Part 2 (1/2)

They shouted like cannibals, and bore down on all opposing objects with resistless force. I did not attempt an entrance. A rough, good-natured looking man stood on the platform outside.

I put on my gla.s.ses (I was sadly and unaffectedly near-sighted), and having further a.s.sured myself of his seeming honesty, inquired if there was such a place as Kedarville in the vicinity.

”Waal, no, miss, thar' ain't,” said he, with a noonday smile, which informed me that there was yet something to hope for. ”Thar's no _Kedarville_ that I know on. Thar's a Wallencamp some miles up yender.

We don't often tackle no Sunday go-to-meeting names on to it, but I reckon, maybe, it's the same you're a-lookin' for.”

He had spoken with such startling indefiniteness of the distance that I asked him how far it was to Wallencamp.

”Waal, thar' you've got me,” said he, beaming on me in a broadly complimentary way, as though I had actually circ.u.mvented him in some skilful play at words. ”Fact is, thar' ain't never been no survey run down in that direction that I know on. We call it four miles, more or less. That's Cape Cod measure--means most anythin' lineal measure.

Talkin' 'bout Cape Cod miles,” he continued, with an irresistible air of raillery; ”little Bachelder Lot lives up thar' to Wallencamp, and they don't have no church nor nothin' thar', so Bachelder and some on 'em they come up here, once in a while, ter Sunday-school. Deacon Lancy, he'd rather see the Old Boy comin' into Sunday-school cla.s.s any time than Bachelder; for he's quiet, the little bachelder is, but dry as a herrin'.

So the Deacon thought he'd stick him on distances. The Deacon is a great stickler on distances.

”'How fur, Bachelder,' says he, 'did Adam and Eve go when they was turned out of the garden of Eden?' says he.

”'Waal,' says Bachelder, coughing a little, so--that's Bachelder's way o' talking--'we have sufficient reason to eenfer, Deacon, that, in all probabeelity, they went a _Ceape Cod mile_.'”

My informant's delight at this reminiscence was huge. It yielded to a more subdued sense of the ludicrous when I asked him if there was any public conveyance to Wallencamp. He made a polite effort to restrain his mirth, but the muscles of his face twitched violently.

”Waal, no, miss,” said he; ”we don't run no reg'lar express up to Wallencamp; might be a very healthy oc'pation, but not as lukertive as some, I reckon--not as lukertive as pickin' 'tater-bugs: that's what they do, mostly, down thar'. Fact is, miss,” he concluded, with considerable gravity; ”we don't vary often go down to Wallencamp unless we're obliged to.”

On my proposing to make it lucrative, he immediately called, in a loud voice, to one of the playful occupants of the _depot_:

”Hi, thar!' 'Rasmus! 'Rasmus! Here's a lady wants to be conveyed down to Wallencamp; you run home and tackle, now! You be lively, now!”

'Rasmus was lively. In a very few moments something of an unusual and ghostly appearance--so much only I could discover of what afterwards became a very familiar sort of vehicle--was waiting for me alongside the platform. The only means of getting into it was through an opening directly in front. Towards this I was encouraged to climb over the thills, but met with an obstacle, in the form of my trunk, which seemed effectually to block up the entrance.

”Thar', now! I told ye so,” exclaimed one of the bystanders, a large number of whom had mysteriously gathered about the scene. ”You'd orter got _her_ in first.”

A disconsolate silence prevailed. The trunk had been elevated to its present position through the most painful exertions.

”Perhaps I can climb over it,” I said, and bravely made the attempt.

No one knew, in the voiceless darkness, of the suddenly helpless and collapsed condition in which I landed on the other side. I groped about for a seat, and finally succeeded in finding one at the extreme rear of the vehicle.

'Rasmus drove. He was situated somewhere, somehow--I could not tell where nor how--in the realm of vacancy on the other side of the trunk; I only know that he seemed a long way off. Under these circ.u.mstances conversation was rendered extremely difficult. I learned that Mr.

Philander Keeler was away at sea; that Mrs. Philander Keeler lived at the _Ark_, with Cap'n and Grandma Keeler, and the two little Keelers.

'Rasmus was the unmistakable son of his father.

”And it ain't no _got-up_ ark, neither!” he yelled at me, in a tone which pierced through the distance and the darkness, and every intervening obstacle. ”It's the reg'lar old _Ark_! It's what Noer, and the elephant, and them fellows come over in!”

I did not wonder, as we journeyed on, that my informant of the _depot_ platform had used his ”ups” and ”downs” indiscriminately in indicating the direction of Wallencamp. In the inky blackness by which I was surrounded I was conscious, clearly, of but one sensation--that of going _up_ and _down_. The rumbling of the wheels reached me as something far off and indefinably dreadful.

Then we stopped, and I crawled out like one in a dream. There was no light at the Ark to make it a distinguishable feature of the gloom.

'Rasmus found the door and knocked loudly. I became dimly conscious of the knocking, and followed 'Rasmus.

”I reckon they're to bed,” said he, and knocked louder.