Joshua Marvel

Out of respect for Ellen, the Old Sailor coughed over a good many words in the songs he sang; for it must be confessed that there was more swearing in them than was absolutely necessary. Poor Jack, however, who called his Poll a something fool, made up for it in the end by declaring that "his heart was his Poll's" (a very pretty though somewhat trite sentiment), and "his rhino's his friend's" (a very unwise and foolish sentiment, as the world goes). Then there was a Polly whom the lads called so pretty, and who entreated her sweetheart, before he sailed in the good ship the "Kitty" to be constant to her; and who, when he returned without any rhino, turned up her nose at him, as young women do now and then. Then there were Poll in "My Poll and my partner Joe" (it was wonderful how faithless the Polls were), and Poll in "Every inch a Sailor," who, when poor Haulyard came home in tatters, swore (very unfeminine of her) that she had never seen his face. But honest Ned Haulyard was a philosophical sailor, for he something'd her for a faithless she, and singing went again to sea. The Nancies were a better class of female:--

And so on, and so on, with gentle Anna and buxom Nan; and poor Fanny, who drowned herself in the waves near to the place where hung the trembling pines; and poor Peggy, who loved a soldier lad (a marine, without doubt); and bonny Kate, who lived happily afterwards with Tom Clueline. Ellen joined in the choruses with her sweet voice; but, strange to say, she had not been asked to sing until the Old Sailor, struck perhaps by a sudden remorse at monopolizing the harmony, called upon her for a song. Ellen, nothing loth, asked what song; and Joshua said,--

"Sing the song you learned of mother, Ellen."

"'Bread-and-Cheese and Kisses?'" inquired Ellen.

"Yes, 'Bread-and-Cheese and Kisses.' 'Tisn't quite a girl's song sir" (to the Old Sailor); "but it is a good song, and Ellen sings it nicely."

"Hooray, then, for 'Bread-and-Cheese and Kisses!'" cried the Old Sailor, casting a glance of intense admiration at Ellen, who, without more ado, sang as follows:--

Thus ended the happy day.

CHAPTER IX.

MINNIE AND HER SHELL.

So the simple ways of Joshua's simple life were drawing to a close. He had chosen his career, and to-morrow he would be at the end of the quiet groove in which he had hitherto moved, and would step upon rougher roads, to commence the battle which dooms many a fair-promising life to a despairing death, and out of which no one comes without scars and wounds which art and time are powerless to heal. To-morrow he was to leave a father almost too indulgent; a mother whose heart was as true in its motherly affection for him as the needle is to the pole; a friend who gave him a love as tender and as pure as that which angels could feel.

During the past week he had been busily engaged in leave-taking, and he had been surprised to find what a number of friends he had. There was not one of the poor neighbors, in the poor locality in which he had passed his boyhood's days, who had not kind words and good wishes for him, and who did not give them heartily and without stint. Many a hearty handwillshake from men whose hands he had never touched before, and many a motherly kiss from women he had been in the habit of saying only "Good-morning" to, did Joshua receive. There is a stronger knitting of affection between poor people in poor neighborhoods than there is among the rich in their wider thoroughfares. Perhaps it is the narrow streets that draw them closer to each other; perhaps it is the common struggle to keep body and soul together in which they are all engaged; perhaps it is the unconscious recognition of a higher law of humanity than prevails elsewhere; perhaps it is the absence of the wider barriers of exclusiveness, among which the smaller and more beautiful flowers of feeling--being so humble and unassuming--are in danger of being lost or overlooked. Anyhow the ties of affection are stronger among the poor. Putting necessity and sickness aside, more mothers nurse their babes from love among the poor than among the rich.

The secret of this unanimity of goodwill towards Joshua lay in his uniformly quiet demeanor and affectionate disposition. The wonderful friendship that existed between Dan and Joshua was a household word in the poor homes round about; there was something so beautiful in it, that they felt a pride in the circumstance of its having been cemented in their midst; and many tender-hearted women said that night to their husbands, that they wondered what Dan would do now that Joshua was going away. "And Josh, too," the husband would reply; "do you think he won't miss Dan?" But the women thought mostly of Dan in that relationship. The romance of the thing had something to do with this general interest in his welfare. Here was a young man, one of their own order, born and bred among them, who, from no contempt of their humble ways of life but from a distinct desire to do better than they (not to be better; that they would have resented), had resolved to go out into the world to carve a way for himself. It was brave and manly; it was daring and heroic. For the world was so wide! Cooped-up as they were, what did they know of it? What did they see of it? Those of them--the few--who worked at home in their once-a-week shirt-sleeves, could raise their eyes from their work, and see the dull prospect of over the way; or, resting wearily from the monotonous labor, could stroll to their street-doors, and look up and down the street in a meaningless, purposeless manner: like automatons in aprons, with dirty faces and very black finger-nails, coming out of a box and performing a task in which there was necessarily no sense of enjoyment.

Those of them--the many--who toiled in workshops other than their homes, saw with the rising and the setting of every sun a few narrow streets within the circumference of a mile, mayhap. Moving always in the same groove, trudging to their workshops every morning, trudging home every night--it was the same thing for them day after day. The humdrum course of time was only marked by the encroachment of gray hairs and white; or by the patching-up of the poor furniture, which grew more rheumatic, and groaned more dismally every succeeding season; or by the cracking and dismemberment of cups and saucers and plates; or by the slow death of the impossible figures on the tea-trays--figures which were bright and gay once upon a time, as their owners were upon a certain happy wedding-day. Here, as a type, are three small mugs, the letters upon which are either quite faded away, or are denoted by a very mockery of shrivelled lines, as if their lives were being drawn out to the last stage of miserable attenuation. Once they proclaimed themselves proudly, and in golden letters, "For George, a Birthday Present;" "For Mary Ann, with Mother's Love;" "Charley, for a Good Boy." George and Mary, Ann and Charley used to clap their little hands, and swing their little legs delightedly, when they and the mugs kept company at breakfast and tea-time; but now flesh and crockery have grown old, and are fading away in common. The hair on George's head is very thin, although he is not yet forty years of age; Mary Ann is an anxious-looking mother, with six dirty children, who, as she declares twenty times a day, are enough to worry the life out of her; and Charley has turned out any thing but "a Good Boy," being much too fond of public-houses. With such like uninteresting variations, the lives of George and Mary Ann and Charley were typical of the lives of all the poor people amongst whom the Marvels lived. From the cradle to the grave, every thing the same; the same streets, the same breakfasts, the same dinners, the same uneventful routine of existence, the only visible signs upon the record being the deepening of wrinkles and the whitening of hairs. But they were happy enough, notwithstanding; and if their pulses were stirred into quicker motion when they shook Joshua's hand and wished him good luck, there was no envy towards him in their minds, and no feeling of discontent marred the genuineness of their God-speed. When at candle-time they spoke of Joshua and of the world which he was going to see, some of the women said that it would have been better if "you, John," or "you, William," "had struck out for yourself when you were young;" and John and William assenting, sighed to think that it was too late for them to make a new start. Well, their time was past; the tide which they might have taken at the flood, but did not, would never come again to their life's shore. Joshua had taken it at the flood, and would be afloat to-morrow; good luck be with him! In the heartiness of their good wishes there was no expressed consciousness that there was as much heroism in their quiet lives as in the lives of great heroes and daring adventurers; which very unconsciousness and unexpressed abnegation made that heroism (begging Mr. Ruskin's pardon for calling it so) all the grander.

Joshua had bidden the Old Sailor good-by. The dear, simple old fellow had given Joshua some golden rules to go by; had enjoined him to be respectful and submissive; to learn all he could; to be cheerful always, and to do his work willingly, however hard it seemed; not to mix himself up in the men's quarrels or grumblings; had told him how that some officers were querulous, and some were tyrannical, but that he could always keep himself out of mischief by obeying orders; and had impressed upon him, more particularly than all, the value of the golden motto--Duty. "Keep that for your watchword, my lad," said the Old Sailor, "and you will do."

"I am glad it is nearly all over," said Joshua to Dan. "I have only two or three more to say good-by to, with the exception of mother and father, and Ellen and you, dear Dan."

"There's Susan, Jo," said Dan after a pause. "I wish you could see her before you go."

"I wish so, too. I am going now to say good-by to Minnie and her father."

"Is he better, Jo?"

"I haven't seen him for a week; but I don't think he is ever quite right here;" touching his forehead.

They were speaking of the street actor, whose name was Basil Kindred.

"And Minnie is very pretty, you say."

"Very pretty, but with such strange ways, Dan, as I have told you before."

"Yes," said Dan, looking earnestly at Joshua.

"Sometimes like a woman, which she is not; sometimes like a little child, which she is not. Yet for all she is so strange, one can't help loving her, and pitying her."

"Is she at all like Ellen, Jo?"

"Minnie is not like Ellen," said Joshua, considering. "Ellen's face is calm and peaceful; Minnie's is grander, larger. Minnie is the kind of girl for a heroine, and Ellen is not, I think. She is too peaceful. Say that Ellen is like a lake, Minnie is like the sea."

A quiet smile passed over Dan's lips, yet a regretful one, too.

"You don't know Ellen, Jo," he said "Give me the lake."

"And me the sea," said Joshua, not meaning it at all with reference to the girls, but literally, with reference to his choice of a profession.

From the first part of this conversation it will be gathered that Susan Taylor had left her home, and had chosen to keep her residence a secret from her family. She was not to blame for it; for she had been most unhappy in the family mansion of the Taylors. Although she earned her own living, and paid for her board and lodging, her father, a drunken, lazy mechanic, had lately been pestering her for small loans, to be spent, of course, at the public-house. These she could not afford to give him; and when he found that she would not assist him, he quarrelled with her. He twitted her about her ungainly person, jeered at her strange mannerisms, pricked her with domestic pins and needles, and made her life so miserable, that she was glad when the culminating quarrel gave her the opportunity to run away.

She had never had a friend. Nearly every girl has a girl-companion with whom she exchanges little confidences, and whom she consults as to the fashion of the new bonnet, and how it is to be trimmed, the pattern of the new dress, and how many flounces it is to have, the color of the new piece of ribbon, and how it should be worn, the personal appearance and intentions of the last new admirer, and how he is to be treated. Susan never had such a companion; worse than that, she never had a sweetheart. She had grown to woman's estate without ever having experienced the pleasures of courtship, either as a child or as a woman. No little boy had taken a liking to her when she was a little girl; and when she grew to be a young woman, no young man had cast a favorable eye upon her. Sooth to say, there was nothing singular in the circumstance; for she was as little attractive externally, as a young woman well could be.

If it were necessary to define and describe her with brevity, a happy definition and description might be given in two simple words--Joints and Knobs. Susan Taylor was all Joints and Knobs, from the crown of her head to the soles of her feet. There was not a straight line about her; every square inch of her frame was broken by a joint or intersected by a knob. Her face did not contain one perfect feature. Bones, with sharp rugged outlines, asserted themselves in her cheeks, in her chin, in her nose (most aggressively there), and in the arches of her eyes. Her shoulders were suggestive of nothing but salt-cellars; her fingers were covered with knuckles; her arms were all elbows; and her knees, as she walked, forced themselves into notice with offensive demonstrativeness. There was nothing round and soft about her. Every part of her was suggestive of Bone; she was so replete with mysterious and complicated angles that she might be said to resemble a mathematical torture. Her angular proportions, broken here by a joint, or intersected there by a knob, did not agree with one another. As not one of them would accept a subordinate position, they were necessarily on the very worst of terms: like a regiment in which every soldier insisted on being colonel, and struggled for the position. The result was Anatomical Confusion.

Cupid is popularly represented to be a mischievous young imp, who delights in tying persons together who are not in the least suited to each other, and as being so reckless and indiscriminate in the use of the metaphorical arrow, which he is everlastingly fixing to that metaphorical bow with such malicious nicety, that the right man seldom finds himself in the right place, and the right woman is similarly unfortunate. As a consequence of this eccentric and inhuman conduct, long men and short women and long women and short men, get absurdly matched, and the mental disparity is often found to be no less than the disparity in limb and bulk. But never, surely, did that tricksy youngster (who is so convenient to writers as a reference, and in various other ways, that they cannot be sufficiently grateful for his mythological existence) play a stranger prank than when he made Susan Taylor and Basil Kindred acquainted with each other. The evening on which Susan, for the first time, saw Basil Kindred act the Ghost scenes in "Hamlet," marked an era in her life not less important than that sad era which was commenced by her letting her brother Daniel fall from her arms out of the window on to the cruel stones. For if ever woman fell in love (which is so violently suggestive that it may well be doubted) with man, Susan Taylor, on that evening, fell in love with Basil Kindred.

But Susan was not the woman to exhibit her passion in words. In another fashion she did exhibit it: in the best fashion that devotion Can show itself--in deeds. She was not a cunning woman, nor a wise one either. Being from the very infirmities of her nature a kind of social outcast, she was not likely to consider what the world would say of any action of hers. And here was an anomaly; she was neither foolish enough nor wise enough to consider what the world would say; yet had she considered that her conduct was open to censure, she would not have swerved a hair's breadth because of the world's opinion; and this very independence proceeded not from a hardened nature, but from a nature utterly simple. So she did what a very considerable majority of the busy bees in this busy world would consider either a very foolish thing or some thing worse. When she left her home she rented a room in the miserable house in which Basil Kindred and his daughter resided. She did this because she loved him; and yet looking for no return of her passion, she did it so that she might make herself useful to him and to Minnie. The living she earned as a dressmaker was a poor and a scanty one enough; but she managed, out of her small earnings, to contribute some little towards the comfort of the couple whose acquaintance she had so strangely made.

Joshua was always certain of a warm welcome from Basil and Minnie; an affectionate intimacy had sprung up between them, and he had spent many a pleasant hour in their company. But in the first flush of their intimacy he had been sorely puzzled by Basil Kindred's strange ways and oft-times stranger remarks; the wandering restlessness of his eyes, and the no less wandering nature of his speech, engendered grave doubts whether he was quite right in his mind. And as Joshua looked from Basil's fine mobile face to that of his daughter, so like her father's in all its grand and beautiful outlines, it distressed him to think that her intellect also might be tainted with her father's disease. It might not be; it might be merely the want of proper moral training that induced her to be so strangely incoherent, so reckless and defiant, and yet at the same time so singularly tender in her conduct. With Minnie every thing was right or wrong according to the way in which it affected herself. She recognized no general law as guiding such and such a principle or sentiment. There was this similarity and this difference between Minnie and Susan: they both ignored the world's opinion and the world's judgment of their actions. But where Susan would be meek, Minnie would be defiant; where Susan would offend through ignorance, Minnie would offend consciously, and be at the same time ready to justify herself and argue the point; which latter she would do, of course, only from her point of view. Supposing that it could be reduced to weights and measures, Minnie would have been content to place herself and her affections on one side of the scale, and all the world on the other, with the positive conviction that she would tip the scale.

She was very affectionate and docile to Joshua; she looked up to him with a kind of adoration, and this tacit acknowledgment of his superiority was pleasing to his vanity. He was her hero, and she worshipped him, and showed that she did so; and he, too, dangerously regarding her as a child, received her worship, and was gratified by it. And so she drifted.

Now as he entered the room, Minnie sprang towards him with a joyous exclamation, and taking his hand, held it tightly clasped in hers as she led him to a seat. The room was not so bare of furniture as it was when he first saw it. He looked round for Basil Kindred.

"Father is not at home, Joshua," said Minnie. "He will be in soon, I dare say." She pushed him softly into a chair, and sat on the ground at his feet. "I am so glad you have come!"

"But I don't think I have time to stay."

"You mustn't go; you mustn't go," said Minnie, drawing his arm round her neck. "I shall be so lonely if you do."

"But you were alone before I came in, Minnie."

"Yes," returned Minnie; "but I did not feel lonely then. I shall now, if you go away."

"Then I will stop for a little while," said Joshua, humoring her.

"Always good!" said Minnie gratefully, resting her lips upon her hand, "always good!"

"Why did you not feel lonely before I came, Minnie?"

"I was thinking."

"Of what?"

"Of long, long ago, when father was different to what he is now."

"It could not have been so long, long ago, little Minnie,"--here came a little caressing action from the child,--"you are only--how old?"

"Fourteen."

"And fourteen years ago is not so long, long ago, little Minnie."

Minnie repeated her caressing action.

"To you it isn't perhaps, but it is to me. It seems almost," she said, placing Joshua's hand upon her eyes, and closing them, "as if I had nothing to do with it. Yet I must have had; for mother was mixed up with what I was thinking.

"But I shall think of something else now that you are here," she said presently. "I am going to listen."

With the hand that was free she took something from her pocket, and placing it to her ear, bent her head closer to the ground. She was so long in that attitude of watchful silence, that Joshua cried "Minnie" to arouse her.

"Hush!" she said; "you must not interrupt me. I am listening. I can almost hear it speak."

"Hear what speak?" asked Joshua, wondering.

Minnie directed his fingers to her ear, and he felt something smooth and cold.

"It is a shell," she said softly, "and I am listening to the sea."

"Ah," said Joshua in a voice as soft as hers, "that is because I am going to be a sailor."

"For that reason. Yes. Call me little Minnie."

"Little Minnie!" said Joshua tenderly; for Minnie's voice and manner were very winsome, and he could not help thinking how quaintly pretty her fancy was.

"Little Minnie, little Minnie!" whispered Minnie in so soft a tone that Joshua could scarcely hear it,--"little Minnie, little Minnie! The sea is singing it. How kind the sea is! and how soft and gentle I should like to go to sleep like this."

"Does the shell sing any thing else, little Minnie?"

"Listen! Ah, but you cannot hear! It is singing, 'Little Minnie, little Minnie, Joshua is going to be a sailor. Little Minnie, little Minnie, would you like to go with him?'"

"And you answer?"

"Yes, yes, yes! I should like to go with him, and hear the sea always singing like this. I should like to go with him because"--But here Minnie stopped.

"Because what?"

"Because nothing," said Minnie, taking the shell from her ear. "Now the sea is gone, and the singing is gone, and we are waiting at home for father."

"What for, Minnie? What am I waiting at home for father for?"

"To see him of course," answered Minnie.

"And to wish him and you good-by," said Joshua.

"Good-by!" echoed the child, with a sudden look of distress in her large gray eyes. "So soon!"

"Yes. My ship sails to-morrow."

"And this is the last day we shall see you," she said, her tears falling upon his hand.

"The last day for a little while, little Minnie," he said, striving to speak cheerfully.

"For how long?" asked the child, bending her head, so that her fair hair fell over her face.

"For a year, perhaps, Minnie," he answered.

"For a long, long year," she said sorrowfully. "You will not do as mother did, will you?"

"How was that?"

"She went away from us one afternoon, and was to come back at night. And it rained--oh, so dreadfully!--that night. We were lodging under some trees, father, mother, and I. Father was ill--very ill, but not with the same kind of illness that he has now sometimes. He had a fever. And mother went into the town to get something for us to eat--as you did that night when the bad boys threw a stone at father, and you brought him home. When father woke we went in search of her. But I never remember seeing mother again. And you are going away, and perhaps I shall never see you again."

"What does the shell say, Minnie?"

Minnie placed the shell to her ear.

"I cannot make out any thing," she said in a voice of pain. "It isn't singing now; it is moaning and sighing."

He took the shell and listened.

"It will speak to me, because I am a sailor."

"And it says?" asked Minnie anxiously.

"And it says--no, it sings--'Little Minnie, little Minnie, Joshua is going to sea, and Joshua will come back, please God, in a year, with beautiful shells and wonderful stories for you and all his friends. So, little Minnie, little Minnie, look happy; for there is nothing to be sorrowful at.'"

"Ah!" said Minnie in less sorrowful tones, "if I was a woman and loved anybody very much, I would not let him go away by himself."

"Why, what would you do?"

"I would follow him." And she pulled Joshua's head down to hers, and whispered, "I should like to go to sea with you."

"Would you indeed, miss!"

"Yes; for I love you, oh, so much!" whispered the child innocently in the same low tones. "But you wouldn't let me go, would you?"

"I should think not. A nice sailor you would make; a weak little thing like you!"

The girl sprang from her crouching attitude, and stood upright. As she did so, expressing in her action what her meaning was, Joshua noticed for the first time that she was growing to be large-limbed and strong. She tossed her hair from her face, and said,--

"Father says I shall be a tall woman."

"Well?"

"Well," she repeated half-proudly and half-bashfully. "I should not make such a bad sailor, after all." And then with a motion thoroughly childlike, she knelt on the ground before him; and placing her elbows on his knees, rested her chin in her upturned palms, and looked steadily into his face. "If I was a woman," she said slowly and earnestly, "I would go with you, even if you would not let me."

"How would you manage that?"

"I would follow you secretly."

"You must not say so," said Joshua reprovingly; "it would be very, very wrong."

"To follow any one you loved?" questioned the child, shaking her head at the same time to denote that she had no doubt whether it would be right or wrong. "Wrong to wish to be with any one you loved? It would be wrong not to wish it. But"--and she looked round, as if fearful, although they were alone, lest her resolution should become known--"nobody should know; I would not tell a living soul."

Joshua was silent, puzzled at Minnie's earnestness. Minnie, with the shell at her ear, soon broke the silence, however.

"Has your friend--the boy you have told me about"--

"Dan?"

"Yes, Dan. Has Dan got a shell?"

"No. I don't suppose he ever thought of it."

"And yet he loves you very much, and a shell is the only thing that can bring the sea to him."

"Who gave you the shell, Minnie?"

"No one."

"How did you get it, then?"

"I took it from a stall."

"O Minnie!" exclaimed Joshua, grieved and shocked; "that was very wicked."

"I know it was," said Minnie simply; "but I did it for you. Two days afterwards, when father had money given to him, I asked him for some, and he gave it me. I went to the stall where the shells were, and asked the man how much each they were. 'A penny,' he said. I gave him two pence and ran away. That was good, wasn't it?"

Joshua shook his head.

"It was very wicked to steal the shell; and I don't think you made up for it by paying double when you got the money."

But Minnie set her teeth close, and said between them, "It was wicked at first, but it wasn't wicked afterwards, was it, shell?"--She listened with a coaxing air to the shell's reply.--"The shell says it wasn't'. Besides, I did it for you; Dan wouldn't have done it."

"No, that he wouldn't."

"Shows he doesn't love you as much as I do," muttered Minnie with jealous intonation. "If he did, he would have thought of a shell, and would have got it somehow. If he did, he would go with you, and would never, never leave you!"

"Now, Minnie, listen to me."

"I am listening, Joshua." She would have taken his hand; but he put it behind his back, and motioned her to be still. She knew by his voice that something unpleasant was coming, and she set her teeth close.

"You know that it is wrong to steal, and you stole the shell."

"I did it for you," she said doggedly. "That does not make it right, Minnie. I want you to give me a promise."

"I will promise you any thing but one thing," she said.

"What is that."

"Never mind. You would never guess, so you will never ask me. What am I to promise?"

"That you will never steal any thing again."

"Do you think I ever stole any thing but the shell, then?" she asked, with an air that would have been stern in its pride if she had not been a child.

It was on the tip of Joshua's tongue to say, "I don't know what to think;" but her manner of putting the question gave the answer to it. "No," he said instead, "I don't think you ever did, Minnie."

Her head was stubbornly bent; and she had enough to do to keep back her tears. She would not have succeeded had his answer been different.

"No, I never stole any thing else. Stole is the proper word, I know; but it is a nasty one, and makes me ashamed."

"That is your punishment, Minnie," said Joshua, wondering at himself for his tenaciousness.

"That is my punishment, then," said Minnie not less doggedly than before; "but I did it for you"--nothing would drive her from that stand-point--"and I promise you, Joshua, that I will never steal any thing again--never, never!"

He gave her his hand, and she took it and caressed it.

"And now, Minnie, about Dan," he said. "You must not say or think any thing ill of him. He is the best-hearted and the dearest friend in the world; and I cannot tell you how much I love him, or how much he loves me."

"Why doesn't he go to sea with you, then?"

Joshua looked at her reproachfully.

"Your memory is not good, Minnie. He is lame, as I told you."

"I forgot. He can't go because he is lame. Would he go if his legs were sound?"

"I think he would."

"Don't think," Minnie said, with a sly look at him; "be sure."

"I am sure he would then."

"Caught!" cried Minnie, clapping her hands, the sly look, in which there was simplicity, changing to a cunning one, in which there was craft. "Caught, caught, caught!"

"I should like to know how," said Joshua. "How ridiculous of you, Minnie, to cry 'Caught!' as if I was a fox!"

"No, I am the fox," she cried, shaking her hair over her face with enchanting grace. "I am in hiding--just peeping round the corner." She made an opening in her thick hair, and flashed a look at him; a look that was saucy, and cunning, and charming, and wilful, all at once. "Am I a good fox?"

"You are a goose. Tell me how I am caught."

"Listen, then," throwing her hair back, and becoming logical. "Dan loves you as well as any man or woman could love another, you said."

"Did I say as well? I thought I said better. I meant better."

"That's no matter. Dan loves you,"--she held up her left hand, and checked off the items on her fingers--"that is one finger. And Dan would go to sea with you; and it would be right, because he loves you--that is two fingers. But Dan can't go because he is lame--that is three fingers. Now I love you, and I am not lame--that is four fingers. And it would not be wrong in me to follow you--and that is my thumb, the largest reason of all. So you are caught, caught, caught, you see."

"I do not see," said Joshua in a very decided voice. "Dan is a boy, and you are a girl; and what is right for a boy to do is often wrong for a girl. I do not see that I am caught."

But Minnie had relinquished the argument. She was satisfied that she was right.

"And you would really be very angry with me if I did it?" she asked.

"I should be very angry with you now, Minnie, if it were not that you were a stupid little girl, just a trifle too fond of talking nonsense. Such nonsense, too! Why, there's Ellen, Dan's sister, she wouldn't talk so."

All the brightness went out of Minnie's face, and a dark cloud was there instead.

Joshua noticed it with surprise. He took her hand gently; but she snatched it away.

"Ellen would not behave like that," he said; "she is too mild and gentle." There came into his mind what he had said to Dan of the two girls--that Ellen was like a lake, and Minnie like the sea; and he thought how true it was. "It would do you good to know her."

"I don't want to know her," said Minnie sullenly, "and I don't want to be done good to."

"I didn't think you would be cross-tempered on my last day at home," said Joshua in a grave and gentle voice. He paused, as if expecting her to speak; but she remained silent. "Ah, well," he said, rising, "I shall go and see if I can find your father."

She jumped up and walked with him to the door.

"Say that you are not angry with me," she said in a voice of the softest pleading, raising her face to his.

He would have made a different reply, but he saw that her face was covered with tears.

"Angry with you!" he said kindly. "Who could be angry with you for long, little Minnie?"

She smiled gratefully and thoughtfully as he kissed her; and when he had gone, and she had heard his last footstep, she returned to her old place upon the floor, and crouching down, placed the shell to her ear, and listened to the singing of the sea.

CHAPTER X.

GOODBY.

Minnie's obliviousness of what was right had never before been presented so clearly to Joshua. He knew well enough that Minnie, although she was aware that it was wrong to steal, could not understand that she did wrong in stealing the shell. At the same time he could not help feeling tenderly towards her because of that wrong action. After all, how much she was to be pitied! Could it be wondered at that she was hard to teach, and that she was wayward and wilful, living such a lonely life as she lived, with no friend to counsel, no mother to guide her? How quaint was her fancy, and what a pretty thing it was to see her as he saw her in his imaginings--sitting alone in her room, with the shell at her ear, listening to the singing of the sea! With what a daintily-caressing motion she nestled to him when he called her "Little Minnie!" He repeated the pet words to himself, "Little Minnie, little Minnie!" as he walked along, and smiled. As for her telling him that she would like to go to sea with him, what was it but a childish whimsey? If he had not contradicted her, and made a matter of importance of it, she would have said it, and there an end. She would like to go to sea with him, and would follow him if she were a woman: Well! she was but a child, and the wish was as innocent as her declaration that she loved him.

When he had thought out all this, he thought of to-morrow, and looked round upon the familiar streets and the familiar houses with a pang of regret. To-morrow he would be far away from them, and every succeeding day would take him farther and farther away from them and all that he loved. From mother, father, the Old Sailor, his pet birds, and from Dan--ah! dear, dear Dan! Did ever boy or man have such a friend? Then there was Ellen, his dear little sweetheart in the days when they were children together. Was there ever such another unselfish little maid as that? So devoted, so tender, so loving! How quickly she had won the heart of the Old Sailor! He remembered that old salt saying, pointing his great finger at Ellen as he said it, "Joshua, my lad, that little lass there is the prettiest, the best, the truest and the kindest-hearted in these dominions." And he remembered himself looking at Ellen's mild face--peaceful as a lake--and saying, "So she is, sir," and meaning it heartily; and he remembered the Old Sailor saying, "That's right, my lad; all you've got to do is to mind your bearings." Although he had answered, "Yes, sir, I will," he wondered afterwards, and he found himself wondering now, what on earth the Old Sailor meant by saying, "Mind your bearings." But what matter? Ellen was the prettiest, the best, the truest, and the kindest-hearted lass in these or any other dominions. God bless her!

As he thought of these things, he felt himself growing so soft-hearted, that he stopped and stamped his feet upon the pavement, and thumped himself upon the chest, saying as he did so, between laughing and crying, "This won't do, Josh; this won't do."

He had given himself a score of thumps, and had said, "This won't do, Josh," half-a-score of times, when loud cries for help fell upon his ears. He had been walking in the direction of the river, through some of the streets where he would be most likely to find Basil Kindred; and he was in a locality where there was a number of low public-houses, patronized by the worst class of seamen. Turning in the direction of the cry, Joshua saw a woman run swiftly out of a narrow thoroughfare. Pursuing her was a man, a dark-looking fellow, with glittering eyes, and rings in his ears, and a knife in his hand, and with all his copper-colored fingers and black-serpent locks of hair flashing in the air with evil intent. Impelled by the unmistakable air of terror in the form of the flying girl, and the unmistakable air of mischief in the form of the pursuing man--partly, also, by the impulsion born of the hunting spirit implanted in man and beast, Joshua started off at a great pace, and flew after the flying couple.

It was that part of the day when the neighborhood was most quiet. All the men were at work in the dockyards, and the few women about (having a wholesome horror probably of a man with an open knife in his hand, and being perhaps accustomed to such diversions) seemed disinclined to take part in the chase. With the exception of one drunken creature, with a blotched and bloated face, who made a frantic motion to follow, but being tripped up by her draggling petticoats, stumbled, more like a heap of rags than a woman, into the gutter, Where she lay growling indistinctly.

The flying woman and the pursuing man were fleet of foot, but Joshua was younger and more nimble than they. As he gained upon them, a dim consciousness stole upon him that he knew them; and, as he approached nearer, the doubt grew into conviction. The almost breathless woman, throwing affrighted looks behind her, as if a dozen men were pursuing her instead of one, was Susan; and the evil-looking man who was bent on running her down was the Lascar who served the Old Sailor, and who cooked for him, and would have poisoned him for rum and tobacco. Some other than those, the ruling cravings of his existence, influenced him now. All the passions of love and hate, and the desire to achieve his purpose by striking terror, were expressed in every motion of every limb: they were so eloquent and earnest in the savage pursuit that they seemed to proclaim their owner's intention, as he raced after the panting girl.

He was almost upon her, and she felt his ugly lips reeking their detestable flavor of rum and tobacco upon her neck, when Joshua, coming up to him, seized him by the throat. He had been so savagely vindictive in the pursuit, that Joshua's hand upon his throat was the first indication he received that he was being himself pursued; but, wasting no look upon his pursuer, he slipped from Joshua like an eel--his neck was redolent of grease--and with an inarticulate cry of rage and baffled lust, he sprang after Susan again, who had gained a few steps by Joshua's ineffectual interposition. But Susan, thoroughly bewildered and terrified, turned into a blind alley, and perceiving that there was no thoroughfare, and that she was trapped, fell upon the rough stones, prostrate from fear and exhaustion.

On one side of the blind alley were four or five houses, in which no signs of life were visible. They seemed stricken to death by disease. On the other side was a black dead wall, which shut out the sky. Before the Lascar could reach Susan--what the man's intention was, or what he would have done in his wild fury, he, being more beast than man, might probably not have been able to explain--Joshua had knocked the knife out of his hand, and had knocked him down with a blow, the force of which astonished Joshua himself, even in the midst of his excitement. Almost before Joshua could realize what had occurred, the cowardly Lascar was crouching by the side of the dead wall, as if his lair were there, and Joshua was on his knee assisting Susan to recover herself; keeping a wary look, however, upon the knife, which was lying in the road at an equal distance from him and the Lascar. The Lascar saw it too--saw it without looking at it, and without seeming to see it. A surprising change had taken place in him. A minute since a volcano of delirious lust was raging in his breast, and every nerve in his body was quivering with dangerous passion; now, as if by magic, he was coiled up like a snake, with no motion of life in him but the quiet glitter of his eyes, which watched every thing, but seemed to watch nothing.

"What is it all about, Susan?" asked Joshua in wonderment, after a pause. But, before Susan could reply, a crawling motion on the part of the Lascar towards the knife caused Joshua to spring into the road. The snake had no chance with the panther. The Lascar was knocked back to his position by the dead wall, and Joshua stood over him grasping the knife. This was the most eventful transaction that had ever occurred to Joshua; and, as he stood over his antagonist palming the knife, a strange sensation of pride in his own strength tingled through his veins. There was blood upon the Lascar's face; Joshua had struck him so fiercely as to loosen one of his teeth--so decidedly to loosen it, that the Lascar put his finger into his mouth and drew it out. He said nothing, however, but kept the tooth clasped in his hand.

"You black devil!" exclaimed Joshua, gazing upon the crouching figure with a kind of loathing amazement. "What do you mean by all this?"

The Lascar wiped the blood from his mouth with his sleeve, and shaking the hair from his eyes, threw upon Joshua a covert look of deadly malice--a look expressive of a bloody-minded craving to have Joshua helpless on the stones beneath him, that he might press the life out of his enemy. His eye spoke, but his tongue uttered no word. Raging inwardly as he was with bad passion, he had sufficient control over himself to suppress any spoken manifestation of it. But his attitude and demeanor were not less dangerous for all that.

"He follows me everywhere," said Susan, still gasping and panting for breath. "He dogs me by day and by night. He waylays me in the dark, and I can hardly get away from him."

"What for?" demanded Joshua, with his eye upon the Lascar, who was sitting cunningly quiet, nursing his wounded mouth.

"I don't know," replied Susan, with an appalled look over her shoulder, as if she were haunted by a fear that the spirit of the Lascar was there, notwithstanding that he was crouching before her in the ugly flesh. "I am afraid to think."

"Afraid! in broad daylight!"

"Day or night it is all the same," moaned Susan. "Whenever he sees me, he dogs me till I am ready to die. You don't know his power--you don't know his power!"

"What were you doing before I saw you?"

"I was looking for some one."

"For whom?"

"For Mr. Kindred," with a curious hesitation.

"For Mr. Kindred!" exclaimed Joshua, more amazed than ever; "why for him?"

"He is ill. I will tell you about it by and by," replied Susan nervously. "I thought I should find him in this neighborhood, and while I was looking for him, he"--pointing to the Lascar with a shudder--"he saw me and spoke to me, and would not leave me--wanted me to go with him and drink with him, and when I refused, he seized me, and then--then--I scratched him--and--I don't remember any thing more, except that I was afraid he wanted to kill me."

Joshua looked up at the Lascar's face, and observed the scratch for the first time. It was a long scratch downwards from the eye to the wounded mouth. The Lascar made no attempt to hide it, but sat still, with his hand on his mouth.

"Serve you right, you black dog!" exclaimed Joshua. "What do you mean by dogging her? What do you mean by following her with a knife? Why, you Lascar dog, for two pins"--he raised his hand indignantly, and advanced a step towards the Lascar, who made a shrinking movement backwards, although in truth he could not get nearer to the dead wall than he was already.

"Don't, Joshua, don't!" cried Susan, seizing his arm, and clinging to him imploringly. "Don't touch him, for God's sake, or"--with another scared look behind her--"he'll haunt you as he haunts me."

A taunting wicked smile crossed the Lascar's lips, but it was gone a moment afterwards. It might have been the shadow of an evil thought finding expression there.

"How does he haunt you more than you have already told me he does?" demanded Joshua in a great heat. "You don't think he can frighten me as he frightens you, Susan, do you? The black dog! Look at him! He's frightened of a white man's little finger!"

"Hush!" implored Susan. "He haunts me when he is not near me."

"How can he do that, you foolish girl?"

"He does it--he can do it--with his double!"

"His double?"

"He has a double--a spirit, a wicked spirit"--she turned her head slowly and trembled in every limb; "and he told me it should haunt me, and follow me wherever I go. And it does! I feel it behind me when I don't see him. It is there now! It is there now!" And wrought to the highest pitch of mental terror and excitement, Susan threw up her hands, and would have fallen to the ground but for Joshua's protecting arm.

The taunting smile came again upon the Lascar's lips, as he secretly watched Susan's terror. With a special maliciousness he flashed his fingers towards her, as if he were issuing a command to his double not to leave her. It was evidence of the power he possessed over her weak mind that, notwithstanding her almost fainting condition, a stronger shuddering came upon her when he made even that slight motion.

Feeling that, for Susan's sake, it was necessary to put an end to the scene, Joshua, with an indignant motion, commanded the Lascar to leave them. The Lascar rose submissively, like a whipped dog, and so stood with bent head before Joshua.

"Now then, what are you waiting for?" asked Joshua.

"My knife," answered the Lascar doggedly.

"Not likely," said Joshua; "I know you too well to let you have it."

"What do you know of me?" asked the Lascar in a low guttural voice.

"I have heard enough of you from Mr. Meddler"--the Lascar grated his teeth with tigerish ferocity--"you and the likes of you. I know how free you are with your knives, you Lascars, on land and on sea. Be off!"

"My knife!" again demanded the Lascar, with his eyes directed to Joshua's feet; but he saw Joshua's face and every motion of Joshua's body. "My knife! It is mine. I bought it and paid for it."

"Stole it more likely," said Joshua with a sneer.

"It is a lie. I bought it. Even if I did steal it, you have no right to it. Give me my knife, and let me go."

"Joshua reflected. Clearly he had no just claim to the man's knife, and had no right to retain it. His mind was soon made up. Releasing his hold of Susan, he placed the blade beneath his foot, and broke it off close to the handle. Then he threw the handle and the blade over the Lascar's head. A dangerous fire gleamed in the man's downcast eyes and a cold-blooded grating of teeth came from his mouth. He stood silent for a few moments, with his hands tightly pressed, striving to master the devil that was raging within him. But he could not restrain his passion.

"Curse you!" he hissed; "I owe you something; I will pay it you, by hell!"

He crouched to receive the blow which he expected Joshua would give him, in return for his curse. But no blow was given nor intended; yet he quivered as if he had been struck before he spoke again.

"See you!" he cried; "I never forget--never--never! My turn will come. You called me black devil"--

"So you are," said Joshua scornfully. "And black dog--dog of a Lascar!"

"So you are."

"You shall pay for it! If it is years before I can pay you, you shall be paid for it! See you--remember!" With all his fingers menacingly, as if each was possessed with a distinct will, and was swearing vengeance against Joshua. "Your life shall pay for it--more than your life shall pay for it!" He spat upon the ground and trod savagely upon the spittle. "I mark you--see!" With his forefinger he marked a cross in the air. "I put this cross against you--curse you!"

Susan, gazing on with sight terror-fixed, saw the infuriated man stamp upon the stones, as if he had Joshua's life-blood beneath his foot, and then saw the cross marked in the air. The fire of her fevered imagination gave red color to the shadowy lines; and when the Lascar lowered his forefinger, she saw the recorded cross standing unsupported in the air--a cross of bright red blood. Fascinated, she gazed until the bright color faded into two dusky lines, and so remained. Joshua laughed lightly at the vindictive action and the curse; yet he did not feel quite at his ease.

"Come, Susan," he said, "let us be going."

But Susan did not move. Every sense was absorbed in watching the dreadful cross and the Lascar's passion-distorted face. He, stooping to pick up the handle of the knife and the broken blade, turned again upon Joshua, and remained faithful to his theme.

"Don't forget," he said in his low, bad voice, the words coming slowly from a throat almost choked with passion. "By this"--placing his hand upon his wounded mouth--"and these"--holding up the pieces of the knife--"I will keep you in mind. If it is to-morrow, or next week, or next month, you shall be paid! The dog of a Lascar never forgets! See you--remember!"

"Storm away," said Joshua, drawing Susan aside to allow the Lascar to pass. "You will have to be very quick about it, for to-morrow I go to sea."

"You do, eh!" exclaimed the Lascar, with another harsh grating of his teeth, and stopping suddenly in his course. "See you now--take this with you for my good-by!" With a swift motion, he cut his finger with the broken blade, and shook the blood at Joshua. It fell in a sprinkle over his clothes, and a drop plashed into his face. The Lascar saw it, and laughed. "Take that with you for luck!" he cried. "By that mark I shall live to pay you, and you will live to be paid!"

So saying, he turned and fled. Joshua sprang after him, but the man was out of sight in a minute. Returning to Susan, Joshua found her sitting upon the pavement, nursing her knees and sobbing distressfully.

"O Josh!" she cried, "it is a bad omen."

"Not at all," said Joshua, cooling down a little, and wiping the spot of blood from his face. "What does the old proverb say? 'Curses always come home to roost.' Do you hear me?"

It was evident that she did not; her fright was still strong upon her. With a shrinking movement of her head, she looked slowly round, and clutching Joshua's hand, whispered, "For pity's sake, don't let him come near me! Hold me tight! Keep close to me! He is not gone!"

With a firm and gentle force, Joshua compelled her to stand upright.

"There is no one here but you and I," he said, in a firm voice. "You are letting your fancies make a baby of you. There is no one here but you and I. If you will not believe what I say--I can see, I suppose, and I am calm, while you are in a regular fever--if you will not believe what I say, I shall leave you."

"No, no!" she cried, clinging to him.

He compelled her to walk two or three times up and down the court. His decided action calmed her. She gave vent to a sigh of relief, and wiped her eyes.

"That's right," said Joshua as they walked out of the court. "Now I can tell you that I am glad I have met you. I join my ship to-morrow."

"I had no idea you were going away so soon."

"I am going now to see if Mr. Kindred is at home."

"I live in the same house as he does," she said, looking timidly at Joshua.

"That is strange. Are you and he intimate?"

"Yes. They are poor, you know, Joshua."

"So are you, Susey."

"But I can help them a little. He's often ill, and Minnie isn't strong enough to take care of him, and so I nurse him sometimes. Minnie and I are great friends."

When they arrived at Basil Kindred's poor lodging, Minnie met them at the door. With her finger to her lips, she motioned them to be quiet.

"Tread softly," she whispered; "father has come home, and is lying down."

They walked to the bed, and saw Basil Kindred lying on the bed in unquiet sleep. Susan placed her hand on his hot forehead, and said,--

"I have been afraid of this for a long time, Josh. He has got a fever. What would he do without me now?"

There was a touch of pride in her voice as she asked the question. The pride arose from the conviction that the man she loved really needed her help, and from the knowledge that she could make some little sacrifice for him.

"He is very, very ill, I think," whispered Minnie.

"We will make him well between us, Minnie," said Susan.

Al! the fears by which she was assailed but a few minutes since were gone. Joshua was glad to see that, at all events.

Minnie took Susan's hand gratefully, and kissed it.

"She has been so good to us, Joshua," she said.

Susan's eyes kindled, and she directed to Joshua a look which said, "Have I not done right in coming to live here? See how useful I can be, and how happy I am!"

"I shall tell them at home where you live, Susey," said Joshua.

"Very well. Give my love to Dan."

Joshua nodded, and bent over Basil Kindred. The action disturbed the sleeping man. He seized Joshua's wrist in his burning hand, and said, in a trembling voice, "She died in my arms, and the earth was her bed. The stars were ashamed to look upon her. Well they might be! Well they might be!"

"He is speaking of his wife," said Susan softly to Joshua. "He loved her very dearly, and would have died for her. When she died, his heart almost broke."

Sympathy and devotion made her voice like sweet music. Joshua looked at her with a feeling of wonder, and was amazed at the change that had come over her. An hour ago, she was crouching in drivelling terror, overpowered by absurd fancies; now she moved about cheerfully, strong in her purpose of love. But he had never in all his life seen her as he saw her now. He bade her good-by, and she wished him Godspeed, and kissed him. Minnie accompanied him to the door.

"Good-by, dear little Minnie," he said.

"Good-by," she said, with tears in her voice. "You forgive me, don t you, for what I said this afternoon?"

"Yes, my dear."

"Ah! I like to hear you speak like that; it sounds sweet and good. Say, 'I forgive you, little Minnie.'"

"But I haven't any thing to forgive, now I come to think of it."

"Yes, you have. You say that out of your good nature. You mustn't go away and leave me to think that you are angry with me."

"I am not angry with you, Minnie. After all, what you did, you did through love, and there could not be much wrong in it."

The brightest of bright expressions stole into her face, and she clasped her hands with joy.

"Say that again, Joshua, word for word, as you said it just now."

"What you did, you did through love," repeated Joshua to please her, "and there could not be much wrong in it."

"O Joshua!" she cried, pressing her hands to her face, "you have made me almost quite happy. I have heard father say the same thing, but in different words. Now I shall follow you to sea. Yes, I shall, with this," holding up her shell. "To-morrow night, and every night that you are at sea, I shall listen to my shell and think of you."

"Stupid little Minnie," he said affectionately.

"And you will come back in a year?"

"I hope so, please God."

"Then I shall be growing quite a woman," she said thoughtfully.

The next moment she raised her face quickly to his. The tears were streaming down it. As he bent to her, she caught him round the neck, and kissed him once, twice, thrice, with more than the passionate affection, but with all the innocence, of a child. Then she ran into the house; and Joshua, taking that as a farewell, walked slowly homewards, to go through the hardest trial of all.