University of Virginia Library

15. CHAPTER XV.
AN OLD MISER, UPON SUITABLE REPRESENTATIONS, IS PREVAILED UPON TO
VENTURE AN INVESTMENT.

The merchant having withdrawn, the other remained
seated alone for a time, with the air of one who, after
having conversed with some excellent man, carefully
ponders what fell from him, however intellectually inferior
it may be, that none of the profit may be lost;
happy if from any honest word he has heard he can
derive some hint, which, besides confirming him in the
theory of virtue, may, likewise, serve for a finger-post
to virtuous action.

Ere long his eye brightened, as if some such hint was
now caught. He rises, book in hand, quits the cabin,
and enters upon a sort of corridor, narrow and dim, a
by-way to a retreat less ornate and cheery than the
former; in short, the emigrants' quarters; but which,
owing to the present trip being a down-river one, will
doubtless be found comparatively tenantless. Owing
to obstructions against the side windows, the whole
place is dim and dusky; very much so, for the most
part; yet, by starts, haggardly lit here and there by
narrow, capricious sky-lights in the cornices. But there

would seem no special need for light, the place being
designed more to pass the night in, than the day;
in brief, a pine barrens dormitory, of knotty pine bunks,
without bedding. As with the nests in the geometrical
towns of the associate penguin and pelican, these bunks
were disposed with Philadelphian regularity, but, like
the cradle of the oriole, they were pendulous, and,
moreover, were, so to speak, three-story cradles; the
description of one of which will suffice for all.

Four ropes, secured to the ceiling, passed downwards
through auger-holes bored in the corners of three rough
planks, which at equal distances rested on knots vertically
tied in the ropes, the lowermost plank but an inch
or two from the floor, the whole affair resembling, on a
large scale, rope book-shelves; only, instead of hanging
firmly against a wall, they swayed to and fro at the
least suggestion of motion, but were more especially
lively upon the provocation of a green emigrant sprawling
into one, and trying to lay himself out there, when
the cradling would be such as almost to toss him back
whence he came. In consequence, one less inexperienced,
essaying repose on the uppermost shelf, was liable
to serious disturbance, should a raw beginner select
a shelf beneath. Sometimes a throng of poor emigrants,
coming at night in a sudden rain to occupy these oriole
nests, would—through ignorance of their peculiarity—
bring about such a rocking uproar of carpentry, joining
to it such an uproar of exclamations, that it seemed as if
some luckless ship, with all its crew, was being dashed
to pieces among the rocks. They were beds devised

by some sardonic foe of poor travelers, to deprive them
of that tranquillity which should precede, as well as
accompany, slumber.—Procrustean beds, on whose hard
grain humble worth and honesty writhed, still invoking
repose, while but torment responded. Ah, did any one
make such a bunk for himself, instead of having it made
for him, it might be just, but how cruel, to say, You
must lie on it!

But, purgatory as the place would appear, the
stranger advances into it; and, like Orpheus in his gay
descent to Tartarus, lightly hums to himself an opera
snatch.

Suddenly there is a rustling, then a creaking, one of
the cradles swings out from a murky nook, a sort of
wasted penguin-flipper is supplicatingly put forth,
while a wail like that of Dives is heard:—“Water,
water!”

It was the miser of whom the merchant had spoken.

Swift as a sister-of-charity, the stranger hovers over
him:—

“My poor, poor sir, what can I do for you?”

“Ugh, ugh—water!”

Darting out, he procures a glass, returns, and, holding it
to the sufferer's lips, supports his head while he drinks:
“And did they let you lie here, my poor sir, racked
with this parching thirst?”

The miser, a lean old man, whose flesh seemed salted
cod-fish, dry as combustibles; head, like one whittled
by an idiot out of a knot; flat, bony mouth, nipped
between buzzard nose and chin; expression, flitting

between hunks and imbecile—now one, now the other—
he made no response. His eyes were closed, his cheek
lay upon an old white moleskin coat, rolled under his
head like a wizened apple upon a grimy snow-bank.

Revived at last, he inclined towards his ministrant,
and, in a voice disastrous with a cough, said:—“I am
old and miserable, a poor beggar, not worth a shoe-string—how
can I repay you?”

“By giving me your confidence.”

“Confidence!” he squeaked, with changed manner,
while the pallet swung, “little left at my age, but take
the stale remains, and welcome.”

“Such as it is, though, you give it. Very good.
Now give me a hundred dollars.”

Upon this the miser was all panic. His hands
groped towards his waist, then suddenly flew upward
beneath his moleskin pillow, and there lay clutching
something out of sight. Meantime, to himself he incoherently
mumbled:—“Confidence? Cant, gammon!
Confidence? hum, bubble!—Confidence? fetch, gouge!
—Hundred dollars?—hundred devils!”

Half spent, he lay mute awhile, then feebly raising
himself, in a voice for the moment made strong by the
sarcasm, said, “A hundred dollars? rather high price to
put upon confidence. But don't you see I am a poor,
old rat here, dying in the wainscot? You have served
me; but, wretch that I am, I can but cough you my
thanks,—ugh, ugh, ugh!”

This time his cough was so violent that its convulsions
were imparted to the plank, which swung him

about like a stone in a sling preparatory to its being
hurled.

“Ugh, ugh, ugh!”

“What a shocking cough. I wish, my friend, the
herb-doctor was here now; abox of his Omni-Balsamic
Reinvigorator would do you good.”

“Ugh, ugh, ugh!”

“I've a good mind to go find him. He's aboard
somewhere. I saw his long, snuff-colored surtout.
Trust me, his medicines are the best in the
world.”

“Ugh, ugh, ugh!”

“Oh, how sorry I am.”

“No doubt of it,” squeaked the other again, “but go,
get your charity out on deck. There parade the pursy
peacocks; they don't cough down here in desertion and
darkness, like poor old me. Look how scaly a pauper I
am, clove with this churchyard cough. Ugh, ugh,
ugh!”

“Again, how sorry I feel, not only for your cough,
but your poverty. Such a rare chance made unavailable.
Did you have but the sum named, how I could
invest it for you. Treble profits. But confidence—
I fear that, even had you the precious cash, you
would not have the more precious confidence I speak
of.”

“Ugh, ugh, ugh!” flightily raising himself. “What's
that? How, how? Then you don't want the money
for yourself?”

“My dear, dear sir, how could you impute to me

such preposterous self-seeking? To solicit out of hand,
for my private behoof, an hundred dollars from a perfect
stranger? I am not mad, my dear sir.”

“How, how?” still more bewildered, “do you, then,
go about the world, gratis, seeking to invest people's
money for them?”

“My humble profession, sir. I live not for myself;
but the world will not have confidence in me, and yet
confidence in me were great gain.”

“But, but,” in a kind of vertigo, “what do—do you
do—do with people's money? Ugh, ugh! How is the
gain made?”

“To tell that would ruin me. That known, every
one would be going into the business, and it would be
overdone. A secret, a mystery—all I have to do with
you is to receive your confidence, and all you have to
do with me is, in due time, to receive it back, thrice
paid in trebling profits.”

“What, what?” imbecility in the ascendant once
more; “but the vouchers, the vouchers,” suddenly
hunkish again.

“Honesty's best voucher is honesty's face.”

“Can't see yours, though,” peering through the obscurity.

From this last alternating flicker of rationality, the
miser fell back, sputtering, into his previous gibberish,
but it took now an arithmetical turn. Eyes closed, he
lay muttering to himself—

“One hundred, one hundred—two hundred, two hundred—three
hundred, three hundred.”

He opened his eyes, feebly stared, and still more feebly
said—

“It's a little dim here, ain't it? Ugh, ugh! But,
as well as my poor old eyes can see, you look honest.”

“I am glad to hear that.”

“If—if, now, I should put”—trying to raise himself,
but vainly, excitement having all but exhausted him—
“if, if now, I should put, put—”

“No ifs. Downright confidence, or none. So help
me heaven, I will have no half-confidences.”

He said it with an indifferent and superior air, and
seemed moving to go.

“Don't, don't leave me, friend; bear with me; age
can't help some distrust; it can't, friend, it can't. Ugh,
ugh, ugh! Oh, I am so old and miserable. I ought to
have a guardeean. Tell me, if—”

“If? No more!”

“Stay! how soon—ugh, ugh!—would my money be
trebled? How soon, friend?”

“You won't confide. Good-bye!”

“Stay, stay,” falling back now like an infant, “I
confide, I confide; help, friend, my distrust!”

From an old buckskin pouch, tremulously dragged
forth, ten hoarded eagles, tarnished into the appearance
of ten old horn-buttons, were taken, and half-eagerly,
half-reluctantly, offered.

“I know not whether I should accept this slack confidence,”
said the other coldly, receiving the gold, “but
an eleventh-hour confidence, a sick-bed confidence, a

distempered, death-bed confidence, after all. Give me
the healthy confidence of healthy men, with their
healthy wits about them. But let that pass. All right.
Good-bye!”

“Nay, back, back—receipt, my receipt! Ugh, ugh,
ugh! Who are you? What have I done? Where go
you? My gold, my gold! Ugh, ugh, ugh!”

But, unluckily for this final flicker of reason, the
stranger was now beyond ear-shot, nor was any one else
within hearing of so feeble a call.