Читать книгу The Master; a Novel - Israel Zangwill - Страница 7

âHE PLACED HIMSELF WITH HIS BACK TO THE DOORâ

âWhy, thereâs onây mud-flats,â he added.

âIâll wait on the mud-flats fur the merciful tide.â She fastened her bonnet-strings firmly.

âThe river is full of ice,â he urged.

âThere will be room fur me,â she answered. Then, with a sudden exclamation of dismay, âMy God! youâve got no shoes and socks on! Youâll ketch your death. Go up-stairs dâreckly.â

âNo,â replied Matt, becoming conscious for the first time of a cold wave creeping up his spinal marrow. âIâll ketch my death, then,â and he sneezed vehemently.

âPut on your shoes anâ socks dâreckly, you wretched boy. You know what a bother I hed with you last time.â

He shook his head, conscious of a trump card.

âDâye hear me! Put on your shoes and socks!â

âTake off your bonnet anâ sacque,â retorted Matt, clinching his fists.

âPut on your shoes anâ socks!â repeated his mother.

âTake off your bonnet anâ sacque, anâ Iâll put on my shoes anâ socks.â

They stood glaring defiance at each other, like a pair of duellists, their breaths rising in the frosty air like the smoke of pistols—these two grotesque figures in the gray light of the bleak passage, the tall, fierce brunette, in her flowery bonnet and astrakhan sacque, and the small, shivering, sneezing boy, in his patched homespun coat, with his trailing braces and bare feet. They heard Harrietâs teeth chatter in the silence.

âGo back to bed, you young varmint,â said Matt, suddenly catching sight of Billyâs white face and gray night-gown on the landing above. âYouâll ketch your death.â

There was a scurrying sound from above, a fleeting glimpse of other little night-gowned figures. Matt and his mother still confronted each other warily. And then the situation was broken up by the near approach of sleigh-bells. They stopped slowly, mingling their jangling with the creak of runners sliding over frosty snow, then the scrunch of heavy boots travelled across the clearing. Harriet flushed in modest alarm and fled up-stairs. Mrs. Strang hastily retreated into the kitchen, and for one brief moment Matt breathed freely, till, hearing the click of the door-latch, he scented gunpowder. He dashed towards the door and pressed the thumb-latch, but it was fastened from within.

âHarriet!â he gasped, âthe gun! the gun!â

He beat at the door, his imagination seeing through it. His loaded gun was resting on the wooden hooks fastened to the beam in the ceiling. He heard his mother mount a chair; he tried to break open the door, but could not. The chances of getting round by the back way flashed into his mind, only to be dismissed as quickly. There was no time—in breathless agony he waited the report of the gun. Crash! A strange, unexpected sound smote his ears—he heard the thud of his motherâs body striking the floor. She had stabbed herself, then, instead. Half mad with excitement and terror, he backed to the end of the passage, took a running leap, and dashed with his mightiest momentum against the frail battened door. Off flew the catch, open flew the door with Matt in pursuit, and it was all the boy could do to avoid tumbling over his mother, who sat on the floor among the ruins of a chair, rubbing her shins, her bonnet slightly disarranged, and the gun, still loaded, demurely on its perch. What had happened was obvious; some of the little Strang mice, taking advantage of the catâs absence at the âmuddinâ frolic,â had had a frolic on their own account, turning the chair into a sled, and binding up its speedily-broken leg to deceive the maternal eye. It might have supported a sitter; under Mrs. Strangâs feet it had collapsed ere her hand could grasp the gun.

âThe pesky young varmints!â she exclaimed, full of this new grievance. âThey might hev crippled me fur life. Always a-tearinâ anâ a-rampaginâ anâ a-ruinatinâ. I kinât keep two sticks together. Itâs ânough to make a body throw up the position.â

The sound of the butt-end of a whip battering the front-door brought her to her feet with a bound. She began dusting herself hastily with her hand.

âWell, whatâre you gawkinâ at?â she inquired. âKinât you go anâ unbar the door, âstead oâ standinâ there like a stuck pig?â

Matt knew the symptoms of volcanic extinction; without further parley he ran to the door and took down the beechen bar. The visitor was âole Hey,â who drove the mail. The deacon came in, powdered as from his own grist-mill, and added the snow of his top-boots to the drift in the hall. There were leather-faced mittens on his hands, ear-laps on his cap, tied under the chin, a black muffler, hoary with frost from his breath, round his neck and mouth, and an outer coat of buffalo-skin swathing his body down to his ankles, so that all that was visible of him was a little inner circle of red face with frosted eyebrows.

Mrs. Strang stood ready in the hall with a genial smile, and Matt, his heart grown lighter, returned to the kitchen, extracted the family foot-gear from under the stove, where it had been placed to thaw, and putting on his own still-sodden top-boots, he set about shaving whittlings and collecting kindlings to build the fire.

âHere we are again, hey!â cried the deacon, as heartily as his perpetual, colossal quid would permit.

âDo tell! is it really you?â replied Mrs. Strang, with her pleasant smile.

âYes—dooty is dooty, I allus thinks,â he said, spitting into the snow-drift and flicking the snow over the tobacco-juice with his whip. âWhatever Deacon Haileyâs hand finds to do he does fust-rate—thetâs a fact. It donât seem so long a while since you and me were shakinâ our heels in the Sir Roger. Nay, donât look so peaked—thereâs nuthinâ to make such a touse about. You air a particâler Baptist, hey? Anâ I guess you kinder allowed Deacon Hailey would be late with the mail, hey? But heâs es spry es if heâd gone to bed with the fowls. You wonât find the beat of him among the young fellers nowadays—thetâs so. Theyâre a lazy, slinky lot; and es for doinâ their dooty to their country or their neighbor—â

âHev you brought me a letter?â interrupted Mrs. Strang, anxiously.

âI guess—but youâre goinâ out airly?â

âI allowed Iâd walk over to the village to see if it hed come.â

âOh, but it ainât the one you expecâ.â

âNo?â she faltered.

âI guess not. Thetâs why I brought it myself. I kinder scented it was suthinâ special, and so I reckoned Iâd save you the trouble of trudginâ to the post-office. Deacon Hailey ainât the man to spare himself trouble to obleege a fellow-critter. Do es youâd be done by, hey?â The deacon never lost an opportunity of pointing the moral of a position. Perhaps his sermonizing tendency was due to his habit of expounding the Sunday texts at a weekly meeting, or perhaps his weekly exposition was due to his sermonizing tendency.

âThank you.â Mrs. Strang extended her hand for the letter. He produced it slowly, apparently from up the sleeve of his top-most coat, a wet, forlorn-looking epistle, addressed in a sprawling hand. Mrs. Strang turned it about, puzzled.

âPâraps itâs from Uncle Matt,â ejaculated Matt, appearing suddenly at the kitchen door.

âYouâve got Uncle Matt on the brain,â said Mrs. Strang. âItâs a Halifax stamp.â She could not understand it; her own family rarely wrote to her, and there was no hand of theirs in the address. Deacon Hailey lingered on, apparently prepared, in his consideration for others, to listen to the contents of his âfellow-critterâsâ letter.

âAh, sonny,â he said to Matt, âonly jest turned out, and not slicked up yet. When I was your age I hed done my dayâs chores afore the day hed begun. No wonder the Province is so âtarnally behindhand, hey?â

âThetâs so,â Matt murmured. Pop! pop! pop! was all that he heard, so that ole Heyâs moral exhortations left him neither a better nor a wiser boy.

Mrs. Strang still held the letter in her hand, apparently having become indifferent to it. Ole Hey did not know she was waiting for him to go, so that she might put on her spectacles and read it. She never wore her spectacles in public, any more than she wore her nightcap. Both seemed to her to belong to the privacies of the inner life, and glasses in particular made an old woman of one before oneâs time. If she had worn out her eyes with needle-work and tears, that was not her neighborsâ business.

The deacon, with no sign of impatience, elaborately unbuttoned his outer buffalo-skin, then the overcoat beneath that, and the coat under that, and then, pulling up the edge of his cardigan that fitted tightly over his waistcoats, he toilsomely thrust his horny paw into his breeches-pocket and hauled out a fig of âblack-jack.â Then he slowly produced from the other pocket a small tool-chest in the guise of a pocket-knife, and proceeded to cut the tobacco with one of the instruments.

âCome here, sonny!â he cried.

âThe deacon wants you,â said Mrs. Strang.

Matt moved forward into the passage, wondering. Ole Hey solemnly held up the wedge of black-jack he had cut, and when Mattâs eye was well fixed on it he dislodged the old âchawâ from his cheek with contortions of the mouth, and blew it out with portentous gravity. Lastly, he replaced it by the wedge of âblack-jack,â mouthed and moulded the new quid conscientiously between tongue and teeth, and passed the ball into his right cheek.

âThetâs the way to succeed in life, sonny. Never throw away dirty afore you got clean, hey?â

Poor Matt, unconscious of the lesson, waited inquiringly and deferentially, but the deacon was finished, and turned again to his mother.

âI âspect it âll be from some of the folks to home, mebbe.â

âMebbe,â replied Mrs. Strang, longing for solitude and spectacles.

âWhen did you last hear from the boss?â

âHe was in the South Seas, the captân, sellinâ beads to the savages. Heâd a done better to preach âem the Word, I do allow.â

âAh, you kinât expect godliness from sailors,â said the deacon. âItâs in the sea es the devil spreads his nets, thetâs a fact.â

âThe Apostles were fishermen,â Mrs. Strang reminded him.

âYes; but fishers ainât sailors, Mrs. Strang. Itâs in furrin parts that the devil lurks, and the further a man goes from his family the nearer he goes to the devil, hey?â

Mrs. Strang winced. âBut heâs gittinâ our way now,â she protested, unguardedly. âHeâs cominâ South with a freight.â

âAh, joined the blockade-runners, hey?â

Mrs. Strang bit her lip and flushed. âI donât kear,â the deacon said, reassuringly. âI donât see why Nova Scotia should go solid for the North. Whatâs the North done for Nova Scotia âcept ruin us with their protection dooties, gol durn âem. They wonât have slaves, hey? Ainât we their slaves? Donât they skin us es clean es a bear does a sheep? Ainât they allus on the lookout to snap up the Province? But I never talk politics. If the North and South want to cut each otherâs throats, thatâs not our consarn. Mind your own business, I allus thinks, hey? And if your boss kin make a good spec by provisioninâ the Southerners, youâll be a plaguy sight better off, I vow. And so will I—for, you know, I shall hev to call in the mortgage unless you fork out thet thar interest purty slick. Thereâs no underhandedness about Deacon Hailey. He gives you fair warninâ.â

âDârectly the letter comes you shall have it—Iâve often told you so.â

âMebbe thetâll be his letter, after all—put his thumb out, I guess, and borrowed another fellerâs, hey?â

âNo—heâd be nowhere near Halifax,â said Mrs. Strang, her feverish curiosity mounting momently. âDonât them thar sleigh-bells play a tune! I guess your horses air gettinâ kinder restless.â

âWell—thereâs nuthinâ I kin do for you to Cobequid Village?â he said, lingeringly.

Mrs. Strang shook her head. âThank you, I guess not.â

âYou wouldnât kear to write an answer now—Iâd be tolerable pleased to post it for you down thar. Allus study your fellow-critters, I allus thinks.â

âNo, thank you.â

Deacon Hailey spat deliberately on the floor.

âEr—you got to home safe this morninâ?â

âYes, thank you. We all come together, me and Harriet and Matt. âTwere a lovely walk in the moonlight, with the Aurora Borealis a-quiverinâ and a-flushinâ on the northern horizon.â

âA-h-h,â said the deacon slowly, and rather puzzled. âA roarer! Hey?â

At this moment a sudden stampede of hoofs and a mad jangling of bells were heard without. With a âDurn them beasts!â the deacon breathlessly turned tail and fled in pursuit of the mail-sleigh, mounting it over the luggage-rack. When he had turned the corner, Mattâs grinning face emerged from behind the snow-capped stump of a juniper.

âI reckon I fetched him thet time,â he said, throwing away the remaining snowball, as he hastened gleefully inside to partake of the contents of the letter.

He found his mother sitting on the old settle in the kitchen, her spectacled face gray as the sand on the floor, her head bowed on her bosom. One limp hand held the crumpled letter. She reminded him of a drooping foxglove. The room had a heart of fire now, the stove in the centre glowed rosily with rock-maple brands, but somehow it struck a colder chill to Mattâs blood than before.

âFatherâs drownded,â his mother breathed.

âHeâll never know âbout Billy now,â he thought, with a gleam of relief.

Mrs. Strang began to wring her mittened hands silently, and the letter fluttered from between her fingers. Matt made a dart at it, and read as follows:

Dear Marm,—Donât take on but ime sorrie to tell you that the Cap is a gone goose we run the block kade oust slick but the 2 time we was took by them allfird Yanks we reckkend to bluff âem in the fog but about six bells a skwad of friggets bore down on us sudden like ole nick the cap he sees he was hemd in on a lee shoar and he swears them lubberly northers shanât have his ship not if he goes to Davy Jones his loker he lufs her sharp up into the wind and sings out lower the longbote boys and while the shot was tearin and crashin through the riggin he springs to the hall-yards and hauls down the cullers then jumps through the lazzaret into the store room kicks the head of a carsk of ile in clinches a bit of oakem dips it in the ile and touches a match to it and drops it on the deck into the runin ile and then runs for it hisself jumps into the bote safe with the cullers and we sheer off into the fog mufflin our oars with our caps and afore that tarnation flame bust out to show where we were we warnt there but we heard the everlastin fools poundin away at the poor old innocent Sally Bell till your poor boss dear marm he larfs and ses he shipmets ses he look at good old Sally sheâs stickin out her yellow tongue at em and grinnin at the dam goonies beg pardon marm but that was his way he never larfed no more for wed disremembered the cumpess and drifted outer the fog into a skwall and the night was comin on and we drov blind on a reef and capsized but we all struck out for shore and allowed the cap was setting sale the same way as the rest on us but when we reached the harbor the cap he warnt at the helm and a shipmet ses ses he as how he would swim with that air bundle of cullers that was still under his arm and they tangelled round his legs and sorter dragged him under and kep him down like sea-weed and now dear marm he lays in the Gulf of Mexiker kinder rapped in a shroud and gone aloft I was the fust mate and a better officer I never wish to sine with for tho he did sware till all was blue his hart was like an unborn babbys and wishing you a merry Christmas and God keep you and the young orfuns and giv you a happy new year dear marm you deserve it.

ime yours to command,

Hoska Cuddy (Mate).

p s.—i would have writ erlier, but i couldnât get your address till i worked my way to Halifax and saw the owners scuse me not puttin this in a black onwellop i calclated to brake it eesy.

Matt hastily took in the gist of the letter, then stood folding it carefully, at a loss what to say to the image of grief rocking on the settle. From the barn behind came the lowing of Daisy—half protestation, half astonishment at the unpunctuality of her breakfast. Matt found a momentary relief in pitying the cow. Then his motherâs voice burst out afresh.

âMy poor Davie,â she moaned. âCut off afore you could repent, too deep down fur me to kiss your dead lips. I hevnât even got a likeness oâ you; you never would be took. I shall never see your face again on airth, and I misdoubt if Iâll meet you in heaven.â

âOf course you will—he saved his flag,â said Matt, with shining eyes.

His mother shook her head, and set the roses on her bonnet nodding gayly to the leaping flame. âYour father was born a Sandemanian,â she sighed.

âWhat is thet?â said Matt.

âDonât ask me; there air things boys mustnât know. And youâve seen in the letter âbout his profane langwidge. I never wouldâve run off with him; all my folks were agen it, and a sore time Iâve hed in the wilderness âway back from my beautiful city. But it was Godâs finger. I pricked the Bible fur a verse, anâ it came: âAnâ they said unto her, Thou art mad. But she constantly affirmed it was even so. Then said they, It is his angel.â â

She nodded and muttered, âAnâ I was his angel,â and the roses trembled in the firelight. âIf you were a good boy, Matt,â she broke off, âyouâd know where thet thar varse come from.â

âHednât I better tell Harriet?â he asked.

âActs, chapter eleven, verse fifteen,â muttered his mother. âIt was the finger of God. Whatâs thet you say âbout Harriet? Ainât she finished tittivatinâ herself yet—with her father layinâ dead, too?â She got up and walked to the foot of the stairs. âHarriet!â she shrieked.

Harriet dashed down the stairs, neat and pretty.

âYou onchristian darter!â cried Mrs. Strang, revolted by her sprightliness. âDonât you know fatherâs drownded?â

Harriet fell half-fainting against the banister. Mrs. Strang caught her and pulled her towards the kitchen.

âThere, there,â she said, âdonât freeze out here, my poor child. The Lordâs will be done.â

Harriet mutely dropped into the chair her mother drew for her before the stove. Daisyâs bellowing became more insistent.

âAnâ he never lived to take me back to Halifax, arter all!â moaned Mrs. Strang.

âNever mind, mother,â said Harriet, gently. âGod will send you back some day. You hev suffered enough.â

Mrs. Strang burst into tears for the first time. âAh, you donât know what my life hes been!â she cried, in a passion of self-pity.

Harriet took her motherâs mittened hand tenderly in hers. âYes we do, mother—yes we do. We know how you hev slaved and struggled.â

As she spoke a panorama of the slow years was fleeting through the minds of all three—the long blank weeks uncolored by a letter, the fight with poverty, the outbursts of temper; all the long-drawn pathos of lonely lives. Tears gathered in the childrenâs eyes—more for themselves than for their dead father, who for the moment seemed but gone on a longer voyage.

âHarriet,â said Mrs. Strang, choking back her sobs, âbring down my poor little orphans, and wrap them up well. Weâll say a prayer.â

Harriet gathered herself together and went weeping up the stairs. Matt followed her with a sudden thought. He ran up to his room and returned, carrying a square sheet of rough paper.

His mother had sunk into Harrietâs chair. He lifted up her head and showed her the paper.

âDavie!â she shrieked, and showered passionate kisses on the crudely-colored sketch of a sailor—a figure that had a strange touch of vitality, a vivid suggestion of brine and breeze. She arrested herself suddenly. âYou pesky varmint!â she cried. âSo this is what become oâ the fly-leaf of the big Bible!â

Matt hung his head. âIt was empty,â he murmured.

âYes, but thereâs another page thet ainât—thet tells you to obey your parents. This is how you waste your time âstead oâ wood-choppinâ.â

âUncle Matt earns his livinâ at it,â he urged.

âUncle Mattâs a villain. Donât you go by your Uncle Matt, fur lanâs sake.â She rolled up the drawing fiercely, and Matt placed himself apprehensively between it and the stove.

âYou said he wouldnât be took,â he remonstrated.

Mrs. Strang sullenly placed the paper in her bosom, and the action reminded her to remove her bonnet and sacque. Harriet, drooping and listless, descended the stairs, carrying the two-year-old and marshalling the other little ones—a blinking, bewildered group of cherubs, with tousled hair and tumbled clothes. Sprat came down last, stretching himself sleepily. He had kept the same late hours as Matt, and, returning with him from the âmuddinâ frolic,â had crept under his bed.

The sight of the children moved Mrs. Strang to fresh weeping. She almost tore the baby from Harrietâs arms.

âHe never saw you!â she cried, hysterically, closing the wee yawning mouth with kisses. Her eyes fell on Billy limping towards the red-hot stove where the others were already clustered.

âAnâ he never saw you,â she cried to him, as she adjusted the awed infant on the settle. âOr it would hev broke his heart. Kneel down and say a prayer for him, you mischeevious little imp.â

Billy, thus suddenly apostrophized, paled with nervous fright. His big gray eyes grew moist, a lump rose in his throat. But he knelt down with the rest and began bravely:

âOur Father, which art in heaven—â

âWell, what are you stoppinâ about?â jerked his mother, for the boy had paused suddenly with a strange light in his eyes.

âI never knowed what it meant afore,â he said, simply.

His motherâs eye caught the mystic gleam from his.

âA sign! a sign!â she cried, ecstatically, as she sprang up and clasped the little cripple passionately to her heaving bosom.