A bad penny

THE low stone-wall of the burying-ground on the hill back of Captain Woodbury’s house had for many years been a favorite meeting-place for young lovers. Many of the silent majority sleeping in the enclosure had plighted their troths, seated on that low stone-wall, and to this day, happy young people watch from this trysting-place the magical changes of light, as the darkness steals silently over the earth, and gaze with a romantic awe at the distant low hills, dark and impressive against the gorgeous colorings of the sky, or down upon the slumberous old town wrapped in its coverlid of leafy trees. Beyond, flows the tidal river, and far off to the east is the sea, flashing back like a mirror the last rays of the sun.

As James sauntered up the hill to meet Alice on the evening of his father’s interview with the Deacon in the bank, the western sky was aglow with orange fire, the fleecy clouds dyed with delicate pink and gray by the wonderful alchemy of the sunlight. The boy’s old hound, Major, trotted along at his master’s heels, tired with the long tramp the two had taken in the afternoon, through the woods and meadows, between Oldbury and Dummer in search of woodchucks. Alice had been seated on the wall for fully half an hour before James appeared, and as soon as she saw him she jumped down and ran to meet him.

“I thought that you would never come, James; where have you been all the afternoon?”

“Oh, Major and I have been over at March’s woods after woodchucks. He starts them up, and we bring them to bay in a stone-wall. How they do fight, when they are put to it.”

“What cruel sport! I do not see how you can enjoy it!”

“Well,” he answered a little shame-faced, “we didn’t find any woodchucks to-day.”

“I have been looking everywhere for you,” said Alice, in a low voice. “I am afraid that something dreadful will happen unless we can prevent it.”

“What can it be?” asked James.

“I will tell you all I know about it, but you must first answer a question. Did a strange man come to your house last night?”

The boy’s heart began to beat the quicker as he remembered his promise to his uncle; he hesitated for a moment, and then answered, “Well, yes, there did.”

“Now, I will tell you what troubles me. I was dusting china in the china-closet this noon when grandfather and Constable Hallett came into the dining-room. Grandfather closed the door leading into the front entry and parlor, but he did not shut the china-closet door. I kept on dusting and did not pay any attention to their conversation until I heard your name.”

“My name! Have they any charge to bring against me?”

“No, not against you; grandfather said that you came to our house last night to see mother, and that you gave her a small package. He said that he was just dropping off to sleep in the parlor, when he was awakened by hearing your voice; and he heard you tell her that the package had been given to you by a sailor to give to her, and that the sailor had told you to say that it had been entrusted to him by Tom Cheever, when he was dying in the hospital at La Guayra. Grandfather then went on to say that your father had just been to his bank to borrow a large sum of money in a great hurry, and that he had heard that a stranger had called at your house last night, and that a schooner, the Tempest, had just arrived in port, and that the mate was reported to stutter in a peculiar way, just as your uncle Tom Cheever used to. And—”

“Why do you stop?” asked James, thrilling with excitement.

“You have heard the stories about your uncle, haven’t you?”

“I know that he left the country suddenly, but I never heard what he did that was wrong. They never speak of him at home, I never heard his name mentioned till—”

He stopped short, fearing to betray his secret, and Alice continued: “Grandfather then said that he meant to find out whether the stranger was Tom Cheever; and if he was, he would have him locked up before to-morrow noon.”

“Locked up! What can he lock him up for?” asked James. “I wonder what he did so many years ago, which was so wicked? I must tell you, Alice, what I know, though I promised not to tell any one; for I think that I ought to. My uncle Tom Cheever did come back to life last night, and he is on board of the schooner Tempest at this moment. What could he have done to your grandfather to make him so vindictive?”

“Then I am afraid that he is in danger, James; for I heard the constable say that he would serve the warrant of arrest as soon as the man was identified. Now, we must not let him be arrested; I cannot bear to have disgrace fall upon your family.”

“What shall I do?” asked James. “I can sail out to the schooner in the Scud, but I suppose that it would not be safe for him to return to town, and, as he does not command the Tempest, he cannot order her to sail.”

“Run to the wharf as quickly as you can and warn him!” said Alice, almost pushing him in her eagerness. He jumped down from the stone-wall and stood in silence for a minute.

“Had I better tell my father?” he asked.

“No, I should waste no time; you may be too late as it is.”

Down the hill he hurried, over across High Street to the bay. He was strangely excited as he ran along under the arching elms so quickly that two old ladies, against whom he jostled, turned around, wondering what mischief the lad was up to. Never before in all his scrapes had he alighted upon a real adventure, but now there was sombre earnest in this afternoon’s work; since he should thwart the redoubtable Hallett, brown-wigged terror to the evil-doer. He made his way to the wharf, off which lay his boat, by short cuts known only to adventurous youths; climbing picket fences, stealing through gardens, and clambering over sheds.

When he reached the end of the wharf and stood by the ladder, covered with green slime, down which he was to slide into his dory, he was delighted to see that the north-west wind was growing stronger every minute, so that there was a chance of a good breeze which would sweep the cobwebs from the sky. He slipped and crept down the ladder, holding tight to the sides; for the rungs were treacherous, and wanting when most expected. He stepped cautiously into his dory and unhitched its painter. The dory, like all boats owned by boys, was leaky, so that he had to bail her some few minutes before he could put his feet in the bottom with any comfort, and during this operation he expected every minute to see Constable Hallett’s red face, peering over the edge of the wharf. Finally he bailed out enough water to satisfy himself, though there was still a good half inch swashing around in the bottom, and he sculled out to the Scud and began putting a reef in the mainsail. The Scud was a weatherly keel-boat, about eighteen feet long, broad in beam, and stoutly built, and she was the pride of her owner and the envy of every other Oldbury boy; for pleasure craft were rare in those days, and parents indulgent enough to supply them to their sons still rarer. Much of James’ time, which should have been devoted to the study of the dead languages, was expended in painting the Scud, scraping the spars, and setting up her rigging. A few stout pulls on the throat and peak halliards hauled up the reefed sail, and a moment after the Scud slipped away from her mooring towards the Tempest with started sheet, piling up the waves under her bluff bow and making a good deal of noise, as she ploughed through the water, even if she was not going very fast. Slow as she would be considered nowadays, if she was brought back to life to compete with a modern racer, there was no boat then in Oldbury harbor which would hold its own with her; and it did not take long to run alongside of the Tempest, on board of which James saw his uncle, in a rough blue coat and broad-brimmed straw hat, leaning over the rail and puffing a cheroot. The green and yellow parrot, which James had noticed the day before, was still hanging in its gilt wire cage from the main-boom just behind Cheever, and the bird gave a long whistle as if to pipe all hands to the sides, and hoarsely cried “Boat ahoy!” as the Scud shot alongside and James threw the painter to his uncle and scrambled on deck.

“So it is you, young ’un,” remarked Cheever, as James landed on deck. “What brings you out here? Has the old gentleman sent me a pressing invitation to partake of fatted calf?”

Without waiting for an answer, he proceeded to make fast the Scud’s painter to a cleat in the overhang of the schooner’s stern.

“Carramba!” shrieked the parrot, cocking his head around to look wickedly with its round eyes, which seemed filled with malicious light. “Boat ahoy! Sacré nom!”

James stood watching the noisy bird and his uncle, equally fascinated by each of the strange beings.

“Did the Captain send you with the money?” asked Cheever, arising from his task and laying his hand on the boy’s shoulder.

“No.”

Cheever looked disappointed.

“Why did you come out here then?”

James told him in a low voice what Alice had overheard in the morning, and his uncle listened attentively.

“So the old hypocrite means mischief, does he? Well, I guess that I can outmanœuvre him and Hallett and the whole lot of them. I am sorry that you haven’t the money with you, though. Just step down below with me, will you? The captain’s ashore and I guess that he will not mind our going into the cabin, though it’s no kind of a place. We shall begin to unload to-morrow, and he is at the Custom House, I guess.”

James followed his uncle down the dark and narrow companionway into an ill-smelling box of a cabin, on each side of which was a bunk, filled with tumbled and dirty blankets. On a small table was a bottle, a couple of glasses, a greasy pack of cards, and a handful of cigars, and the odor of bilge-water pervaded the whole place.

“If you have ever felt inclined to go to sea, as I suppose you have, you may like to see the way the officers live,” said Cheever, as he sat down on the port bunk. “It’s growing dark; do you think that old Fairbanks will come out to-night, with his posse—If he’s going to, I guess I’d better be making myself scarce. There’s one comfort about not being blessed with this world’s goods, that when I want to move in a hurry, I can do it. When you are campaigning, you must carry as little baggage as possible. I packed my whole fortune into my satchel last night, and I am ready to start for China at a minute’s notice.”

“Is there any reason why you should be afraid of these men?” asked James, burning with curiosity to hear the story of his mysterious relative.

Cheever looked at him quizzically for a moment.

“Well, the truth is, James, the Deacon and I never were over-partial to each other; and while I know a thousand cussed mean things he has done, none of ’em would get him into trouble with the law, while he knows, or thinks that he knows, one thing, which I did years ago, upon which the law doesn’t smile; I will not say what it was— It’s so long ago now, that I can hardly remember myself what I did, that night— I had been drinking down at the Merrimac tavern, to be sure—but never mind what happened; I shouldn’t be talking to you about it.”

The sun had set by this time, and the cabin was almost dark, save near the companionway, which was dimly lighted by the after-glow. The gathering shadows made the cabin more mysterious and gloomy than ever, and Cheever was obscured in the darkness.

There was a silence for a moment or so, broken only by the hurtling of the rudder, as the vessel swayed with the tide, a silence which was finally ended by the shrill voice of the parrot calling: “Boat ahoy, carramba, sacré nom, boat ahoy!”

Cheever grabbed up his leather bag, jumped hastily from the bunk, and ran up the companionway. James closely followed him and, as he did so, thought that he saw something gleaming in his uncle’s hand. When he got on deck, he saw Cheever lying flat on his back by the bulwark, unfastening the painter of his boat from the cleat; while some fifty feet from the schooner a large boat was being rowed by two men towards them. In the stern of the dory sat Constable Hallett and Deacon Fairbanks. The after-glow of the sun was full in the faces of the men in the dory, and James stood silhouetted against it.

“It’s the old snake in the grass, James,” hoarsely whispered Cheever. “Hold them for a minute.”

He was slowly pulling the Scud alongside as he spoke and the dory was getting nearer.

“Schooner ahoy!” shouted the constable.

James was silent, and the dory came nearer, as the oarsmen were pulling in good earnest.

“Boat ahoy!” cried out Cheever from the deck, as the row-boat came alongside and the hands of the crew clutched the side of the schooner.

“Now’s my chance,” he whispered to James; “the schooner is between us. Don’t let them up yet. I’ll take your boat; tell your father to get you a new one out of the money and to send the rest of it to Mr. Marks, Bell-in-Hand Tavern, Boston. Good-by, boy.”

Like a cat he slipped over the rail into the Scud and in a second had the tiller and sheet in hand and the boat was flying down the harbor. The men in the dory had by this time scrambled aboard the schooner and the big hat and red-brown wig of the constable soon followed over the rail.

“Hi, there!” cried the constable, as he saw the sail-boat running away before the breeze. “Who are you? Come back here! Come back, I say, you are wanted.”

“Polly wants a cracker!” observed the parrot, in a hoarse chuckle.

“Guess you’ll have to do without me!” called back Cheever, with a broad grin. “Sorry to disappoint you.”

By this time Deacon Fairbanks had been hoisted on deck by the two oarsmen, while one of the crew of the Tempest, who had been asleep under a boat on deck, aroused by the noise, had come aft.

“I say there, stop!” called out the Deacon, as he saw the sail-boat slipping away. “Mr. Hallett, shoot the man if he doesn’t come back!”

“I don’t think I care about shooting, until you identify him!” said Hallett, dryly. “After fifteen years, I couldn’t swear that was Tom Cheever, and if I could, I wouldn’t shoot him.”

“What’s all this row about?” asked the Tempest’s seaman. “That man there is Mr. Marks, our first mate, and I don’t see what call you have to be talking of shooting him, old man. If you come to that, there are three or four of the boys asleep down in the forecastle, who will join in the sport.”

“The man is a burglar under indictment!” cried out Fairbanks, pale with rage. “He broke into and entered my house and stole my silverware, in ’96.”

“Sixteen years ago!” observed the sailor, rolling his quid around in his mouth. “I should think you might have forgotten it by this time.”

James stood trembling with excitement, as he watched his boat and his uncle disappearing down the bay. His emotions were mixed; he was astounded at hearing the accusation which the Deacon made against his uncle, pleased at the latter’s escape, mournful over the loss of his boat, and terrified by the fact that he was mixed up in the escape. There was the Scud, verifying her name by the rate she was travelling down the bay, and it would doubtless appear to the officer that he was an accomplice in the escape.

“Whose boat is that?” asked the Deacon, and as he spoke he noticed James for the first time. “Is it yours, boy?”

James turned crimson and looked down at the deck. The constable, provoked at being thwarted by the escape of such an important criminal, interrupted the Deacon.

“Say, men, there’s a spritsail in our boat; can’t you catch that fellow?”

“A hundred dollars reward to the man who arrests him!” exclaimed the Deacon, frowning angrily.

“We couldn’t no more catch the Scud in our boat than we could catch a streak of greased lightning,” replied one of the men. “There ain’t no faster boat in the bay than her.”

She was out of range of the voice now, and Cheever was sitting quietly in the stern sheets, heading her for the island, threading the channel with the skill of a man who knew every mud-flat, sand-bank, and rock in the harbor.

“I don’t know whether yon is Tom Cheever,” said one of Hallett’s men, “but I’ll bet that he is an Oldbury boy from the way that he is handling the boat.”

“But the harbor has changed since ’96,” said Hallett, who was anxious to retrieve his official reputation by capturing the fugitive. “The sand-bar by Mark Island has almost filled up the old channel; he may run ashore there. I guess that we had better follow him on the chance. Here, tumble into the boat, men! Hurry up! Deacon. Come along with us, young Woodbury; I don’t like the looks of your performance to-day. I guess that I must take you in charge.”

The two oarsmen tumbled over the side into the row-boat and the Deacon followed them more cautiously; then came Hallett, with a grip on James’ shoulder. The men bungled over setting the spritsail, but finally succeeded in getting it up, and pushed off and set to rowing with all their might, splashing the water and nearly catching crabs at every stroke; for the waves were now running high.

James noticed that the Scud was drawing away from them every minute, despite their violent exertions, and the satisfaction which this gave him was added to by his noticing that the tail of the Deacon’s coat, unknown to its eager owner, was soaking in the water, over the stern of the boat.

“He’s coming near Mark Island bar!” called out the bow-oar, who was turning his head as he rowed to keep his eye on the chase, “and he’s headed straight for the shallowest spot.”

“Gosh! I guess that we have got him now!” observed the stroke.

James saw the Scud about half a mile ahead flying before the wind, headed for the bar. It was a moonless night; the twilight had died away, and the waves, which had been rosy with the sunset when he had left the wharf, were now leaden and angry as they swept, crested with foam, after the overloaded boat; the wind was too strong to carry the spritsail, so that James thought that it was far more likely to come to grief than the Scud, especially as he remembered that the tide was only half-ebb, and that there would be enough water in bar for the Scud to bump over it.

“He’s over the bar,” called out the bow-oar. “’Tain’t no use following him any more, and I guess that we are in more danger than he is; it’s blowing harder every minute, the tide’s running out, and we are overloaded.”

The Deacon saw the white sail of the Scud as she crossed the bar and came about to make for the mouth of the bay, and he slapped his knee with anger.

“Well, I guess that we had better put about,” said Hallett. “We have done all we can, and there’s no need of imperilling our lives.”

There was nothing for the Deacon to say, and as the boat was being put about and the spritsail taken in he perceived, for the first time, that his coat-tail had been soaking in the water. For a moment it seemed as if this partial wetting would soon be made unimportant by the total immersion of the whole party; for it was no easy task to get the boat around against the rising waves. As it was, a wave broke over the side, and when the boat was headed towards the town there were several inches of water in the bottom, and every wave which she butted into cast a spray over the whole party. Wet and discomfited and cheated of his prey, the Deacon’s mind turned towards James, who was seated opposite to him.

“James Woodbury!” said the Deacon, sternly, “you have behaved in a most shameful manner! What do you mean by assisting a criminal to escape. Don’t you know that it makes you an accomplice, an accessory after the fact? There’s been disgrace enough on your family in the past, without you adding to it.”

“I never heard of any disgrace to my family in the past, till you made the charge put now,” stoutly insisted James.

“It looks pretty black for you, that your uncle should escape in your boat, and that you should be found on board the schooner,” said the constable. “I am sorry for you, James, but it does look pretty black.”

“There’s bad blood in that Cheever family,” said the Deacon, “and this boy is the living image of his uncle twenty-five years ago.”

“It seems to me I can see Tom Cheever now,” said the constable, “squirming around in the minister’s pew during one of his father’s long sermons. I never thought that he would come to good, remembering the proverb about ministers’ sons, but he turned out a good deal worse than I supposed he would. Let’s see, Deacon, you had a pretty clear case against him, the time he left the town for good, didn’t you?”

“Enough to swear out this warrant on,” answered the Deacon. “That was the last I ever saw of the silver; I never knew what he did with it. I couldn’t trace it anywhere. He was seen around town early the morning after. It wasn’t till late that day I suspected him.”

The two men were then silent for some minutes and nothing was heard but the rhythmic working of the oars in thwarts, and sousing of the bow into the waves. The wind was increasing and was blowing the clouds into long black shreds, which scurried over the sky seawards.

“I wonder where that fellow will fetch up to-night,” said the bow-oar. “He will not strike a harbor till Rockport, and it’s a long stretch over there. I shouldn’t care to be in his shoes.”

“You’ll never see the Scud again, James,” said the stroke, “or your uncle either, if that was him.”

“He will wish that he had never come back to Oldbury, I guess. When a man who is wanted for burglary is so fortunate as to have a gravestone over him, he is a fool to come to life again. Yes?”

It was quite late in the evening when the boat, carrying the Deacon and his fortunes, bumped against the slimy ladder, down which James had slid in his haste to warn his uncle, when the strong hand of one of the oarsmen assisted the boy rather roughly up from the boat. The Deacon and the constable had climbed up before him and were talking together in whispers, when he had landed on the wharf. He was anxious to know what they were saying, feeling sure that his fate was under discussion. Was he to be sent to the lock-up that night, or would gentler counsels prevail?

He felt sure that the constable was on his side. His reddish-brown wig with its respectable curls, twining over his neck, had a benevolent aspect, and it was impossible to associate truculence with the curving lines of his rotund figure, while the Deacon’s bowed shoulders and angular frame armed suspicion in the boy’s breast. As the two men became more interested in their talk, the whispers grew into loud conversation.

“I tell you what, Deacon, the boy is a good boy, and there isn’t a finer man in town than Captain Woodbury, and I’ll be jiggered if I see what charge you have to bring against him. He couldn’t help the man’s going off with his boat, and it’s no crime to be found aboard a schooner, doing nothing.”

“It’s perfectly clear to me that he was aiding in the escape,” insisted Deacon Fairbanks. “I insist that it is your duty to arrest him.”

“Now, look here; Deacon Fairbanks, I do not propose to have you or any other man tell me what my duty is. As you cannot prove that the man who just sailed away from us is Tom Cheever, the evidence that the boy helped him to escape, is of no account. If you can get the judge to issue a warrant for James’ arrest, I shall serve it, but I shall not do anything now. Run off to your home, James.”

The boy did not wait for a second invitation, but walked off, slowly at first that he might not seem over-glad to be out of their clutches, but, once around the corner, he took to his heels and made very good time up High Street. He did not think it safe to stop at the Deacon’s to see Alice, and he was very anxious to tell his father what had occurred in the afternoon. As he walked up from the street to the house, he saw a dark figure standing on the front steps.

His father’s voice called:

“Is that you, James?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Where have you been?”

“I will tell you as soon as I get to you, sir.”

Then the two walked together in silence to the Captain’s study and James told all that happened. The Captain listened with his chin resting upon his hand; and when James had finished, he said slowly:

“You did right, James, quite right. You have never heard, I believe, the story of your uncle’s life, but, richly as he deserved punishment, it was right for a nephew to warn him of his danger. I shall protect you from the Deacon’s anger. And so he sailed away on your boat, boy; I do not suppose that you will ever see it again. Well, never mind, you will not need it in Cambridge. Run down-stairs; your aunt will give you some supper. She has been saying that probably you were drowned, until I grew foolishly nervous about you.”

“Shall I tell her about it?” asked James.

“No; ask her to be kind enough to come up here.”

Aunt Elizabeth was seated at the head of her table when her nephew entered the dining-room. Her thin white hands were laid solemnly on her lap, and her eyes followed the boy with a silent protest as he walked to his seat.

“Where have you been all the afternoon?”

“Father will tell you, Aunt Elizabeth; he wishes to see you in his room.”

“If I had not felt sure that you were not destined to be drowned, I should have felt very anxious about you. I shall go to your father. Do not scratch the table legs with your boots, and do not spill anything upon the floor. If you had been my boy, I should not have saved you any supper, but your father seemed bent upon spoiling you.”

Thus she spoke and walked primly from the room, though, if it had not been for her Puritan conscience, she would have fallen upon the boy’s shoulders and wept with joy at his reappearance; she had felt sure that he had been drowned, and, indeed, she was in the habit of giving him up for lost whenever he was late to supper.

Safe in his father’s home, with the bulwark of his father’s love to protect him from the world, the boy felt secure and happy, and he laughed as he thought of his uncle, disappearing beyond Mark Island, leaving the Deacon to impotent wrath.

Many a time in life the man looks back, with a fond regret, upon the days spent in his father’s home, and longs for a caress of the strong hand which sheltered and protected him, and to gaze in the kind eyes which used to dwell so lovingly upon him, and when that hand is stilled and those eyes closed forever, the son for the first time feels the difficulties of the world pressing in upon him; for a good father is a shield to a son, even when the son is a father himself.

The old minister, who owed his immortality to the brush of Copley, looked gravely down at his grandson, seated at the shining mahogany table, and seemed to thank him for saving, from a new shame, the son he had loved and mourned over. The boy happened to look up at the portrait and was struck by the resemblance to his uncle, and he fell to thinking of the lives of the Parson and his son: the one the honored minister and leading gentleman of his town and the other flying before the constables,—an outcast from his family; and he wondered where the wonderful journey, through the world, would lead his heedless feet.

Behind the thickets would lurk the tempters: the greenest, most seductive meadows would conceal the most dangerous pitfalls; and the towers of Capua, gleaming in the distance, would invite him to repose, when he should be hewing his way through the ranks of the enemy to new victories.