Читать книгу Jack the Hunchback: A Story of Adventure on the Coast of Maine - Otis James - Страница 2

Jack toiled manfully on, running until his breath came in such short gasps that he was forced to walk slowly, and then pressing forward once more as if expecting Farmer Pratt was in full pursuit, urged to rapid travelling by the fear that little Louis would be taken to the poor farm.

Up the long, steep hill, past the railroad station, until three roads stretched out before him: one straight ahead, another to the right, and the third to the left.

He believed there was no time for hesitation.

The one leading toward the south was the most inviting because of the trees scattered here and there along its edges, and into this he turned, going directly away from the city where Louis's mother awaited tidings of her darling.

The child grew fretful because of the heat and the dust, and the little hunchback heeded not his own fatigue in the effort to quiet him.

On he went, literally staggering under his heavy burden, until the yellow road seemed to mellow into a mist which danced and fell, and rose and danced again before his eyes until further progress was wellnigh impossible.

They had arrived at a tiny stream, the banks of which were fringed with alders, and overhead a wooden bridge afforded a most pleasing shelter from the sun's burning rays.

Wiping the perspiration from his face, Jack looked back.

No one was in sight.

If Farmer Pratt had come in pursuit he might have mistaken the road, or turned homeward again some time previous, believing the boat not of sufficient value to warrant the journey which, if successful, would only end at the poorhouse.

"Here's where we're goin' to stop, Louis," Jack said, lowering the child to the ground. "It'll be cool among these bushes, and if we turn into the fields a bit no one can see us from the road."

Then Jack took off his shoes and stockings, holding them on one arm as he raised the child with the other, and, wading through the shallow water, made his way among the bushes a distance of forty or fifty feet to where the leafy screen would prevent passing travellers from seeing them.

"I tell you what, the water feels good around a fellow's feet. I'm goin' to give you the same kind of a dose, an' then you'll be ready to go to sleep."

Louis, sitting on the grass at the edge of the stream, offered no objection to the plan, and Jack soon made him ready for the partial bath.

As the child's feet touched the water he laughed with glee, and Jack's fatigue was forgotten in his delight at having been able to afford this pleasure.

After a few moments of such sport the misshapen guardian wiped the pink feet carefully with his handkerchief, replaced the shoes and stockings, took from his pocket the bread which was crumbled into many fragments, moistened them in the brook, and fed his charge until the latter's eyes closed in slumber.

Not before he had arranged a screen of leaves in such a manner that the sun would be prevented from looking in upon the sleeping child did Jack think of himself and then he too indulged in the much-needed rest.

The hours passed until the sun began to sink in the west.

The birds came out from among the leaves and peeped down curiously at the sleeping children, while a colony of frogs leaped upon a moss-covered log, croaking in chorus their surprise at these unfamiliar visitors.

One venerable fellow seemed to think this a most fitting opportunity to read his sons a homily on the sin of running away, and after the lengthy lesson was concluded he plunged into the water with a hoarse note of disapprobation, making such a splash that Jack leaped to his feet thoroughly awake and decidedly frightened.

The hasty departure of the other frogs explained the cause of the disturbance, and he laughed to himself as he said, —

"I reckon my hump frightened them as much as they did me."

He made a hurried toilet, bathed Louis's face with his wet handkerchief until the little fellow awoke, and then continued what was at the same time a flight and a journey.

"We've got to run the risk that somebody else will try to send us to the poor farm," he said when they had trudged along the dusty road until the child became fretful again. "At the next nice-lookin' house we come to I'm goin' to ask the folks if they'll let me do chores enough to pay for our lodging."

Fully half an hour passed before they were where this plan could be carried into effect, and then Jack halted in front of a small white cottage which stood at the head of an arm of the sea, partially hidden by the trees.

"Here's where we've got to try our luck," the boy said as he surveyed the house intently, and almost as he spoke a tiny woman with tiny ringlets either side her wrinkled face appeared in the doorway, starting back as if in alarm on seeing the newcomers.

"Goodness me!" she exclaimed as she suddenly observed Jack staring intently at her. "Why don't you come out of the sun? That child will be burned brown as an Injun if you stand there long."

Jack pressed Louis closer to him as he stepped forward a few paces, and asked hesitatingly, —

"Please, ma'am, if you'll let us stay here to-night I'll do up all the chores as slick as a pin."

The little woman's surprise deepened almost into bewilderment as she glanced first at Louis, who had by this time clambered down from his guardian's arms, and then at Jack's boots, which were covered thickly with dust.

"Oh, I'll brush myself before I come in," the boy said quickly, believing her hesitation was caused by the dirt on his garments, "an' we won't be a mite of trouble."

The mistress of the cottage took Louis by the hand and led him, with Jack following close behind, into the wide, cool hall, the floor of which was covered with rugs woven with representations of impossible animals in all the colors of the rainbow.

"Now tell me where you came from, and why it is necessary to ask for a home?"

Jack hesitated an instant.

The fear that she too might insist on sending Louis to the poor farm caused him to question whether he had better tell the whole truth, but another look at the kindly face decided him.

He related his story with more detail than he had to Farmer Pratt, and when he concluded the little woman said in a motherly tone, —

"You poor children! If the ship exploded there's no one for you to go home to, and what will become of such a helpless pair?"

"I can't tell I'm sure, ma'am; but I know we ain't helpless"; and Jack spoke very decidedly now. "I'm big an' can work, so I'll take care of Louis till we find his father."

"But if the ship was blown all to pieces?" the little woman continued.

"That don't make any difference," Jack interrupted. "We're goin' right to his house in New York some time, no matter how far it is."

"But it's a terribly long distance, and you children will surely be sun-struck before you get even to Boston!" Then she added quickly, "Here I am forgetting that you must be hungry! Come straight away into the kitchen while I see what there is in the cupboard, for Aunt Nancy Curtis never lets any one, much less children, want for food very long in her house."

"Are you Aunt Nancy?" Jack asked.

"I'm aunt to everybody in the neighborhood, which ain't many, and two or three more nephews won't make any difference. Set right up to the table, and after you've had a glass of cool milk, a piece of chicken and some cake I baked to put away for the summer boarders, we'll see what can be done."

Jack was disposed to be just a trifle jealous of Louis's evident admiration for this quaint little Aunt Nancy. He had already taken her by the hand, and, in his baby fashion, was telling some story which no one, probably not even himself, could understand.

"You are a dear little boy," the old lady said as she led him into the kitchen; "but neither you nor Jack here is any more calculated to walk to New York than I am to go to China this minute."

"If you'll let me have a brush I'll get some of this dust off," Jack said as he glanced at the well-scoured floor and then at his shoes. "I'm not fit to go anywhere till I look more decent."

"Here's a whisk-broom. Be careful not to break the handle, and don't throw it on the ground when you're done," Aunt Nancy said as she handed the brush to Jack. "There's the pump, and here's a towel and piece of soap, so scrub yourself as much as you please, for boys never can be too clean. I'll comb the baby's hair while you're gone, and then we'll have supper."

Louis made not the slightest protest when his misshapen little guardian left him alone with Aunt Nancy. He had evidently decided that she was a woman who could be trusted, and had travelled so much during the day that even a journey to the pump was more than he cared to undertake.

Jack brushed and scrubbed, and rubbed his face with the towel, after holding his head under the pump, until the skin glowed red, but cleanly.

When he entered the kitchen again where the little woman and Louis were seated cosily at the table, he was presentable even to Aunt Nancy, in whose eyes the least particle of dirt was an abomination.

He took the vacant chair by Louis's side, and was considerably surprised, because it was something so unusual in his experience, to see the little woman clasp her withered hands and invoke a blessing upon "the strangers within her gates," when she had thanked her Father for all his bounties.

"I went to meetin' once down in Savannah," Jack said; "but I didn't know folks had 'em right in their houses."

Aunt Nancy looked at him with astonishment, and replied gravely, —

"My child, it is never possible to give too much praise for all we are permitted to enjoy, and one needn't wait until he is in church before speaking to our Father."

Jack did not exactly understand what she meant, but he knew from the expression on the wrinkled face that it was perfectly correct, and at once proceeded to give his undivided attention to the food which had been put upon his plate with a liberal hand.

How thoroughly enjoyable was that meal in the roomy old kitchen, through which the summer breezes wafted perfume from the honeysuckles, and the bees sang at the open windows while intent on the honey harvest!

When the children's hunger was appeased, it seemed as if half their troubles had suddenly vanished.

Louis crowed and talked after his own peculiar fashion; Jack told stories of life on board the "Atlanta," and Aunt Nancy appeared to enjoy this "visiting" quite as much as did her guests.

The housework was to be done, however, and could not be neglected, deeply interested though the little woman was in the yarns Jack spun, therefore she said as she began to collect the soiled dishes, —

"Now if you will take care of the baby I'll have the kitchen cleaned in a twinkling, and then we'll go out under the big oak-tree where I love to sit when the sun is painting the clouds in the west with red and gold."

"Louis can take care of himself if we put him on the floor," Jack replied, "and I will dry the dishes for you; I've done it lots of times on the 'Atlanta.'"

The little woman could not refuse this proffered aid, although she looked very much as if she fancied the work would not be done exactly to her satisfaction, and after glancing at Jack's hands to make certain they were perfectly clean, she began operations.

Much to her surprise, the deformed boy was very apt at such tasks, and Aunt Nancy said as she looked over her spectacles at him while he carefully dried one of her best China cups, —

"Well I declare! If you ain't the first boy I ever saw who was fit to live with an old maid like me. You are handier than half the girls I have here when the summer boarders come, and if you could only milk a cow we should get along famously."

"It wouldn't take me long to learn," Jack said quickly; for he was eager to assist the little lady as much as possible, having decided in his own mind that this would be a very pleasant abiding place for himself and Louis until the weather should be cooler, when the tramp to New York could be continued with less discomfort. "If you'd show me how once I'm sure I'd soon find out, and – "

"It won't do any harm to try at all events," Aunt Nancy replied thoughtfully; "but the cow hasn't come home yet, and there's plenty of time."

When the dishes were washed and set carefully away in the cupboard, the little woman explaining to her assistant where each particular article of crockery belonged, Jack began to sweep the already painfully clean floor. Aunt Nancy wiped with a damp towel imaginary specks of dirt from the furniture, and Louis, as if realizing the importance of winning the affections of his hostess, laid his head on the rag rug and closed his eyes in slumber before the work of putting the kitchen to rights was finished.

"Dear little baby! I suppose he's all tired out," Aunt Nancy said as she took him in her arms, leaving to Jack the important duty of folding one of her best damask tablecloths, a task which, under other circumstances, she would not have trusted to her most intimate friend. "I'm not very handy with children, but it seems as if I ought to be able to undress this one."

"Of course you can. All there is to do is unbutton the things an' pull them off."

Aunt Nancy was by no means as awkward at such work as she would have her guest believe.

In a few moments she had undressed Louis without awakening him, and clothed him for the night in one of her bedgowns, which, as a matter of course, was much too long, but so strongly scented with lavender that Jack felt positive the child could not fail to sleep sweetly and soundly.

Then laying him in the centre of a rest-inviting bed which was covered with the most intricate of patchwork quilts, in a room on the ground-floor that overlooked the lane and the big oak-tree, they left him with a smile on his lips, as if the angels had already begun to weave dream-pictures for him.

Aunt Nancy led the way out through the "fore-room," and, that Jack might see the beauties it contained, she opened one of the shutters, allowing the rays of the setting sun to fall upon the pictures of two of the dead and gone Curtis family, an impossible naval engagement colored in the most gorgeous style, two vases filled with alum-encrusted grasses, and a huge crockery rooster with unbending feathers of every hue.

This last-named ornament particularly attracted Jack's attention, and during fully five minutes he stood gazing at it in silent admiration, but without daring to ask if he could take the brilliantly painted bird in his hands.

"Handsome, isn't it?" Aunt Nancy asked, turning her head slowly from side to side while she critically viewed the combination of colors much as if she had never seen them before.

"Its perfectly splendid!"

"I'm glad you like it. I think a great deal of him; too much to allow a live rooster on the place crowing around when he can't. It was presented to me in my girlhood days by a young gentleman whom every one thought was destined to be an ornament in the world; but – "

Aunt Nancy paused. Her thoughts had gone trooping down the dusty avenues of the past, and after waiting fully a moment Jack asked, —

"Where is the young gentleman now?"

"I don't know," was the reply sandwiched between two sobs, and then Aunt Nancy became her old self once more.

She closed the shutters carefully, waved her apron in the air to frighten away any overbold dust specks, and the two went out on the long, velvety lane that the little woman might admire the glories of the setting sun.