University of Virginia Library

19. CHAPTER XIX.

To keep up with the improvements in Crest made in
his absence, Sam Rogers, with an ivory cane, made occasional
excursions about the town and suburbs. Crossing
a field, one gray December afternoon, to shorten the
distance to an unfrequented road which he wished to
gain, he saw a pair of horses which he knew, toiling up
the hill, and stopped behind the stone wall till they
reached the place where he stood, and passed. He saw
Parke in his light curricle, and Charlotte Lang beside
him. He noticed that the whip was in its rest, and that
only one of Parke's hands was employed in driving;
the reins hung loosely, and the horses went to one side
of the hill and then to the other, as they chose. Sam
looked after the carriage till it rolled out of sight; then
he sat down on the wall, wiped his face with his handkerchief,
and said: “Damned strumpet—cursed fool—
coward—knave!” He sat there a long time, staring at
the hill, before he could make up his mind what plan to
follow.

That evening he made the tour of the stores where
men gathered to gossip over the events of the day, and
listened to them with jealous attention, but heard nothing
that he feared and half-expected to hear concerning
that chain of circumstances—a link of which he had
seen that afternoon. The next morning he haunted the
bar-room of the tavern, the stable, the ship-yards, and

wharves, and made several calls among his female acquaintances,
but heard no mention of the fact, which
was nearly breaking his heart. On all sides he was accosted
with raillery for his rare and unexpected appearance.
“You are getting tired of your aristocratic
friends,” said one; and, “Have you had too much of the
Austers?” said another; and, “We were afraid you were
going to give up us and whaling,” said a third. To all
of which he growled expletives more forcible than elegant.
On his way home he met Jason, and, suddenly
wheeling about, walked with him. Thrusting his hands
into his pockets, he fell into a deep study. Jason was
reminded of Mr. Ritchings's vagaries, and wondered
whether Sam, too, had not fallen a victim to the same
trouble. He made no effort to break Sam's revery, but
walked beyond his own house, and would have walked
still farther, if Sam had not suddenly looked up and
struck him on the shoulder.

“How are you, Jason?”

I think, Sam, I am better than you are.”

“I vow to God, I hope you'll keep so.”

He wheeled round suddenly, left Jason without another
word, and went home to his dinner, which he attacked
with an absent-mindedness that amazed and distressed
his mother.

“You eat,” she said, “but you do not set any value
on your food. I thought that apple-pie would go to the
right place. I put cinnamon in it on purpose.”

He immediately bit a large piece, but with an expression
which by no means satisfied her.

“I do believe you wish you were off to sea again, and
I am no better than the pelican in the wilderness.”

He laughed wildly.

“Any neighbors been in lately, mother?”

“Mrs. Jones, Tim's mother, was here yesterday, after
some carpet-rags.”

“What did she say?”

“She was so bound up in rags she couldn't think of
much else.”

“A she Lazarus.”

“She is afflicted with a bad humor,” Mrs. Rogers
said, solemnly.

He laughed wildly again, and she declared that she
shouldn't wonder if he was coming down with the canker-rash—it
was about.

“The Jones family live near those Langs, don't they?”

“Yes, the Jones's house is the nearest; about half a
mile from it.”

“She did not mention them, I suppose?”

“Well, she did say that they kept themselves to themselves,
as they ought to; and she said, too, that Mrs.
Lang always washed on odd days of the week, instead
of Monday. She must have queer ways, but I believe
she is regular at the Baptist meeting.”

“I thought you were going to have a tea-party for
me?”

“Law, Sam, I will any day.”

“Some day this week?”

“Let me see, to-day is Tuesday—well, Friday, say.”

“Who shall we have—the Austers.”

“And Mr. Ritchings.”

“Of course. Did you ever ask Elsa Bowen to tea,
mother?”

“Many's the cup of hyson she and me have had together

in years gone by. What a hand with sick folks
she was! We used to go watching together; I always
thought she was all the more lively in times of distress.
She never goes out now, and I don't see much of her.”

“She never will forsake the Austers.”

“Not on account of any trouble they may be in, for
she is so odd; she may go from some whim. She is
proud of her connection with them; you know she was
second cousin to Mrs. Maria Parke, the Squire's second
wife.”

“You believe one person is as good as another, don't
you?”

“Pretty much, unless they are Universalists.”

“I am a Universalist.”

“Don't let anybody know it in Crest. Take your
notions of salvation to the natives, if you want to.
Dear me, how can you believe that the wicked ought
to be saved?”

It seemed as if her discourse soothed him. He smoked
several pipes while she ran on, and his countenance assumed
its wonted expression of tranquillity. For a moment
he could not believe in the reality of calamity.
His mother's placid face, the tones of her voice, so free
from anxiety, denied it for him. He remembered that
she had passed through trouble, but not a vestige remained.
The material atmosphere about was alone
marked with permanence; the most trivial objects outlasted
the heaviest affliction the heart could bear. There
were the brass candlesticks on the shelf, which had been
kept bright year in and year out, in the face of disaster
and death; and the eight-day clock, with its dull, enamelled
face and glit top; and the chair-cushions of broadcloth

patch-work were kept in their old place, while millions
of men had gone mad with trouble, and out of life.
The smell of the old wood-work, the light from the
green knots in the old window-glass, the nameless sounds
which come and go where people live, which were associated
in his mind with events of the past, and had survived
them, assured him that in such things alone existed
perpetuity. The creaking of his mother's old chair, in
which she sat rocking, and had rocked so many years,
he listened to, and compared it without emotion to the
creaking of the cordage of the ship which went down,
carrying with her his shipmates, and leaving him with
a solitary boat, on just such a day as this, when there
was a long, unbroken swell in the sea, with silvery reflections
from the pale, cold, angry sun. What did the
sea know of that event to-day! The gulls dipped into
the swell with their gay scream, and chased each other,
with wildly-flashing wings, over its gray surface. That
was all he remembered.

Early in the evening he went to Jason's, and sat down
to chess with Philippa. There was an unusual bustle in
the house, owing to some kitchen anniversary. Elsa
made frequent inroads into the parlor, where they were,
and Sarah frequent exits from it. Great fires were burning,
and lamps were alight in all the rooms. The atmosphere
was exhilarating, fixed, secure, and Sam could not
help feeling comforted. As the evening advanced quiet
settled over the house. Sarah, fatigued, rested silently
in her chair by the fire. Jason sat by himself over the
dining-room fire, with his feet on the fender, and his arms
folded. Parke came in, and with a nod to Sam, and “How
are you, shipmate?” seated himself by the piano, and

played, at first, a loud, triumphant march, full of reiterated
notes, and then a waltz, which opened with a silvery
trickle, deepened into a wild, rushing flow—a chaos of
tumultuous, broken, whirling foam, and ended in a vague,
solemn, unvarying swell. Sam's sensibilities, excited
again, traced the spirit of the waltz, its wild cry for possession,
its unappeased longings, its wail of satiety, its
necessity for the eternal, and its despair.

Jason's pale face passed the door, and repassed.

It was Philippa's turn to move, but the game had stood
still. Sam gave the board a shake, which toppled the
chess-men over, with noise enough to rouse Parke from
his musical dream. He left the piano. Sam furtively
searched his face. He saw only the same tranquil, winning
beauty. But Parke's lids drooped over his eyes.
Behind lay a world, concerning which Milton invoked
the heavenly muse to sing,—

Parke drew a chair beside his mother's. He smoothed
her glossy, waving hair, turned the curls over his fingers,
asked her about the brooch that fastened her collar, took
her hand, and feared it was hardened with too much
work; she must not do so much for them all. She met
his eyes with a smile, and he looked into hers, with an
expression which she could not read, because for her
“the handwriting on the wall” was never visible. The
kind mood expanded and included Philippa, who yielded
to his irresistible sway. Could she have understood his
face and manner, there was that in them which would
have made her soul quell with pain. An apprehensive
chill struck Sam. He felt that danger emanated from
Parke's behavior. It betokened the wakefulness of a
faculty which had roused all the other faculties into play.
It betokened a farewell to the relations between him and
his mother—Philippa—all! A cowardly fear assailed
him lest Parke should envelop him too, and then, with his
infernal candor, show him the sword oscillating over
their heads.

“What has become of Jason?” he exclaimed, starting
up. “By-the-way, I am going to have a tea-party. Will
you all come, on Friday?”

“Of course,” said Sarah.

“Of course,” Parke echoed, dreamily.

Sam passed quickly into the room where Jason was,
instead of leaving the house by the front door, and spoke
to him, listening for some movement from Parke. He
had gone to the piano again. Relieved from his fear,
Sam went into the kitchen, hoping to get out unobserved,
but Elsa and Mary were still busy there.

He walked round the table and asked Elsa to give him
something to take home to eat—he was starved.

“Gracious, Sam, if you don't like your mother's cooking,
I can't suit you.”

“What's the news?” he asked, peering into her acute
face.

“I don't go about collecting the article. Haven't you
brought some? You look wise.”

“Yes, the devil isn't dead.”

“Is that news? Here, take this mince-pie, and clear
out with your devil. Bury him if you can.”

He took the pie, with a laugh, and disappeared.

“He is bright,” said Elsa to herself, “and good.

People don't know him as well as they think they do.
And his father was a stupid man, and his mother is a
stupid woman.”