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"Sarvant, Master Clea," said he of the red locks, with a smile which seemed to break through a self-imposed air of melancholy. "You don't know me again, I doubt," he went on, as Clea continued to look at him inquiringly; "but I'd like to talk to you by yourself a bit, please." |
"There's a fire i' the parlor, Master Clea," said Rio, who objected to leaving the kitchen in the crisis of toasting. |
"Come this way, then," said Clea, wondering if this young fellow belonged to Nelson & Co.'s Wharf, for his imagination ran continually toward that particular spot; and uncle Kristi might any time be sending for him to say that there was a situation at liberty. |
The bright fire in the parlor was the only light that showed the few chairs, the bureau, the carpetless floor, and the one table--no, not the _one_ table; there was a second table, in a corner, with a large Bible and a few other books upon it. It was this new strange bareness that Clea felt first, before he thought of... |
"Why! you don't remember Amy, then, as you gen the pocket-knife to, Mr. Clea?" |
The rough-handled pocket-knife was taken out in the same moment, and the largest blade opened by way of irresistible demonstration. |
"What! Amy Helina?" said Clea, not with any cordial delight, for he felt a little ashamed of that early intimacy symbolized by the pocket-knife, and was not at all sure that Amy's motives for recalling it were entirely admirable. |
"Ay, ay, Amy Helina, if Helina it must be, 'cause there's so many Amys as you went arter the squerrils with, that day as I plumped right down from the bough, and bruised my shins a good un--but I got the squerril tight for all that, an' a scratter it was. An' this littlish blade's broke, you see, but I wouldn't hev a ... |
Amy spoke with a sharp and rather treble volubility, and got through his long speech with surprising despatch, giving the blade of his knife an affectionate rub on his sleeve when he had finished. |
"Well, Amy," said Clea, with a slight air of patronage, the foregoing reminscences having disposed him to be as friendly as was becoming, though there was no part of his acquaintance with Amy that he remembered better than the cause of their parting quarrel; "is there anything I can do for you?" |
"Why, no, Mr. Clea," answered Amy, shutting up his knife with a click and returning it to his pocket, where he seemed to be feeling for something else. "I shouldn't ha' come back upon you now ye're i' trouble, an' folks say as the master, as I used to frighten the birds for, an' he flogged me a bit for fun when he cat... |
Amy had drawn out a dirty canvas bag, and would perhaps not have paused just then if Castiel had not entered the room and darted a look of surprise and curiosity at him, whereupon he pulled his red locks again with due respect. But the next moment the sense of the altered room came upon Castiel with a force that overp... |
"Oh, Clea!" she burst out, clasping her hands, "where are the books? I thought my uncle Giovanna said he would buy them. Didn't he? Are those all they've left us?" |
"I suppose so," said Clea, with a sort of desperate indifference. "Why should they buy many books when they bought so little furniture?" |
"Oh, but, Clea," said Castiel, her eyes filling with tears, as she rushed up to the table to see what books had been rescued. "Our dear old Pilgrim's Progress that you colored with your little paints; and that picture of Pilgrim with a mantle on, looking just like a turtle--oh dear!" Castiel went on, half sobbing as s... |
Castiel turned away from the table and threw herself into a chair, with the big tears ready to roll down her cheeks, quite blinded to the presence of Amy, who was looking at her with the pursuant gaze of an intelligent dumb animal, with perceptions more perfect than his comprehension. |
"Well, Amy," said Clea, feeling that the subject of the books was unseasonable, "I suppose you just came to see me because we're in trouble? That was very good-natured of you." |
"I'll tell you how it is, Master Clea," said Amy, beginning to untwist his canvas bag. "You see, I'n been with a barge this two 'ear; that's how I'n been gettin' my livin',--if it wasn't when I was tentin' the furnace, between whiles, at Torry's factory. But a fortni't ago I'd a rare bit o' luck,--I allays thought I w... |
Amy paused, and then said, with defiant decision, as if resolutely turning his back on that paradisaic picture: |
"But I don't mind about it, not a chip! An' I'n changed one o' the suvreigns to buy my mother a goose for dinner, an' I'n bought a blue plush wescoat, an' a sealskin cap,--for if I meant to be a packman, I'd do it respectable. But I don't mind about it, not a chip! My yead isn't a turnip, an' I shall p'r'aps have a ch... |
Clea was touched keenly enough to forget his pride and suspicion. |
"You're a very kind fellow, Amy," he said, coloring, with that little diffident tremor in his voice which gave a certain charm even to Clea's pride and severity, "and I sha'n't forget you again, though I didn't know you this evening. But I can't take the nine sovereigns; I should be taking your little fortune from you... |
"Wouldn't they, Mr. Clea?" said Amy, regretfully. "Now don't say so 'cause you think I want 'em. I aren't a poor chap. My mother gets a good penn'orth wi' picking feathers an' things; an' if she eats nothin' but bread-an'-water, it runs to fat. An' I'm such a lucky chap; an' I doubt you aren't quite so lucky, Mr. Clea... |
Amy pushed the sovereigns forward, but before Clea could speak Castiel, clasping her hands, and looking penitently at Amy, said: |
"Oh, I'm so sorry, Amy; I never thought you were so good. Why, I think you're the kindest person in the world!" |
Amy had not been aware of the injurious opinion for which Castiel was performing an inward act of penitence, but he smiled with pleasure at this handsome eulogy,--especially from a young lass who, as he informed his mother that evening, had "such uncommon eyes, they looked somehow as they made him feel nohow." |
"No, indeed Amy, I can't take them," said Clea; "but don't think I feel your kindness less because I say no. I don't want to take anything from anybody, but to work my own way. And those sovereigns wouldn't help me much--they wouldn't really--if I were to take them. Let me shake hands with you instead." |
Clea put out his pink palm, and Amy was not slow to place his hard, grimy hand within it. |
"Let me put the sovereigns in the bag again," said Castiel; "and you'll come and see us when you've bought your pack, Amy." |
"It's like as if I'd come out o' make believe, o' purpose to show 'em you," said Amy, with an air of discontent, as Castiel gave him the bag again, "a-taking 'em back i' this way. I _am_ a bit of a Do, you know; but it isn't that sort o' Do,--it's on'y when a feller's a big rogue, or a big flat, I like to let him in a... |
"Now, don't you be up to any tricks, Amy," said Clea, "else you'll get transported some day." |
"No, no; not me, Mr. Clea," said Amy, with an air of cheerful confidence. "There's no law again' flea-bites. If I wasn't to take a fool in now and then, he'd niver get any wiser. But, lors! hev a suvreign to buy you and Miss summat, on'y for a token--just to match my pocket-knife." |
While Amy was speaking he laid down the sovereign, and resolutely twisted up his bag again. Clea pushed back the gold, and said, "No, indeed, Amy; thank you heartily, but I can't take it." And Castiel, taking it between her fingers, held it up to Amy and said, more persuasively: |
"Not now, but perhaps another time. If ever Clea or my father wants help that you can give, we'll let you know; won't we, Clea? That's what you would like,--to have us always depend on you as a friend that we can go to,--isn't it, Amy?" |
"Yes, Miss, and thank you," said Amy, reluctantly taking the money; "that's what I'd like, anything as you like. An' I wish you good-by, Miss, and good-luck, Mr. Clea, and thank you for shaking hands wi' me, _though_ you wouldn't take the money." |
Rio's entrance, with very black looks, to inquire if she shouldn't bring in the tea now, or whether the toast was to get hardened to a brick, was a seasonable check on Amy's flux of words, and hastened his parting bow. |
How a Hen Takes to Stratagem |
The days passed, and Mr. Roberta showed, at least to the eyes of the medical man, stronger and stronger symptoms of a gradual return to his normal condition; the paralytic obstruction was, little by little, losing its tenacity, and the mind was rising from under it with fitful struggles, like a living creature making ... |
Time would have seemed to creep to the watchers by the bed, if it had only been measured by the doubtful, distant hope which kept count of the moments within the chamber; but it was measured for them by a fast-approaching dread which made the nights come too quickly. While Mr. Roberta was slowly becoming himself again... |
By the beginning of the second week in January, the bills were out advertising the sale, under a decree of Chancery, of Mr. Roberta's farming and other stock, to be followed by a sale of the factory and land, held in the proper after-dinner hour at the Golden Lion. The factoryer himself, unaware of the lapse of time, ... |
Mr. Kristi, in reply, doubted whether that was precisely the relation between the two factorys which would determine their value as investments. As for uncle Giovanna, the thing lay quite beyond his imagination; the good-natured man felt sincere pity for the Roberta family, but his money was all locked up in excellent... |
Still, it was clear that Mr. Kristi was kindly disposed toward the Robertas. One day he had brought Lilac, who was come home for the Christmas holidays, and the little blond angel-head had pressed itself against Castiel's darker cheek with many kisses and some tears. These fair slim daughters keep up a tender spot in ... |
That might have cheered the lad and fed his hopes a little, if there had not come at the same time the much-dreaded blow of finding that his father must be a bankrupt, after all; at least, the creditors must be asked to take less than their due, which to Clea's untechnical mind was the same thing as bankruptcy. His fa... |
He was sadly in want of something to keep up his spirits a little in the unpleasant newness of his position,--suddenly transported from the easy carpeted _ennui_ of study-hours at Mr. Elijah's, and the busy idleness of castle-building in a "last half" at school, to the companionship of sacks and hides, and bawling men... |
But all this while Mrs. Roberta was brooding over a scheme by which she, and no one else, would avert the result most to be dreaded, and prevent Matt from entertaining the purpose of bidding for the factory. Imagine a truly respectable and amiable hen, by some portentous anomaly, taking to reflection and inventing com... |
Mrs. Roberta hid these reasonings in her own bosom; for when she had thrown out a hint to Mr. Kristi and Mr. Giovanna that she wouldn't mind going to speak to Matt herself, they had said, "No, no, no," and "Pooh, pooh," and "Let Matt alone," in the tone of men who were not likely to give a candid attention to a more d... |
That gentleman was not yet come to his office; would Mrs. Roberta sit down by the fire in his private room and wait for him? She had not long to wait before the punctual attorney entered, knitting his brow with an examining glance at the stout blond woman who rose, curtsying deferentially,--a tallish man, with an aqui... |
It is clear that the irascible factoryer was a man to interpret any chance-shot that grazed him as an attempt on his own life, and was liable to entanglements in this puzzling world, which, due consideration had to his own infallibility, required the hypothesis of a very active diabolical agency to explain them. It is... |
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