Mrs. Cliff started back astonished. "w.i.l.l.y Croup!" she exclaimed. "You amaze me! I don"t think she would suit you."
"I"d like to know why not?" he asked quickly.
"In the first place," said she, "it"s a long time since w.i.l.l.y was a girl."
"That"s the kind I want," he answered. "I don"t want to adopt a daughter. I want to marry a grown woman."
"Well," said Mrs. Cliff, "w.i.l.l.y is certainly grown. But then, it doesn"t seem to me that she would be adapted to a married life. I am sure she has made up her mind to live single, and she hasn"t been accustomed to manage a house and conduct domestic affairs. She has always had some one to depend upon."
"That"s what I like," said he. "Let her depend on me. And as to management, you needn"t say anything to me about that, Mrs. Cliff. I saw her bouncing to the galley of the _Summer Shelter_, and if she manages other things as well as she managed the cooking business there, she"ll suit me."
"It seems so strange to me, Mr. Burke," said Mrs. Cliff, after a few moments" silence. "I never imagined that you would care for w.i.l.l.y Croup."
Mr. Burke drew himself forward to the edge of the chair on which he was sitting, he put one hand on each of his outspread knees, and he leaned forward, with a very earnest and animated expression on his countenance.
"Now, look here, Mrs. Cliff," he said, "I want to say something to you.
When I see a young woman, brought up in the very bosom of the Sunday school, and on the quarter deck of respectability, and who never, perhaps, had a cross word said to her in all her life, or said one to anybody, judging from her appearance, and whose mind is more like a clean pocket-handkerchief in regard to hard words and rough language than anything I can think of;--when I see that young woman with a snow-white disposition that would naturally lead her to hymns whenever she wanted to raise her voice above common conversation,--when I see that young woman, I say, in a moment of life or death to her and every one about her, dash to the door of that engine room, and shout my orders down to that muddled engineer,--knowing I couldn"t leave the wheel to give them myself,--ramming them into him as if with the point of a handspike, yelling out everything that I said, word for word, without picking or choosing, trusting in me that I knew what ought to be said in such a moment, and saying it after me, word for word, cursing, swearing, slamming down oaths on him just as I did, trusting in me all the time as to what words ought to be used, and just warming up that blasted engineer until sense enough came to him to make him put out his hand and back her,--then, Mrs. Cliff, I know that a woman who stands by me at a time like that will stand by me at any time, and that"s the woman I want to stand by. And now, what have you got to say?"
"All I have to say," answered Mrs. Cliff, who had been listening intently to Mr. Burke"s extraordinary flow of words, "all I have to say is, if that"s the way you think about her, you ought to speak to her."
"Madam," said Burke, springing to his feet, "that suits me. I would have spoken to her before, but I had my doubts about what you"d think of it.
But now that I see you"re willing to sign the papers, what I want to know is, where will I be likely to find Miss Croup?"
Mrs. Cliff laughed. "You are very prompt," said she, "and I think you will find w.i.l.l.y in the little parlor. She was sewing there when I saw her last."
In less than a minute Mr. Burke stood before w.i.l.l.y Croup in the little parlor. "Miss Croup," said he, "I want to ask you something."
[Ill.u.s.tration: w.i.l.l.y SAT AND LOOKED AT HIM]
"What is it?" said w.i.l.l.y, letting her work drop in her lap.
"Miss Croup," said he, "I heard you swear once, and I never heard anybody swear better, and with more conscience. You did that swearing for me, and now I want to ask you if you will be willing to swear for me again?"
"No," said w.i.l.l.y, her cheeks flushing as she spoke, "no, I won"t! It was all very well for you to tell me that I didn"t do anything wrong when I talked in that dreadful way to Mr. Maxwell, and for you to get the ministers to tell me that as I didn"t understand what I was saying, of course there was no sin in it; but although I don"t feel as badly about it as I did, I sometimes wake up in the night and fairly shiver when I think of the words I used that day. And I"ve made up my mind, no matter whether ships are to be sunk or what is to happen, I will never do that thing again, and I don"t want you ever to expect it of me."
"But, William Croup," exclaimed Mr. Burke, forgetting in his excitement that the full form of her Christian name was not likely to be masculine, "that isn"t the way I want you to swear this time. What I want you to do is, to stand up alongside of me in front of a minister and swear you"ll take me for your loving husband to love, honor, and protect, and all the rest of it, till death do us part. Now, what do you say to that?"
w.i.l.l.y sat and looked at him. The flush went out of her cheeks, and then came again, but it was a different kind of a flush this time, and the brightness went out of her eyes, and another light, a softer and a different light, came into them. "Oh! Is that what you want?" she said, presently. "I wouldn"t mind that."
THE END