Part 16 (1/2)

”Humph!” returned Mr. Bowdoin. ”How about state rights? Do we live in the sovereign State of Ma.s.sachusetts, or do we not, I should like to know?”

”How about the Union, sir?” whispered Harley slyly.

”Hang the Union! Hang the Union, if it employ a parcel of thugs to do its work!” said Mr. Bowdoin, so loud that there was a ripple of laughter in the court-room; and the judge looked up from the bench and smiled, for had not he dined with old Mr. Bowdoin in their college club once a month for forty years? But a low-browed fellow who was sitting behind the counsel at the table was heard to mutter ”Treason.”

Beside him in the prisoner's dock sat the slave; not cowed nor abject, though in chains and handcuffs, but looking straight before him at the low-browed man who was his master, as a bird might look at a snake.

”Which of those two is the slave?” asked Mr. Bowdoin in an audible voice.

Again the room laughed. The clerk rapped order. The low-browed man looked up angrily, and spoke to a deputy marshal whose face had been turned away from Mr. Bowdoin before. He rose and started toward them.

”By Heaven,” cried Mr. Bowdoin, ”it is David St. Clair!”

IV.

But old Jamie knew naught of this, and the Bowdoins never told him.

They consulted much what they should do; but they never told him. And Jamie went on, piling up his money. Three rolls were in the old chest now, and all of Spanish gold. Doubloons and pistoles were growing rarer, and the price was getting higher. But the old clerk was not content with replacing the present value to the credit of ”Pirates” on the books; the actual pieces must be returned; so that if any earringed, whiskered buccaneer turned up to demand his money from James Bowdoin's Sons, he might have it back in specie, in the very pieces themselves, that the honor of the firm might be maintained.

Until then, he felt sure, there was little chance the box would ever be looked into. Practically, he was safe; it was only his conscience, not his fears, that troubled him.

Since he had sent her that hundred dollars, he had heard nothing from Mercedes. The Bowdoins did not tell him how her husband had sunk to be a slave-catcher; for they knew how miserly old Jamie had become, and supposed that his salary all went to her. While Jamie could take care of her, it mattered little what the worthless husband did, save the pain of Jamie's knowing it. And of course they did not know that Jamie could no longer take care of her, and why.

But one day, in the spring of 185-, a New York correspondent of the bank came on to Boston, and Mr. Bowdoin gave a dinner for him at the house. The dinner was at three o'clock; but old lady Bowdoin wore her best gown of tea-colored satin, and James Bowdoin and his wife were there. After dinner, the three gentlemen sat discussing old madeira, and old and new methods of banking, and the difference between Boston and New York, which was already beginning to a.s.sume a metropolitan preeminence.

”By the way, speaking of old-fas.h.i.+oned ways,” said the New Yorker suddenly, ”that's a queer old clerk of yours,--Mr. McMurtagh, I mean.”

”Looks as if he might have stepped out of one of d.i.c.kens's novels, does he not?” said Mr. Bowdoin, always delighted to have Jamie's peculiarities appreciatively mentioned.

”But how did you come to know him?” asked Mr. James.

”Why, I see him once a year or so. Don't you send him occasionally to New York?”

”He used to go, some years ago,” said Mr. Bowdoin.

”He buys his Spanish gold of us,” added the New Yorker. ”Queer fancy you have of buying up doubloons. Gold is gold, though, in these times.”

”Spanish doubloons?” said Mr. James.

”We have a use for them at the bank,” remarked the old gentleman sharply. ”Shall we join the ladies?”

”You have to pay a pretty premium for them,” added the money-dealer, as he stopped to wipe his lips. ”Wonderful madeira, this.”

Old Mr. Bowdoin took no squeaking toy to bed with him that night; but at breakfast his worthy spouse vowed he must take another room if he would be so wakeful. For once the old gentleman had no repartee, but hurried down to the bank. Early as he was, he found his son James there before him. And with all his soul he seized upon the chance to lose his temper.

”Well, sir, and what are you spying about for? You're not a director in the bank!”

Mr. James looked up, astonished.

”Got a headache, I suppose, from drinking with that New York tyke they sent us yesterday!”