspicious looking dog, that had the
mange and a bad reputation. Of course, the Captain's
horses were at their service, for rides to the
beach, for pic-nics in the woods, for shopping in the
village, or, perchance, to take Mr. Mewker to some
distant church-meeting. And not only were the
horses absent at unusual times; there seemed to be
a growing fondness in the Captain for late hours.
The old-style regularity of the Oakery, the time-honored
habits of early hours to bed, the usual procession
up the stairs, formal but cheerful, were, in
some measure, broken into; not but what these
were observed as formerly; not but what every
member of the family waited and watched until
the Captain returned, no matter how late; but
that sympathetic feeling which all had felt when
the hour of bed-time came, had ceased to be,
and in its place was the dreary languor, the tiresome,
up and wait and wait, for an absent one, waiting
and asking, “Why tarry the wheels of his chariot?”
There was an increasing presentiment, a gloomy
foreshadowing of evil, in Miss Augusta's mind at
those doings of the Captain: and this feeling was
heightened by something, trifling in itself, yet still
mysterious and unaccountable. Somebody, almost
every day, cut off a tolerably large piece from the
beef or mutton, or whatever kind of meat there
chanced to be in the cellar. And nobody knew
anything about it. Hannah was fidelity itself; Jim
was beyond suspicion; Adolphus never went into
the cellar, scarcely out of the library, in fact. The
Captain! could it be her brother? Miss Augusta
watched. She saw him do it! She saw him
covertly draw his jack-knife from his pocket, and
purloin a piece of beautiful rump-steak, then wrap
it in paper, put it in his pocket, and walk off
whistling, as if nothing had happened. “The
widow is at the bottom of this!” was the thought
that flashed through the mind of Augusta. She
was indirectly correct. The widow was at the
bottom of the theft, and I will tell you how. I
have mentioned a large mangy dog, of disreputable
name. Whenever the Captain drove up the path to
the house of his friend, there, beside the step of the
wagon, from the time it passed the gate until it
reached the porch, was this dog, with a tail short
as pie-crust, that never wagged; thick, wicked
eyes, and a face that did not suggest fidelity and
sagacity, but treachery and rapine, dead sheep, and
larceny great or small. And although the Captain
was a stout, active, well-framed man, with a rosy
cheek, a bright eye, and a sprightly head of hair,
yet he was afraid of that dog. And therefore the
Captain, to conciliate Bose, brought him every day
some choice morsel from his own kitchen; and as
he did not dare to tell Augusta, the same was
abstracted in the manner already described.
Here I must mention a peculiarity in Captain
Belgrave's character. He never saw a dog without
thinking of hydrophobia; he never bathed on
the beautiful beach in the rear of his house without
imagining every chip in the water, or ripple on the
wave, to be the dorsal fin of some voracious shark.
When he drove home at night, it was with fear and
trembling, for an assassin might be lurking in the
bushes; and if he passed a sick neighbor, he
whooping-cough trundling at his heels. In a word,
he was the most consummate coward in Little-Crampton.
It was for this reason he had built and
slept in the tower; and what with reading of
pirates, buccaneers, Captain Kidd, and Black
Beard, his mind was so infected that no sleeping-place
seemed secure and safe, but his own turret
and trap-door, scarp, counter-scarp, ditch, and
glacis, through which all invaders had to pass before
they encountered him with his tremendous
horse-pistol.
It was not the discovery of the theft alone that
had opened the eyes of Augusta in regard to her
brother's motions. Although he had told her,
again and again, that he merely went to Mewker's
to talk over church matters, yet she knew intuitively,
as every woman would, that, a widow so
lovely as Harriet Laseiver could not but have great
attractions for such an old bachelor as her brother.
In fact, she knew, if the widow, as the phrase is,
“set her cap for him,” the Captain was a lost man.
But to whom could she apply for counsel and assistance?
Adolphus? Adolphus had no more sense
than a kitten. Hannah? There was something of
would not bend to the level of Hannah, the help.
Jim? She would go to Jim. She would see that
small boy of sixty, and ask his advice. And she
did. She walked over to the stable in the evening,
while her brother was making his toilet for the
customary visit to the Mewkery, and without beating
around the bush at all, reached the point at
once. “Jim,” said she, “the Captain is getting too
thick with the Mewkers, and we must put a stop to
it, How is that to be done?”
Jim paused for a moment, and then held up his
forefinger. “I know one way to stop him a-goin'
there; and, if you say so, Miss Augusta, then old
Jim is the boy to do it.”
Augusta assented in a grand, old, towering nod.
Jim, with a mere motion of his forefinger, seemed
to reiterate, “If you say so, I'll do it.”
“Yes.”
“Then, by Golly!” responded Jim, joyfully,
“arter this night he'll never go there ag'in.”
Augusta walked toward the house with a smile,
and Jim proceeded to embellish Shatter.
By-and-by the Captain drove off in the wagon,
and old Jim busied himself with Spectator, fitting
ready for action.
5. V.
There was a thin cloud, like lace, over the moon
that night; just enough to make objects painfully
distinct, as Captain Belgrave turned out from Mewker's
gate, and took the high road toward home.
He jogged along, however, quite comfortably, and
had just reached the end of Mewker's fence, when
he saw a figure on horseback, emerging from the
little lane that ran down, behind the garden, to the
pond at the back of the house. The apparition
had a sort of red cape around its shoulders; a soldier-cap,
with a tall plume (very like the one the
Captain used to wear on parade), was upon its
head; in its hand was a long, formidable-looking
staff; and the horse of the spectre was enveloped
in a white saddle-cloth, that hung down almost to
the ground. What was remarkable, Old Shatter,
as if possessed with the devil, actually drew out of
the road toward the stranger, and gave a whinny,
which was instantly responded to in the most frightful
tones by the horse of the spectre. Almost paralyzed,
the Captain suffered the apparition to
of hair, like tow, waved around features that
seemed to have neither shape nor color. Its face
seemed like a face of brown paper, so formless and
flat was it, with great hideous eyes and a mouth of
intolerable width. As it approached, the figure
seemed to have a convulsion—it rolled so in the
saddle; but, recovering, it drew up beside the
shaft, and, whirling its long staff, brought such a
whack upon Shatter's flank, that the old horse
almost jumped out of his harness. Away went the
wagon and the Captain, and away went the spectre
close behind; fences, trees, bushes, dust, whirled
in and out of sight; bridges, sedges, trout-brooks,
mills, willows, copses, plains, in moonlight and
shadow, rolled on and on; but not an inch was lost
or won; there, behind the wagon, was the goblin
with his long plume bending, and waving, and
dancing, and his staff whirling with terrible menaces.
On, and on, and on, and ever and anon the
goblin steed gave one of those frightful whinnies
that seemed to tear the very air with its dissonance.
On, and on, and on! The Captain drove with his
head turned back over his shoulder, but Shat knew
the road. On, and on, and on! A thought flashes
“The horse-pistol!” It is under the cushions. He
seizes it nervously, cocks it, and—bang! goes the
plume of the goblin. “By gosh!” said a voice
under the soldier-cap, “I didn't cal'late on that;”
and then, “I vum ef old Shat hain't run away!”
Sure enough, Shatto has run away; the wagon is
out of sight in a turn of the road; the next instant,
it brings up against a post; off goes Shat, with
shafts and dislocated fore-wheels; and old Jim soon
after finds the remains of the wagon, and the senseless
body of his master, in a ditch, under the moon,
and a willow. To take the red blanket from his
shoulders, which he had worn like a Mexican poncho
by putting his head through a hole in the middle,
is done in an instant; and then, with big tears
rolling down his cheeks, the old boy brings water
from a spring, in the crown of the soldier-cap, to
bathe the face of the Captain. The report of the
pistol has alarmed a neighbor; and the two, with
the assistance of the hind wheels and the body of
the wagon, carry poor Belgrave through the moonlit
streets of Little-Crampton, to the Oakery.
When the Captain opened his eye (for the other
was under the tuition of a large patch of brown
at home, surrounded and fortified, as usual, by
Augusta, Adolphus, Hannah, the help, and Jim, in
picturesque attitudes. How he came there, was a
mystery. Stay; he begins to take up the thread:
Mewkers, fence, the figure, the race for life, and
the pistol! What else? Nothing—blank—oblivion.
So he falls into a tranquil state of comfort,
and feels that he does not care about it. No getting
up that steep ladder to-night! Never mind.
It is a labor to think, so he relapses into thought-lessness,
and finally falls asleep. There was a
stranger in the room behind the bed's head, a tall,
astringent-looking man, Dr. Butternuts, by whom
the Captain had been let blood. If Belgrave had
seen him, he would have fainted. “No injuries of
any consequence,” says the doctor, departing and
waving his brown hand. “Terribly skart, though,”
Augusta responds, in a whisper. “Yes, he will
get over that; to-morrow he will be better;” and
the doctor waves himself out. Adolphus retires,
and then Hannah, the help; but Augusta and Jim
watch by the bedside until morning. The Captain,
every now and then, among the snowy sheets and
coverlet, turns up a side of face that looks like a
but Augusta whispers soothingly, “Never mind,
Jim, it's for his good; I'm glad you skart him;
you skart him a leetle too much this time, that's
all; next time you'll be more careful, won't you,
and not skear him so bad?”
That Captain Belgrave had been thrown from
his wagon, and badly hurt, was known all over
Little-Crampton, next morning. Some said he had
been shot at by a highwayman; some said he had
shot a highwayman. The story took a hundred
shapes, and finally was rolled up at the door of the
Rev. Melchior Spat, who at once took his wagon,
and drove off to the Mewkery. There the rumor
was unfolded to Mr. Mewker, who, enjoying it
immensely, made so many funny remarks thereon,
that the Rev. Melchior Spat was convulsed with
laughter, and then the two drove down to the Oakery
to condole with the sufferer. On the way
there, the Rev. Melchior was so wonderfully facetions,
that Mewker, who never enjoyed any person's
jokes but his own, was actually stimulated
into mirth, and had it not been for happily catching
a distant sight of the tower, would have so forgotten
himself as to drive up to the door with a
they both entered grave as owls, and inquired, in
faint and broken voices, how the Captain was, and
whether he was able to see friends. Augusta, who
received them, led them up to the room, where the
Captain, with his face like the globe in the equinox,
sitting propped up in bed, shook both feebly
by the hand, and then the Rev. Melchior proposed
prayer, to which Mewker promptly responded by
dropping on his knees, and burying his face in the
bottom of an easy chair. This was a signal for
Adolphus to do likewise; and the Captain, not to
be behind, struggling up into a sitting posture,
leaned forward in the middle of the coverlet, with
his toes and the end of his shirt deployed upon the
pillows. Then the Rev. Melchior, in a crying
voice, proceeded according to the homoœopathic
practice—that is, making it short and sweet as possible—touched
upon the excellent qualities of the
sufferer, the distress of his beloved friends, and
especially of the anxiety which would be awakened
in the bosom of one now absent, “whose
heart was only the heart of a woman, a heart not
strong and able to bear up against calamity, but
weak, and fragile, and loving, and pitiful, and ten
pitiful, and tender, and fragile, that it could not
bear up against calamity; no, it could not; no, it
could not; it was weak, it was pitiful, it was loving,
it was tender, it was fragile like a flower, and
against calamity it could not bear up.”
So great was the effect of the Rev. Melchior
Spat's eloquence, that the Captain fairly cried, so
as to leave a round wet spot in the middle of the
coverlet, and Mr. Mewker wiped his eyes frequently
with his handkerchief, as he rose from the
chair. And although the voice of the Reverend
Melchior had been heard distinctly, word for word,
by Jim, in the far-off stable, yet it sank to the
faintest whisper when he proceeded to inquire of
the Captain how he felt, and what was this dread
ful story. And then the Captain, in a voice still
fainter, told how he was attacked by a man of
immense size, mounted on a horse of proportionate
dimensions, and how he had defended himself, and
did battle bravely until, in the fight, “Shatto got
skeared, and overset the wagon, and then the man
got onto him, and pounded the life out of him,
while he was entangled with reins.” Then Mr.
Mewker and the Rev. Mr. Spat took leave with
renewed the jocularity which had been interrupted
somewhat by the visit to the Oakery.
To say that Mr. Mewker neglected his friend,
the Captain, during his misfortunes, would be doing
a great injustice to that excellent man. Every day
he was at the Oakery, to inquire after his health;
and rarely did he come without some little present,
a pot of sweetmeats, a bouquet, or something of the
kind, from the lovely Lasciver. How good it was
of him to buy jelly at two shillings a pound at the
store, and bring it to the Captain, saying, “This
little offering is from Harriet, who thought some
delicacy of the kind would be good for you.”
Was it not disinterested? Hiding his own modest
virtues in a pot of jelly, and presenting it in the
name of another! The truth is, Mewker's superior
tactics were too profound for Augusta to contend
against; she felt, as it were, the sand sliding from
under her feet. Nor was Mewker without a powerful
auxiliary in the Reverend Melchior Spat,
who, by his prerogative, had free access to the
house at all times, and made the most of it, too.
Skillfully turning to common topics when Augusta
was present, and as skillfully returning to the old
with such desire for the lovely widow, that, had it
not been for his black eye, he would assuredly have
gone off and proposed on the spot. This feeling,
however, subsided when the Rev. Melchior was
gone; the Captain did not think of marrying; he
was a true old bachelor, contented with his lot, and
not disposed to change it even for a better; besides,
he was timid.
6. VI.
At last our hero was able once more to go about,
and Jim drove him down slowly to the Mewkery.
Such a noise as Bose made when he saw the carriage
approaching! But there was no present
from the hand of his friend this time; so Bose contented
himself with growling and snapping angrily
at his own tail, which was not longer than half a
cucumber. What a blush spread over the face of
the Captain when he saw the widow, all dimples
and dimity, advancing to meet him in the familiar
back-parlor! How the sweet roses breathed
through the shaded blinds as he breathed out his
thanks to the widow for many precious favors
Captain sat beside her on the sofa; one of her
round, plump, white, dimpled hands was not far
from him, resting upon the black hair-cloth of the
sofa bottom. He looked right and left; there was
no one near; so he took the hand respectfully, and
raised it to his lips, intending to replace it of
course. To his dismay, she uttered a tender “O!'
and leaned her head upon his shoulder. What to
do, he did not know; but he put his arm around
her bewitching waist, to support her. Her eyes
were closed, and the long, radiant lashes heightened,
by contrast, the delicious color that bloomed
in her cheeks. The Captain looked right and left
again; no one was near; if he could venture to
kiss her? He had never kissed a pretty woman in
all his life! The desire to do so increased; it
seemed to grow upon him; in fact, drawn toward
her by an influence he could not resist, he leaned
over and touched those beautiful lips, and then—in
walked Mr. Mewker.
Had Mewker not been a genius, he might have
compromised everything by still playing the humble,
deferential, conscientious part; but hypocrisy
on a low key was not his cue now; he knew his
branch of art had been, there was another still
more natural to him; he was wonderful in the sycophant,
but matchless in the bully! Those little,
weak, bladdery eyes seemed almost to distil venom,
as, wrapping his knobby arms in a knot, he strode
up to the astonished Belgrave, and asked him
“how he dared invade the privacy of his house,
the home of his wife and children, and the sanctuary
of his sister? How he dared trespass upon the
hospitality that had been extended toward, nay,
that had been lavished upon him? Was not the
respectability of the Mewker family, a family
related to the wealthy Balgangles of Little-Crampton,
and connected by marriage with the Shellbarques
of Boston, a sufficient protection against
his nefarious designs? And did he undertake,
under the mask of friendship,” and Mewker drew
up his forehead into a complication of lines like an
indignant web, “to come, as a hypocrite, a member
of the church (O Mewker!) with the covert intention
of destroying the peace and happiness of his
only sister?”
Belgrave was a man who never swore; but on
this occasion he uttered an exclamation: “My
grief!” said he, “I never had no such idee.”
“What, then, are your intentions?” said Mewker,
fiercely.
“T' make it all straight,” replied the Captain.
“How?”
Belgrave paused, and Mewker shuffled rapidly
to and fro, muttering to himself. At last he broke
out again:
“How, I say?”
“On that p'int I'm codjitatin'.”
“Do—you—mean—” said Mewker, with a
remarkable smile, placing his hand calmly on the
Captain's shoulder, “to—trifle—with—me?”
“No,” replied poor Belgrave, surrendering up,
as it were, what was left of him; “I'm ready to be
married, if that will make it all straight, provided,”
he added, with natural courtesy, turning to the
lovely widow, “provided this lady does not think
me unworthy of her.”
Mewker drew forth a tolerably clean handkerchief,
and applied it to his eyes: a white handkerchief
held to the eyes of a figure in threadbare
black is very effective. The lovely Lasciver
remained entirely passive; such is discipline.
Here, at last, was an opportunity to beat a
retreat. The Captain rose, and shaking Mewker's
like a bunch of radishes,” left the room without so
much as a word to the future Mrs. Belgrave. So
soon as the door closed upon him, Mr. Mewker
raised his eyes from the handkerchief, and smiled
sweetly upon his sister. The thing is accomplished.
As some old bear, who had enjoyed freedom
from cubhood, feels, at the bottom of a pit dug by
the skillful hunter, so feels Captain Belgrave, as he
rides home sorrowfully. His citadel, after all, is
not a protection. Into its penetralia a subtle spirit
has at last found entrance. The air grows closer
and heavier around him, the shadows broader, the
bridges less secure, the trout-brooks blacker and
deeper. How shall he break the matter to Augusta?
“No hurry, though; the day hasn't been
app'inted yit;” and at this suggestion the clouds
begin to break and lighten. Then he sees Mewker,
threadbare and vindictive; his sky again is overcast,
but filaments of light stream through as he
conjures up the image of the lovely widow, the
dimpled hand, the closed eyes, the long radiate
lashes, cheeks, lips, and the temptation which had
so unexpected a conclusion. Home at last; and,
with some complaint of fatigue, the Captain retires,
future.
The future! yes, the future! A long perspective
stretched before his eyes; and, at the end of
the vista, was a bride in white, and a wedding. It
would take some months to gradually break the
subject to his sister. Then temperately and moderately,
the courtship would go on, year by year,
waxing by degrees to the end.
7. VII.
Mr. Mewker altered the focus of Belgrave's
optics next morning, by a short note, in which he
himself fixed the wedding-day at two weeks from
the Captain's declarations of intentions. This
intelligence confined the Captain two days in the
tower, “codjitating,” during which time every body
in Little-Crampton was informed that Widow Lasciver
and he were engaged to be married. The
news came from the best authority—the Rev. Melchior
Spat. On the evening of the second day, a
pair of lead-colored stockings, a fustian petticoat,
a drab short gown, and a bright bunch of keys,
the tower, and walked into the room adjoining.
Then two hands commenced wringing themselves,
by which we may understand that Augusta was in
great tribulation. The rumor, rife in Little-Crampton,
had reached her ears, and her brother had
confirmed its truth. The very means employed to
keep him out of danger had only assisted the other
party to carry him off. This should be a warning
to those who interfere with affairs of the heart.
But what was her own future? Certainly her reign
was at an end; a new queen-bee was to take possession
of the hive; and then—what then? kings
and kaisers, even, are not free from the exquisite
anguish which, in that hour, oppressed the heart of
Augusta Belgrave. It was but a step; but what a
step? from mistress to menial, from ruler to subordinate.
She knelt down heavily by the bedside, and
there prayed; but oh! the goodness of woman's
heart!—it was a prayer, earnest, sincere, truthful
and humble; not for herself, but for her brothers.
Then her heart was lightened and strengthned;
and as she rose, she smiled with a bitter sweetness,
that, considering everything, was beautiful.
Great preparations now in Little-Crampton for
scissors, flowers, laces, ribbons, and mantua-makers,
at a premium. The Captain took heart of grace,
and called upon his lovely bride, but always managed
to get past that lane before night-fall. Hood
& Wessup the fashionable tailors of Little-Crampton,
were suborned to lay themselves out night and
day upon his wedding-suit. He had set his heart
upon having Adolphus dressed precisely like himself
on the occasion. Two brothers dressed alike,
groom, and groomsman, look remarkably well at a
wedding. But to his surprise, Adolphus refused to
be dressed, and would not go to the wedding—
“positively.” Neither would Augusta. Brother
and sister set to work packing up, and when the
expected night arrived there was all their little
stock and store in two, blue, wooden trunks, locked,
and corded, and ready for moving, in the hall of
the Oakery.
8. VIII.
It was a gloomy night outside and in, for the
rain had been falling all day, and a cold rain-storm
in summer is dreary enough. But cheerful bars of
windows, lighting up a green strip on a tree here
and there, a picket or two in the fence, and banding
with an illuminated ribbon the side and roof
of the dripping barn. The Captain was making
his toilet. White ruffled shirt, with a black mourning
pin containing a lock of his mother's hair;
white Marseilles waistcoat, set off with an inner
vest of blue satin (suggested by Hood & Wessup);
trowsers of bright mustard color, fitting as tight as
if his legs had been melted and poured into them;
blue coat, cut brass buttons, end. of handkercher'
sticking out of the pocket behind; black silk stockings
and pumps; red check-silk neck-cloth, and flying-jib
collars. Down he came, and there sat brother
and sister on their corded trunks in the hall,
portentous as the Egyptian statues that overlook
the Nile from their high stone chairs. Not a word
was said; but the Captain opened the door and
looked out. “Why, it rains like fury. Jim!”
Jim, who was unseen in the darkness, and yet
within three feet of the door, answered cheerily,
“Aye, aye, Sir!”
“All ready, Jim?”
“All ready, Capt'in.”
“Wait till I get my cloak;” and as the Captain
wrapped himself up, his sister silently and carefully
assisted him; not on account of his plumage, but
to keep him from catching cold.
Off goes Shatter, Jim, and the Captain; off
through the whistling rain and the darkness. The
mud whirled up from the wheels and covered the
cloak of the bridegroom, so he told Jim “to drive
keerful, as he wanted to keep nice.” It was a long
and dreary road, but at last they saw the bright
lights from Mewker's windows, and with a palpitating
heart the Captain alighted at the porch.
Old Bose, who had been scouring the grounds
and barking at every guest, started up with a fearful
growl, but the Captain threw off his travel-stained
cloak, and exhibited himself to the old dog
in all his glory. The instant Bose recognized his
friend and benefactor he leaped upon him with
such a multitude of caresses that the white Marseilles
vest and mustard-colored trowsers were
covered with proofs of his fidelity and attachment.
“Hey, there! hey! down, Bose!” said Mewker at
the door: “Why, my dear brother!”
The Captain, with great gravity, was snapping
with his thumb and finger the superfluous mud
“Come in here,” said Mewker, chuckling and
scratching his chin. “I'll get you a brush. No
hurry. Time enough before the ceremony.”
The Captain walked after him through the hall,
and caught a glimpse of the parlors, radiant with
wax-lights, and crowded with such a display of
company as was rarely seen in Little-Crampton.
“Come in here,” said Mewker, still chuckling,
as he opened the door. “This is your room;” and
he winked, and gave the bridegroom such a nudge
with his knobby elbow as almost tumbled him over
the bed. “Your room—understand? The bridal-
chamber! Wait here, now; wait here till I get a
brush.”
The Captain, left alone, surveyed the apartment.
The pillow-cases were heavy with lace. Little
tasteful vases filled with flowers, made the air
drunk with fragrance; a white, worked pin-cushion
was on the bureau, before an oval glass, with his
own name wrought thereon in pins' heads. The
astral lamp on the mantel shed a subdued and
chastened light over the whole. Long windows
reached to the floor, and opened on the piazza;
other fastenings than a latch. The Captain
tried the windows, and they opened with a touch
of his thumb and fore-finger. He had not slept in
so insecure a place for more than twenty years.
Then he thought of the phantom-horseman, and the
deep pond behind the house. He shivered a little,
either from cold or timidity. The window was partially
raised, so he throws it up softly, touches the
latch; the blinds are open; he walks out on the
piazza, and then covertly steals around to the front
of the house, where he finds Shatter and the
wagon, with old Jim peering through the blinds, to
see the wedding come off.
“Jim,” he says, in a hoarse whisper, “take me
hum. I ain't a-goin' to sleep in such a room as
that, no how.”
The old boy quietly unbuckled the hitching-strap,
and when Mewker got back with the brush, Shatter
was flying through the mud toward the Oakery,
at a three-minute gait. Two or three quick knocks
at his own door, and it is opened by Augusta, who,
with her brother, had kept watch and ward on
their corded trunks. The Captain took the candle
from the table without saying a word, ascended the
and ditch, mounted his ladder, drew it up after
him, bolted the trap in the floor, and cocked his
pistol.
“Now,” said he, “let'em come on! They ain't
got me married this time, anyhow!”
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