My uncle laughed.
"Dead!" the stranger repeated. "Dead, Top! And you, too--you hound!"
"Twas an anathema spoken in wrath and hatred.
"I"m thinkin"," says my uncle, "that ye"re an unkind man."
The stranger growled.
"Save your temper, man," my uncle admonished. "Ye"ll need the last rag of it afore the night"s by."
The man cried out against the threat.
"I"m tellin" ye," says my uncle--and I heard his broad hand come with a meaning clap on the stranger"s shoulder--"that ye"ll be wakin" the lad."
"The lad! the lad!" the stranger whined. "Is there nothing in the world for you, Top, but that club-footed young whelp?"
I heard it! I heard the words! My door was ajar--my room at the head of the stair--my ears wide and anxious. I heard the words! There was no mistaking what this intruder said. "The club-footed young whelp!" says he. "Is there nothing in the world for you, Top, but that club-footed young whelp?" He said it--I remember that he said it--and to this day, when I am grown beyond the years of childish sensitiveness, I resent the jibe.
"Nothing," my uncle answered. "Nothing in the world, sir," he repeated, lovingly, as I thought, "but only that poor club-footed child!"
Sir? "Twas a queer way to address, thinks I, this man of doubtful quality. Sir? I could not make it out.
"You sentimental fool!"
"Nay, sir," my uncle rejoined, with spirit. "An they"s a fool in the company, "tis yourself. I"ve that from the lad, sir, that you goes lacking--ay, an" will go, t" the grave!"
"And what, Top," the stranger sneered, "may this thing be?"
"Ye"ll laugh, sir," my uncle replied, "when I tells you "tis his love."
The man did laugh.
"For shame!" cried my uncle.
He was taking off his wraps--this stranger. They were so many that I wondered. He was a man of quality, after all, it might be. "I tell you, Top," said he, "that the boy may be d.a.m.ned for all I care. I said d.a.m.ned. I _mean_ d.a.m.ned. There isn"t another form of words, with which I am acquainted, sufficient to express my lack of interest in this child"s welfare. Do you understand me, Top? And do you realize--you obstinate noddy!--that my heart"s in the word? You and I, Top, have business together. It"s a dirty business. It was in the beginning; it is now--a dirty business for us both. I admit it. But can"t we do it reasonably? Can"t we do it alone? Why introduce this ill-born whelp?
He"s making trouble, Top; and he"ll make more with every year he lives. Let him shift for himself, man! I care nothing about him. What was his father to me? What was his mother? Make him a cook on a trader. Make him a hand on a Labradorman. Put him before the mast on a foreign craft. What do I care? Let him go! Give him a hook and line. A paddle-punt is patrimony enough for the like of him. Will you never listen to reason? What"s the lad to you? d.a.m.n him, say I! Let him--"
"For that," my uncle interrupted, in a pa.s.sion, "I"ll hurt ye! Come soon, come late, I"ll hurt ye! Hear me?" he continued, savagely. "I"ll hurt ye for them evil wishes!"
I had expected this outbreak. My uncle would not hear me d.a.m.ned in this cruel way without protest.
"Top," says the stranger, with a little laugh of scorn, "when _you_ hurt _me_--I"ll know that the chieftest knave of the St. John"s water-side has turned fool!"
"When I hurts ye, man," my uncle answered, "I"ll hurt ye sore!"
Again the man laughed.
"Ah, man!" my uncle growled, "but ye"ll squirm for that when the time comes!"
"Come, come, Top!" says the stranger, in such a whine of terror, in such disgusting weakness and sudden withdrawal of high boasting, in such a failure of courage, that I could hardly credit the thing.
"Come, come, Top!" he whined. "You"ll do nothing rash, will you? Not _rash_, Top--not rash!"
"I"ll make ye squirm, sir," says my uncle, "for d.a.m.nin" Dannie."
"But you"ll do nothing rash, man, will you?"
My uncle would not heed him.
"I"m a reasonable man, Top," the stranger protested. "You know I"m not a hard man."
They moved, now, into the dining-room, whence no word of what they said came to my ears. I listened, lying wide-eared in the dark, but heard only a rumble of voices. "And you, too--you hound!" the man had said; and "twas spoken in the hate that forebodes murder. My uncle?
what had that childlike, tenderhearted old rascal accomplished against this man to make the penalty of unG.o.dly wrath a thing meet to the offence? "And you, too--you hound!" I lay in grave trouble and bewilderment, fearing that this strange guest might work his hate upon my uncle, in some explosion of resentment, before my arm could aid against the deed. There was no sound of laughter from below--no hint of conviviality in the intercourse. Voices and the clink of bottle and gla.s.s: nothing mellow in the voices, nothing genial in the clink of gla.s.s--nothing friendly or hospitable. "Twas an uneasy occupation that engaged me; no good, as I knew, came from a surly bout with a bottle of rum. "Twas still blowing high; the windows rattled, the sea broke in thunder and venomous hissing upon the rocks, the wind screamed its complaint of obstruction; "twas a tumultuous night, wherein, it seems to me, the pa.s.sions of men are not overawed by any display of inimical power, but break restraint in evil company with the weather. The voices below, as I hearkened, rose and fell, like the gusts of a gale, falling to quiet confidences, lost in the roar of the night, swiftly rising to threat and angry counter-threat.
It ended in a cry and a crash of gla.s.s....
I was by this brought out of bed and pattering down the stair to my uncle"s help. It seemed they did not hear me, or, having heard, were enraged past caring who saw them in this evil case. At the door I came to a stand. There was no encounter, no movement at all, within the room; "twas very quiet and very still. There had fallen upon the world that pregnant silence, wherein men wait appalled, which follows upon the irrevocable act of a quarrel. A bottle of rum was overturned on the table, and a gla.s.s lay in splinters on the hearth at my uncle"s back, as though cast with poor aim. The place reeked with the stench of rum, which rose from a river of liquor, overflowing the table, dripping to the floor: a foul and sinister detail, I recall, of the tableau. My uncle and the gray little man from St. John"s, leaning upon their hands, the table between, faced each other all too close for peaceful issue of the broil. Beyond was my uncle"s hand-lamp, where I had set it, burning serenely in this tempest of pa.s.sion. The faces were silhouetted in profile against its quiet yellow light. Monstrous shadows of the antagonists were cast upon the table and ceiling. For the first time in my life I clapped eyes on the man from St. John"s; but his face was in shadow--I saw dimly.
"Twas clean-shaven and gray: I could tell no more. But yet, I knew, the man was a man of some distinction--a gentleman. "Twas a definite impression I had. There was that about him--clothes and carriage and shaven face and lean white hands--that fixed it in my memory.
I was not observed.
"Out there on the Devil"s Teeth," my uncle impa.s.sively began, "when I laid hold--"
"But," the stranger protested, "I have nothing to do with that!"
"Out there on the Devil"s Teeth, that night," my uncle repeated, "when the seas was breakin" over, an" the ice begin t" come, an" I laid hold o" that there Book--"
"Hear me, Top! Will you _not_ hear me?"
"Out there on the Devil"s Teeth," my uncle patiently reiterated, "when the crew was drownin" t" le"ward, an" "twas every man for his own life, an" the ice begin t" come, an" I laid hold o" that there--"
The stranger struck the table with his palm. "Hear me!" he implored.
"I have nothing--nothing--to do with the Devil"s Teeth!"
"Out there on the Devil"s Teeth, when I took the oath--"
"You stupid fool!"
"When I took the oath," my uncle resumed, "I knowed "twould be hard t"
stand by. I knowed that, sir. I done the thing with open eyes. I"ll never plead ignorance afore the Lord G.o.d A"mighty, sir, for the words I spoke that night. I"ve stood by, as best I could; an" I"ll keep on standin" by, sir, t" the end, as best I"m able. G.o.d help me, sir!" he groaned, leaning still closer to the gray face of his enemy. "Ye think ye"re in hard case, yourself, sir, don"t ye? Do ye never give a thought t" _me?_ Dirty business, says you, betwixt you an" me! Ay; dirty business for Nick Top. But he"ll stand by; he"ll stand by, sir, come what may--t" the end! I"m not complainin", mark ye! not complainin" at all. The lad"s a good lad. I"m not complainin". He"ve the makin"s of a better man than you. Oh no! I"m not complainin". Out there on the Devil"s Teeth, that night, when the souls o" them men was goin" Aloft an" Below, accordin" t" their deserts, does ye think I was a fool? Fool! I tells ye, sir, I knowed full well I give my soul t"
h.e.l.l, that night, when I laid my hand on the Book an" swore that I"d stand by. An" I _will_ stand by--stand by the lad, sir, t" the end!
He"s a good lad--he"ll make a better man than you--an" I"ve no word o" complaint t" say."
"The lad, the lad! Do _I_ care for the lad?"
"No, G.o.d forgive ye!" my uncle cried, "not you that ought."