Howard Pyle

“ A dull, whispering moaning sound came from out the hollow of the west, and Tom could hear it through all the beating and thundering of the surf behind him. There was something awful in that moaning that seemed to fill the air above and around them; both men stood looking out toward the west, and neither of them said a word. Tom noticed how the sea gulls were running restlessly up and down the beach, uttering shrill wild cries every now and then, but not taking to wing.
And every moment the deep moaning grew louder and louder. ”

“ He walked straight up to Captain Knight and looked him squarely in the eyes.
The captain looked back at him for a little while, but presently his eyes wavered, and he turned them aside. Then it was that a certain vague thought that had been floating about in Tom’s mind, took shape and form. At first he rejected the thought, but the longer he looked upon Captain Knight the more he felt sure that his surmise was right. At last he spoke:
“Look here, sir,” said he, sternly, “you’re not fit to be where you are. You’re not in your right mind—you’re crazy.” ”

“ I don’t deny that,” said Tom, with a pang at his heart.
“Thee couldn’t truthfully deny it if thee would, Thomas,” said Patty.
“I’m only a rough sea-faring man,” said Tom. “I don’t know that any one respects me very much.” He waited a moment, but Patty said nothing; then he went on again: [23]
“For all that, I’d rather be a man of thirty at thirty, and not as dead to all things as though I was a man of eighty. Isaac Naylor is more like a man of eighty than he is like one of thirty. No one would take him to be only five years older than I am.” ”

“ The ship rose and fell lazily on the heaving of the ground swell that rolled in around the Capes. Down to the southward the white sands stretched away into the looming of the distance, rimmed with a whiter line of foam until all was lost in the misty haze cast up by the tumbling surf.
The pilot boat had now run up near to them, and was launching a dory from her deck. Tom stood leaning on the rail, looking at her, and presently the pilot came and stood beside him. He was a short, powerful man, bull-necked and long-armed. ”

“ For a moment Tom had a feeling of spinning toward the shore, with the green water towering ten feet above him; then it arched slowly over, there was a crash and a roar, and he was struggling in a whirling, watery blindness.
Over and over he rolled, grasping at the sand every now and then, but all the time feeling himself as helpless as a rat in the tumultuous swirling of the water. Presently he felt himself being sucked out again. Faster and faster he went, as the undertow gathered force in its rush. ”

“ The whole thing was over in a dozen seconds, but those dozen seconds are stamped on Tom Granger’s mind as clearly as though they were chiseled in marble. Even now, though he is over eighty years old, he can see that great frigate rising higher and higher as she surges forward, towering over the little ship, while a hundred faces pop up above the rail and stare down upon her decks. ”

“ Then Tom left the room. He found Patty sitting on the porch when he went out. He was feeling very bitter, for his talk with Elihu had not been of the pleasantest kind. It seemed to have taken much of the joy out of his new happiness, for the grudging words of Elihu’s consent had stung his pride very sharply. Therefore there was a smack of bitterness in his joy that spoilt the savor of the whole. He sat down by Patty without a word, and began rubbing his palm slowly over the end of the arm of the chair on which he was sitting, looking down at it moodily the while. ”

“ Thee tell him, Susan.”
Susan looked down, and the color rose in her face.
“What is the news?” said Tom, again.
“Well,” said his father, “as Susan don’t seem inclined to tell thee, I suppose I must do it myself. How would thee like Will Gaines for a brother?”
Tom did not speak for a moment, then he said, a little unsteadily; “I—I wish thee joy, Susan; thee’s chosen a good man for thy husband, and I believe he’ll make thee happy.”
Then they were silent for a while.
“When is thee going to be married?” said Tom again, at last. ”

“ As Henry and he walked along the turn-pike road, numbers of Friends passed them on their way homeward from meeting.
There was a clatter of hoofs behind them, and old Elihu Penrose came riding by with Patty back of him on the pillion saddle.
“Woah!” cried he, reigning in his horse when he had come up to Tom and Henry. “How is thee, Thomas? I’m glad to see thee back again.”
“I’m glad to get back again,” said Tom.
“That’s right! I like to hear a young man say he’s glad to get back home again,—it sounds well. Come over and see us some time.”
“I will,” said Tom; “I’d like to come over very much.” ”

“ After a while there was a movement, and he heard Jack calling to him to come along, as they were all going over to the boat, but it was still in the same dazed state that he walked along the beach with the others until they came around the end of the sand hills, saw the bay open before him, and the barque floating like a swan upon the smooth surface of the water. A ship’s boat was lying high and dry on the sand of the beach, and two sailors were sitting in the stern, smoking comfortably and talking together. ”

“ What do you want to get away for, anyhow? Is the only woman that you love in all the world waiting at home for you, looking for you, and praying for you, and wondering why she don’t hear from you—thinking, maybe, that you’re dead. God help her! I wish that I was dead, and that she knew it. It would be better for us both, I guess!” Then he rested his elbows on his knees and buried his face in his hands, rocking his body to and fro as he sat.
Jack did not say another word, and in a few moments Tom heard him get up and walk away. After a little while Tom got a grip on himself and looked up again. ”

“ Patty sat looking at him, as though waiting for him to speak.
“Thy father don’t seem much pleased with this, Patty,” said he, at last.
“Never mind, Tom,” said Patty, and her little hand slid over and rested softly upon his own; “he’ll like it when he is more used to the thought of it. Father’s queer, and sometimes harsh in his [34] ways, but his heart is all right. No one could be more kind and loving than he is to me. When he finds how dear thee is to me, he’ll like thee for my sake, if for nothing else. After a while he will be as proud of thee as though thee were his own son.” ”

“ This was all of the family that were at home, for Henry was in a store in Lancaster and Mary was visiting friends in Chester.
Friends, of the old times especially, were a restrained, self-repressed people, giving but little freedom to the flow of natural feeling. Tom’s father and his brothers had been moved—deeply moved; but now, when they came forward to shake him by the hand, excepting for the closeness of the grip that they gave him and the firmness of the pressure of palm to palm, no one would have thought that he had returned to them as the dead might return from the grave. ”

“ I think that few eyes were dry in the magistrate’s office. Tom stood looking at his darling with trembling lips, the tears trickling unnoticed down his cheeks. Old Elihu Penrose sat gazing stonily ahead of him, his hands clasped tightly together upon his lap.
Nothing was said for some time, and Mr. Morrow sat wiping his spectacles. After a while he spoke in a gentle and soothing manner: “You must answer me—you must, indeed. It is sad, very sad. I wouldn’t ask you these things if I didn’t have to. But you must answer me. Can’t you tell me what was said between you when you saw him last?” ”

“ Isaac Naylor must have had some fear that Tom would do him a harm in his passion, for he stepped a pace back. “Come, come, Thomas!” said he, soothingly; “don’t be violent; I’ve done thee no harm—at least, I’ve done thee no witting harm. Every one said that thee was dead; even thy own people said so. Go thy ways, Thomas, and let me go mine in peace. Come; let me past!”
“No, by G-d! Thee’ll not go a step from this till I let thee. Thee shan’t see Patty this day! She’s mine and no other man shall have her for his wife! Will thee give her up to me, Isaac Naylor? Will thee give her up? ”

“ Tom leaned on the rail, sick at heart; he felt miserable about the whole matter. Here he was, embarked on a cruise for which he had no liking, in the stormy season of the year, in a ship which he believed to be unfit for sailing, with a crew that had no discipline, and the captain and the first mate [64] at loggerheads before they were out of harbor. He would have given an eye to be safe ashore again.
And yet, that Sunday morning was not a day to breed troubled thoughts. Tom had rarely seen a lovelier one; the air seemed more like June than April. ”

“ Elihu was always very glad to see him and Patty herself seemed pleased at his coming. I think that some of the happiest evenings of his life were those spent in sitting on the porch of the old mill-house in the long summer twilights—Elihu and he smoking their pipes, he telling his adventures at sea and Patty sitting listening to him. Often some one of the young men of the neighborhood would be at the house, and then it was not so pleasant for Tom; his talk would cease, and after a little while, perhaps, he would arise and bid them farewell. ”

“ Tom made a motion as though to interrupt him, but Elihu held up his hand; “I know! I know!” said he; “thee don’t feel, just now, as though such a thing could happen; but my observation has led me to find that what a man will do once, he may do again. Besides all this, thy trade must unsettle thy life more or less; thee [31] knows the old saying,—‘a rolling stone gathers no moss.’”
“I don’t know why a man should want to stay long enough in one place to get moss-grown,” said Tom. ”

“ When Jack stopped, a laugh went up from all around, for it was plain to see that the men were in sympathy with Hitch. This made the fellow feel inclined to go a step further, for he felt bold when he saw Jack pause.
“If you don’t put the boat’s head to the shore,” said he, “I’ll pull out the plug, anyhow!”
“Tom,” cried Jack, passionately, “give me the tiller; if they will drown for a pack of lubberly fools, let them drown and be ——d!” [110]
“For heaven’s sake, Jack!” cried Tom; “think what you’re about. You’ll drown us all. Let me hold the tiller!” ”

“ CHAPTER XVI. IT oftentimes comes in this world that cares and troubles fall upon one, not in one deadly blow, but in stroke after stroke, as though to bear the man to the earth with their constant beating. Surely men’s souls are of tough fibre that they can so bend beneath such blows, beaten down only to rise again, bruised, wounded, but living. There is within a man a courage bred of hope that lives even in the darkest moments; a courage that lifts him up again out of the dust and supports him along his way, lame and sore, perhaps, but not broken down utterly.
So it was with Tom. ”

“ You leave a poor lean little chit of a thing; a few years pass, you meet her and, lo! she is transmogrified into a young woman, going her sedate way with very different thoughts in her head than when you saw her last. It seems as though it were only a week or two since you patted her upon the head and said kind things to encourage her; now your heart shrinks at the thought of such boldness, and you feel that she needs encouragement no longer.
When Tom had last seen Patty Penrose, three years before, he left her just such a little chit as I have spoken to you of,—lean and not graceful. ”

“ Why, when that junk attacked the Quaker City off Ceylon, there was not a man aboard that fought like you. Captain Austin told me all about it, though you would never do so, and I haven’t forgotten it. And now you pretend to tell me that you are afraid.” [45]
“No, sir,” said Tom Granger, very hot about the ears; “it ain’t that; it’s the kind of fighting that I don’t like. When such a junkfull of coolies as that was came down on us, a man was bound to fight for his own life and the lives (and more beside) of the women aboard, and there was no great credit to him in doing it. ”

“ Every one has read tales of shipwreck and of lonely islands, and there is generally something romantic and even pleasant in them; but in real shipwreck there is nothing either romantic or pleasant; neither is a desert island a cheerful place to dwell upon. I say this because I wish you to understand why it is that I do not intend to give you a long account of the life that they led at this place.
Nevertheless, I would not have you think from that which I have just written that Tom and Jack were altogether miserable during the year and a half that they lived there. ”

“ A thrill darted through his heart as he said this, for it made him realize that she was indeed his, and his alone. It was the last time that he saw Isaac for a year and a half.
Tom went straight to his mother and told her everything. A mother is nearer to her son in such matters than a father, for there is more in a woman’s sympathy than there is in a man’s. ”