Part 4 (1/2)

”Aye, aye, sir. Git dap! Git dap! Limpin', creepin', crawlin', hoppin', jumpin'.... Starboard! _starboard_, you son of a Chinee! Need a tug to haul this critter into the channel, I swan you do! Git dap! All s.h.i.+pshape aft there, Cap'n Sears? Good enough! let her run.”

The old white horse--like the whisk broom and the Rogers group, a part of the furniture of the General Minot place--plodded along the dusty road and the blue truck-wagon rolled and rattled behind him. Captain Kendrick, settling his invalid limbs in the most comfortable fas.h.i.+on, lay back upon the seaweed and stared at the sky seen through the branches of elms and silver-leaf poplars which arched above. He made no attempt to look over the sides of the cart. Raising himself upon an elbow to do so entailed a good deal of exertion and this was his first trip abroad since his accident. Besides, seeing would probably mean being seen and he was not in the mood to answer the questions of curious, even if sympathetic, townsfolk. Judah made several attempts at conversation, but the replies were not satisfactory, so he gave it up after a little and, as was his habit, once more broke forth in song.

Judah Cahoon, besides being sea cook on many, many voyages, had been ”chantey man” on almost as many. His repertoire was, therefore, extensive and at times astonis.h.i.+ng. Now, as he rocked back and forth upon the wagon seat, he caroled, not the _Dreadnought_ chantey, but another, which told of a Yankee s.h.i.+p sailing down the Congo River, evidently in the old days of the slave trade.

”'Who do you think is the cap'n of her?

Blow, boys, blow!

Old Holy Joe, the darky lover, Blow, my bully boys, blow!

'What do you think they've got for dinner?

Blow, boys, blow!

Hot water soup, but a dum sight thinner, Blow, my bully boys, blow!

'Oh, blow to-day and blow to-morrer, Blow, boys, blow!

And blow for all old salts in sorrer, Blow, my bully----'

”Oh, say, Cap'n Sears!”

”Yes, Judah?”

”They've put up the name sign on the Fair Harbor since you was in Bayport afore, ain't they? We're right off abreast of it now. Can't you hist yourself up and look over the side? It's some consider'ble of a sign, that is. Lobelia she left word to have that sign painted and set up last time she was here. She's over acrost in one of them Eyetalian ports now, so I understand, her and that feller she married. Eh? Ain't that quite a sign, now, Cap'n?”

Kendrick, because his driver seemed to be so eager, sat up and looked over the sideboard of the truck-wagon. The vehicle was just pa.s.sing a long stretch of ornate black iron fence in the center of which was a still more ornate gate with an iron arch above it. In the curve of the arch swung a black sign, its edges gilded, and with this legend printed upon it in gilt letters:

FAIR HARBOR

For Mariners' Women

”Without, the stormy winds increase, Within the harbor all is peace.”

Behind the fence was a good-sized tract of lawn heavily shaded with trees, a brick walk, and at the rear a large house. The house itself was of the stately Colonial type and its simple dignity was in marked contrast to the fence.

Captain Kendrick recognized the establishment of course. It, with its next door neighbor the General Minot place, was for so many years the home of old Captain Sylva.n.u.s Seymour. Captain Sylva.n.u.s, during his lifetime, was active claimant for the throne of King of Bayport. He was the town's leading Democratic politician, its wealthiest citizen, with possibly one exception--its most lavish entertainer--with the same possible exception--and when the Governor came to the Cape on ”Cattle Show Day” he was sure to be a guest at the Seymour place--unless General Ashahel Minot, who was the exception mentioned--had gotten his invitation accepted first. For General Minot was Bayport's leading Whig, as Captain Sylva.n.u.s was its leading Democrat, and the rivalry between the two was intense. Nevertheless, they were, in public at least, extremely polite and friendly, and when they did agree--as on matters concerning the village tax rate and the kind of doctrine permitted to be preached in the Orthodox meeting-house--their agreement was absolute and overwhelming. In their day the Captain and the General dominated Bayport by sea and land.

But that day had pa.s.sed. They had both been dead for some years. Captain Seymour died first and his place and property were inherited by his maiden daughter, Miss Lobelia Seymour. Sears Kendrick remembered Lobelia as a dressy, romantic spinster, very much in evidence at the church socials and at meetings of the Shakespeare Reading Society, and who sang a somewhat shrill soprano in the choir.

Now, as he looked over the side of Judah Cahoon's truck-wagon and saw the sign hanging beneath the arch above the gate of the Seymour place he began dimly to remember other things, bits of news embodied in letters which his sister, Sarah Macomber, had written him at various times.

Lobelia Seymour had--she had done something with the family home, something unusual. What was it? Why, yes....

”Judah,” he said, ”Lobelia Seymour turned that place into a--a sort of home, didn't she?”

Judah twisted on the wagon seat to stare at him.

”What are you askin' me that for, Cap'n Sears?” he demanded. ”You know more about it than I do, I guess likely. Anyhow, you ought to; you was brought up in Bayport; I wasn't.”

”Yes, but I've been away from it ten times longer than I've been in it.

I'd forgotten all about Lobelia. Seems to me Sarah wrote me somethin'

about her, though, and that she had turned her father's place into a home for women.”

”For mariners' women, that's what she calls it. Didn't you see it on the sign? Ho, ho! that's a good one, ain't it, Cap'n Sears? 'Mariners'