F. J. Stimson

“ But it takes more love than most women have for each other to give the tact, the self-abnegation, that such unequal relations, to be permanent, require. The momentary gush of sympathy that the Bowdoin girls felt, upon their grandfather's account of Sadie's loneliness, was chilled at the first haughty word Mercedes gave them. It takes an older nature, more humbled by living than is an American young lady's, to meet the poor in money without patronizing, and the proud at heart without seeming rude. So this attempted intimacy faded.
Jamie gave his life to her. ”

“ Old Jamie understood nothing of this. He only saw and wondered; saw the soldiery, saw old Mr. Bowdoin leaning from a window as a young man on the sidewalk tried to drag down a flag that hung from it, with a black coffin stitched to the blue field. [1]
"Young man," cried the old gentleman, "leave that flag alone; it's my property!"
"I am an American," cried the youth, "and I'll not suffer the flag of my country to be so disgraced!"
"I too am an American, and damme, sir, 'tis the flag in the street there that's disgraced!" ”

“ There are certain male natures that fight crying. An enemy who looks straight at you with tears in his eyes is not to be contended with. And Jamie stood there, blushing fiery red, with flashing eyes, and tears streaming down his cheeks.
"James Bowdoin, you're a d—d fool!" sputtered his irate sire. "You talk as your wife might talk. This is an affair of men. Jamie," he added very gently, "you are quite right. My boy's an ass." He put his hand on Jamie's shoulder. "You'll find some fine young fellow to marry her yet, and she'll bring you—grandchildren." ”

“ Money-getting, love of self, love,—is not that quite all? Yet poor Jamie and Mercedes, who was nearest to him, did not happen in the same division. Hughson, perhaps, made even the third. Yet a woman who holds herself too fine for her world will get recognition, commonly, from it. To honest Hughson, lying unwontedly awake and thinking of the evening's chances and mischances, now in a hot fit, now in a cold fit, of something like to love, such a creature as Mercedes, as she lightly hung upon his arm that evening, had never yet appeared. ”

“ Bowdoin would probably have never condoned a theft, once discovered; and James Bowdoin wasted his time in hinting they might make it good.
"Confound it, sir," said the father, "it's the making it good to Jamie, not the making it good to us, that counts,—don't you see?"
"You do suspect him, then?"
"Not a bit,—not one whit, sir!" cried the father. "I know him better. And I hate a low, suspicious habit of mind, sir, with all my heart!"
"You once said, sir, years ago (do you remember?) , that but one thing—love—could make a man like Jamie go wrong." ”

“ Bowdoin. "How about state rights? Do we live in the sovereign State of Massachusetts, or do we not, I should like to know?"
"How about the Union, sir?" whispered Harley slyly.
"Hang the Union! Hang the Union, if it employ a parcel of thugs to do its work!" said Mr. Bowdoin, so loud that there was a ripple of laughter in the court-room; and the judge looked up from the bench and smiled, for had not he dined with old Mr. Bowdoin in their college club once a month for forty years? ”

“ Jamie tried to find his way through the artillery company, but failed. It was only when they got down to the Long Wharf that the artillery divided, sending two guns to either side of the street, and Jamie and the others hurried to the end. Here was a United States revenue cutter, armed with marines, to take this poor bondsman back to his master. No crowned head ever left a country with more pomp of escort and retinue of flag and cannon. But Jamie's business was with the slave-catcher, not the slave. ”

“ For Jamie was wandering with Mercedes under sunny skies; and now, for many days, his ravings had not been of money or of this world's duty, but only of her. It had been so from about the time she must have died; dare one suppose he knew it? So his mind was still with her.
The doctors, though, were very anxious for his mind, still wandering. If his body returned to life, they feared that his mind would not. ”

“ It must be confessed that Hughson had little conversation; and as they walked back, through Hanover Street, among crowds of young women, none so neatly dressed as she, and men less respectable than honest Hughson, Mercedes was conscious of a void within her life. In the afternoon she shut herself in her room and had a crying spell; at least so Jamie feared, as he tiptoed by her door, in apprehension of her sobs. Her piano had grown silent of late. What use was a piano among such as Hughson? So Jamie and the rising teamster sat in the kitchen and discussed the situation over pipes. ”

“ It may be imagined with what terror—a terror even transmuting itself to pity dictating a refusal on Mercedes' part—old Jamie heard of a proposition, one holiday, that David should take his wife there. Mercedes would not go; and St. Clair laughed at her, in private, and went alone. She was forced to be the accomplice of his going.
The fact is, St. Clair, from the tip of his mustache to his patent-leather shoes, was bored with regular hours, respectability, and the assurance of an income adequate to his ordinary spending. Something must be done for joy of life. ”

“ Clair seemed prosperous, and Jamie even mentioned his son-in-law to the other clerks, which was like a boast for Jamie.
Perhaps at no time had the two Bowdoins thought of him so much. He lived now as if he were very poor, and they suspected him of sending all his salary to Mercedes. "It makes no difference raising it; 'twould all go just the same," said Mr. Bowdoin. "Man alive, why didn't you let him take the money, that day down the wharf, and take the girl yourself? You used to be keen enough about girls before you got so bald," added the old gentleman, with a chuckle. ”

“ Hughson petted the old man, and gave him pipes of tobacco; for McMurtagh was too poor to buy tobacco, those days. The children on Salem Street feared him, as a miser; which was hard, for Jamie was very fond of little children.
How does a man live whose heart rules his soul, and is broken; whose conscience rules his head, and is dishonored? For men so heavy laden, heaven was, and has been lost. But Jamie never thought his soul immortal until his love for Mercedes came into it ”

“ Still a year went by, and no other man seemed near Mercedes. Then the old mother died. To Mercedes, life seemed always going into mourning for elderly people. They went on living, she and Jamie, as before. He had got to be so completely accepted as her adoptive father that to no one, not even the Bowdoins, had the situation raised a question; to Mercedes least of all. With such natures as hers, there also goes instinctive knowledge of how far male natures, most widely different, may be trusted. But Jamie had thought it over many times. ”

“ He may be forty, more or less."
"What a strange thing to have come into the old fellow's life! And we thought it would give him something to care for! I never fancied he loved her that way."
"I don't believe now he loves her so much that way—as—as he loves her," said old Mr. Bowdoin, as if vaguely. "She isn't worth him." ”

“ Bowdoin would get him three months' leave.
"Three months!" cried the old man. "Why, Jamie, you've not taken a vacation for fifteen years!"
"That's why I make bold to ask it, sir," said Jamie humbly.
"Take six months, man, six months,—not a week less! And your salary shall be paid in advance"—Mr. Bowdoin noted a sudden kindling in Jamie's eye that gave him his cue. "Two quarters! you have well deserved it. And now that the bank is to change its charter, there'll be a lot of fuss and worry; it'll be a good time to go away." ”

“ He was more than ever seen with Miss Mercedes, and she seemed to like him better than before. Women who are to all men fascinating must have a subtle instinct for perceiving it, a half-conscious liking for it. Else why do not they stop it sooner?
But Jamie had never admitted it to himself. Perhaps because he loved her better than himself. He judged his own pretensions solely from her interest. Marriages were fewer did all men so. ”

“ Bowdoin's peppery query why the devil she had not sent for him, Mrs. Hughson had nothing to say. It had never occurred to her, perhaps, that the well-being of such a quaint, dried-up old chap as Jamie could be a matter of moment to his wealthy employers whom she had never known.
"Can I see him?" asked Mr. Bowdoin. But as he spoke, Harley came down the stairs.
"It's heart-breaking," he said. "He thinks he's in the South with her. He was going to meet her, it seems; and the poor old fellow does not know he has not gone." ”

“ Young James Bowdoin and McMurtagh were all eyes. The boat rowed up to the slippery wharf steps; in the bow were the two ringleaders and the ship's captain, in the waist of the boat the rowers, and in the stern the rank and file of the pirates, some eight or ten ill-looking fellows chained together. ”

“ Bowdoin anxiously.
"Not the slightest. I saw his grave. But, unhappily, Mercedes is dead, too."
"All is for the best," said Mr. Bowdoin philosophically. "Perhaps you'd have married her."
"Perhaps I should," said Commander Harley simply. "Well, I found her at the hospital where he had died, and she died too. This little girl was all she had left. I brought her back. As you see, she is like her mother, only gentler, and her mother brought her up to reverence old Jamie above all things on earth."
"It was time," said Mr. Bowdoin dryly. ”

“ A quiet little place the office would have seemed to us; and yet there was not a sea on earth, probably, that did not bear its bounding ship sent out from that small office. And if it was still, in there, it had a cosmopolitan, aromatic smell; for every strange letter or foreign sample with which the place was littered bespoke the business of the bright, blue world outside. From the street below came noise enough, and loud voices of sailors and shipmen in many a foreign tongue. ”

“ Bowdoin came in, and caught him crying. The old gentleman knocked over a coal-scuttle, and turned to pick it up. By the time he had done so Jamie had rubbed the tears from his eyes, and stood there like a soldier at "Attention."
"Jamie," said Mr. Bowdoin, "I should like to make a little present to your ward, to Mercedes. Could you send it for me? I hope she is well?" And before Jamie could answer Mr. Bowdoin had written out a check for a hundred dollars. "Give her my love when you write. I must go to a directors meeting." ”

“ It was spring, after all; and the light reminded Jamie of the South. She was there, and alone.
He had tried to save his own good name, and it was all in vain. He might at least do what he could for her.
He did not go home, but wandered on, walking. Unconsciously his steps followed the southwest, toward the light (we always walk to the west in the afternoon) , and he found himself by the long beach of the Back Bay, the railroad behind him. The tide was high, and the west wind blew the waves in froth at his feet. ”

“ And that chest was never opened by James Bowdoin or James Bowdoin's Sons.
"When the pirate wants it, he can have it,—in hell or elsewhere," ended Mr. Bowdoin profanely.
But coming out, and after Mr. James had gone away, the old gentleman went to Jamie McMurtagh's desk. Poor Jamie had seen them enter the vault, and his heart stood still. But all Mr. Bowdoin said was to ask him if his salary was sufficient. For once in his life the poor old man had failed to meet his benefactor's eye. ”

“ Well, good-night, Jamie."
"Good-night, Mr. Harley." Jamie had never used the "Mr." to Harley before, of all the Bowdoins; and now it seemed emphasized, even. The young man stopped.
"Tell me, Jamie, can I help you in anything?"
"No!" cried old Jamie; and Harley fled.
Left alone, Jamie laid down his pen. It seemed his figuring was done. But he continued to sit, motionless, upon his high stool. For Mercedes had told him, between Worcester and Boston, that her David would be in prison, perhaps for life, unless he could get him seventeen thousand dollars within forty-eight hours. ”

“ For the old chest was getting so full now that the clerk could almost hold his head up among men. The next year, but three rows of gold coin remained to fill. The smaller coins had all been purchased long ago. And Jamie (who had only thought to do this, and die, at the first) now began, timidly, to let his imagination go beyond the restitution; to think of Mercedes, of seeing her, of making her happy yet. For she was still a young girl, to him.
The thirteenth year came. Jamie had begun to take notice of the world. He took regularly a New Orleans newspaper. ”

“ Love was the best thing in the world; then why did it make the misery of it? How irradiated old Jamie's face had been the day before! Yet Jamie would never have gone to meet her at Worcester, had he not given him the hint. Dear, dear, what could be done for St. Clair, as he called himself? Mr. Bowdoin half suspected there had been trouble at the bank. Mercedes such a pretty creature, too! Only, Abby really never would do for her what she might have done. Why were women so impatient of each other? Old Mr. Bowdoin felt vaguely that it was they who were responsible for the social platform ”