Part 5 (1/2)
”He's gone down to the Nancy Jane. Won't you come in, Captain Perkins?
Come in and sit down a while.”
”Wal, yes. And how's your little gal?” Seeing a dubious look on Mrs.
Browne's face, he said: ”Or is it a boy, now? I call at so many houses I git confused. Fine child, I remember.”
”The lad's gone off with his father,” said Judith, giving Perkins a seat in the pa.s.sage.
After more preliminary talk the peddler got to his main point, that he had lots of nice notions and things this year cheaper'n they could be had in London. All the folks agreed that his things were ”cheaper, considerin' quality, Mis' Braown, than you could git 'em in London.”
Judith knew by experience that his things were neither very good nor very cheap, but her only chance in life to know anything of the delights of shopping lay in the coming of peddling sloops. One might order a frock, a bonnet, or a petticoat from London, but one must wait nearly a year till the tobacco s.h.i.+p returned to get what had been sent for. It was better to be cheated a little in order to get the pleasure of making up her mind and then changing it, of fancying herself possessor now of this and now of that, and finally getting what she liked best after having had the usufruct of the whole stock. She was soon examining the goods that Perkins's boy had brought up to her--fancy things for herself and young Sanford, and coa.r.s.e cloth for her servants. She concluded nothing about staple trading till her husband should return; for prices were to be fixed on the corn and bacon which must be paid in exchange. But there were articles that she craved, and of which she preferred not to speak to her husband, for a while at least, and these she paid for from her little h.o.a.rd of pieces of eight, or Spanish dollars. The change she made in fractions of these coins--actual quarters of dollars cut like pieces of pie. These were tested in Perkins's little money scales. Less than a quarter of a dollar was usually disregarded in the South; and as for Perkins, he never seemed to have any fractional silver to give back in change, but always proposed some little article that he would put in at cost just to fill up to the value of a piece of eight.
Paddling with the wind, Sanford Browne's cedar canoe made good speed, and as the sun was setting and the wind falling it glided past the Yankee sloop into shoal water farther up, where its inmates disembarked, and beached their craft.
Sanford Browne walked rapidly up the bank, followed by his son, the servants, and the old convict. He approached Perkins and greeted him, but in a manner not cordial and hardly courteous. He looked at Judith so severely that she fancied him offended with her. She reflected quickly that he could not have known anything of her surrept.i.tious trading with the peddler. Uriah Perkins concluded that a storm was brewing between husband and wife, and found it necessary to return to the sloop to make her fast astern, against the turn of the tide and the veering of the wind.
When Perkins had disappeared, Sanford Browne pointed to the convict and said slowly and with fierceness:
”Judy, that's the man. That's Black Jim Lewis, that stole me away from home and sold me for a redemptioner. Jocko, go fetch the manacles.”
Judith stood speechless. It was a guiding maxim with her that women should not meddle with men's business, and it was an article of faith that whatever her husband did was right. She sympathized with his resentment against the man who had kidnaped him. But the sight of the terror-stricken face of the cowardly brute smote her woman's heart with pity as the manacles were put on the convict's wrists.
”See that he doesn't get away,” said Browne to Bob.
”He can't pound his corn with them things,” said Bob, pointing to the handcuffs. ”Shall I get him some meal?”
”Not to-night,” said Browne. ”He didn't give me a crust to eat the first night I was on s.h.i.+p. Turn about's fair play, Captain Lewis. Take him to the quarters.”
When the convict found himself manacled, his terror increased. He pulled away from Bob and approached Browne.
”Let me speak a word, master,” he began tremulously. ”I'm all broke up and ruinated, anyhow. I know the devil must 'a' been in me the day I took you away. I've thought of it many a time, and I've said, 'Jim Lewis, something dreadful'll come to you for stealin' a good little boy that way.'” Here he paused. Then he resumed in a still more broken voice: ”When I was put on to a transport to come to this country I remembered you, and I says, 'That's what's come of it.' Soon as I saw that little fellow, the very picture of you the day when I coaxed you away, I says to myself, 'O my G.o.d, I'm done fer now! I'm ruinated for a fact; I might as well be in h.e.l.l as in Maryland.' But, master, if you'll only have just a little pity on an old man that's all broke up and ruinated, I'll--I'll--be a good servant to you. I promise you, afore Almighty G.o.d. Don't you go and be too hard on a poor ruinated old man. I'm old--seems to me I'm ten year older than I wuz afore I saw you this mornin'. I know you hate me. You've got strong reasons to hate me.
I hate myself, and I keep sayin' to myself, says I, 'Jim Lewis, what an old devil you are!' But please, master, if you won't be too hard on me, I think I'll be better. I can't live long nohow. But----”
”There, that'll do,” said Browne.
”Please, Mr. Browne,” interposed Judy.
”Lewis, do you remember when you woolded a sailor's head?” demanded the planter.
”I don't know, master. I have done lots of things a little hard.
Sailors are a hard lot.”
”If you'd had pity on that poor sailor when he begged for mercy, I'd have pity on you to-night But I cried over that sailor that you wouldn't have mercy on, and now I can't pity you a bit. You've made your own bed. Your turn has come.”
Saying this, Sanford Browne went into the house, while the old sea captain followed Bob in a half-palsied way round the south end of the house toward the servants' quarters, muttering, ”Well, now, Jim Lewis, you're done fer.”
”Mr. Browne, what are you going to do with that old man?” asked Judy, with more energy than she usually showed in speaking to her husband.
”I don't know, Judy. Something awful, I reckon.” Browne could not make up his mind to any distinct act of cruelty beyond sending the convict supperless to bed.
”I don't like you to be so hard on an old man. I know he's bad--as bad as can be, but that's no reason why you should be bad.”