A. M. Williamson

“ There was a sob in the voice which cut Jack Starbuck like a knife. He knew he had no right to hear such words—he knew he ought not to remain. And yet he could not go. Yet it was not that he would yield weakly to mere curiosity.
"It's your own fault that we don't feel as we did. You've got us into trouble, and you won't get us out, when you can as well as not. You ought to think of the good of the many. ”

“ The captain could not smoke. Something, he said, must be wrong with that new tobacco. Mrs. Starbuck knitted industriously, and for many moments no sound was to be heard save the measured ticking of the clock and the click of the glittering needles. Jack watched their quick play almost sullenly. Life had been so full of meaning to him of late. Of course he had known for a long time that he loved Barbara. He felt for her the dumb devotion of a dog. ”

“ She must be longing for her own world again. How poor and mean the old-fashioned bravery of the house must have seemed in her eyes all this time! How kind she had been not to smile at the Books of Beauty, and the pictures and the shells! A pained sensitiveness, born of his great love, told the young islander that the surroundings he knew could not be what she had been used to. As he sat watching his mother's needles and eating his heart out in his dumb misery, the captain spoke with sudden gruffness.
"Look ye here, boy! Do you mean t' let thet gel go away from us?" ”

“ And you wouldn't care—none of you would care."
"It's the only thing to do. Telegraph to-morrow. We can't stay on here, but we can't get away without paying. What else is there to be done?"
"Oh, I don't know! I'll think it over again. I—I'll do my best for you." And then, with a despairing lifting of both hands above its head, the dark figure turned quickly, going toward the town. The other followed, but Jack Starbuck stood still, thinking. Nothing was clear to him, save that she was in trouble, and he meant to help her. ”

“ What should an able-bodied, well-grown feller o' your age an' build do t' keep a gel from goin' out o' the family?"
Jack was shocked into silence, and the knitting-needles had ceased plying.
The slip of a woman looked excitedly from the face of tall husband to that of tall son. But she knew the duty of woman, and held her peace.
"Well?" queried the captain. "I little thought ever t' ask a son o' mine such a question about a play-actin' gal. But queer things come to a man when he's on shore and grown old. ”

“ If she had chanced to meet him in happier days and under ordinary circumstances, she might only have recognised in him a fine-looking, countrified young man, far removed from her own sphere, and it is possible that she might even have smiled good-naturedly at his big hands, rough clothes, odd way of speaking, and bashful manner. ”

“ He found her overseeing the manufacture of the day's pastry. "Look here, Jack," said she, brushing the flour from her hands and motioning her guest towards the dining-room, "I wanted to talk to ye about that poor gel who tried t' kill herself; the Lord forgive her fur her sin!"
"Well, what about her?" queried Jack.
"She's a play-actress, an' I shouldn't 'a s'posed I'd 'a had so much sympathy fur her. But she has got the appealin'est ways! And when that ugly, hang-faced feller came after her yest'day, an' sent up word he must see her, why she jest went right out o' her head like! ”

“ But for some reason, Jack Starbuck felt aggrieved by his friend's comment, and vouchsafed no reply.
Dick, unaware of his punishment, continued. "She an' her whole troupe's stoppin' at the Veranda House, Alf Folger says. He's seen 'em, and allows they're a better-lookin' lot than most show folks that comes to th' Island. I guess I'll go round to th' theatre to-night. What do you say?"
"I don' know," responded Jack sheepishly. "My folks have never been theatre-goers." ”

“ In the morning he went to the Veranda House.
"Are Miss Dayton's people gone yet?" he inquired, shamefacedly but steadily.
"No, nor likely to be," was the surly answer. "Their manager's gone off by this morning's boat, and left 'em without anybody to pay their bills, so they say. Something's got to be done about it pretty quick, for we ain't the folks to keep 'em here for nothin'."
"No," said Jack slowly. "But just let 'em stay a day or two without making any fuss. If it doesn't come all right, I'll—be responsible for 'em." ”

“ But I reckon the show people hope fur better luck—or else they ain't got nowhere else to go."
"I reckon," responded Jack mechanically. All day he thought of the face in the picture. He lounged about the streets longer than was his wont, even making an errand to the Veranda House, but among the few whom the cold weather had not frightened from the hotel "piazzas," he could not find the one he sought.
That night at supper, old Captain Starbuck challenged his son to a game of chess. ”

“ We thought you'd maybe feel happier here, and get well faster, so we—my son—brought you here, from the hotel."
"And he—the man, you know, who came to see me that last day?"
"There ain't any man in this whole town thet's agoin' to bother ye." And the little old lady nodded reassuringly over her knitting-work.
"I went to sleep thinking that someone was being so kind to me, and now I wake up and find it is true."
The world-worn actress closed her eyelids, and as the simple old Nantucketer looked down on the white and delicate profile, her heart was quickened to tenderness. ”

“ It's pretty clear this man's got some power over her, and whatever her faults may be, bein' on the stage, an' the likes o' thet, she's a young gal, an' it don't go with my conscience to see any harm come to her."
Neither did it go with Jack's conscience. And he had not even the right of a friend to interfere.
"I don't know as much about her as I wish I did," he said, with true Nantucket caution. "But I think I see a way out o' this trouble. I'll come round again and tell you in an hour or so." ”

“ Say, some feller's wired money to pay the show folks' bills, all but Miss Dayton's. She's what they call the 'star,' you know. An' they're goin' by the afternoon boat,' said Ben Rogers, meeting Jack Starbuck in the street next day. ”

“ The longest-living author of this work died in 1933, so this work is in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 89 years or less. This work may be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works. ”