Marty

“ If—if it aren't—aye 'tis—Martin! Why for sure 'tis my bonnet Marty as saved my skin time and again aboard the 'Faithful Friend!' Though ye go mighty fine, lad, mighty fine! But good luck t'ye and a fair wind, say I!" And thrusting the dagger into his girdle he nodded mighty affable. "But look'ee now, Marty, here's me wishing ye well and you wi' a barker in your fist, 'tis no fashion to greet a shipmate, I'm thinking."
"Enough words!" says I, stepping up to him. "Do you go—alive, or stay here dead—which?" ”

“ For an instant the tall head stooped to the level of the struggling animal, and a strange, expressive look passed between the great equine eyes and the misty ones of the man. Then Marty’s hand went swiftly around to his pocket, there was the click of a weapon, a flash and report, and Comanche moved no more.
More shaken and ill from this deed than from his terrible fall, Marty sat long in silence by Ephraim’s side beneath the eucalyptus trees ”

“ He had what so many young people long for in vain, a mystery. He had amused himself occasionally with monstrous hypotheses. But what real account could he give of himself? What account, that is, of the sort that Marty Martin and his like had by heart before they could spell? The most that he knew about his parents—except that they were alive and in the tropics—was that they banked in Honolulu and had some natural hold or other on Marty Martin’s uncle. Marty Martin’s uncle had picked out Peter’s school and his college for him, and was telegraphed for when Peter had appendicitis. ”

“ Don't you fidget about me so, good Marty." Never was Stephen heard to speak discourteously or even ungently to a human being. It would have offended his taste. It was not a matter of principle with him,--not at all: he hardly ever thought of things in that light. A rude or harsh word, a loud, angry tone, jarred on his every sense like a discord in music, or an inharmonious color; so he never used them. But as he ran upstairs, three steps at a time, after his kind, off-hand words to Marty, he said to himself, "Good heavens! I do believe Marty gets uglier every day. ”

“ So old a trick, Marty! Now look'ee, were I a murderer and loved it—like Adam, curse him—I should pull trigger! But being Roger Tressady wi' a heart o' gold, I say sit down, lad, sit down and let us talk, friend, let us talk. Come—sit down! Never mind Andy, he shan't trouble us!" So with the pistol at my ear we sat down side by side and the dead man sprawling at our feet.
"Now first, Marty lad, how come ye here alone on Bartlemy's island—how?" ”

“ Marty took it and tore the envelope with trembling fingers, Elly showing her how. Inside there was a fat letter, and inside of that a one-dollar bill. Little John's eyes were popping in wonder. Uncle Eb drew on his spectacles and sat down in his rocking-chair. Marty was so excited that she crowded up and held fast to his coat as if she feared the precious letter might fly away. It was from the postmaster's wife, and this is what it said:
"Dear Marty,—I wish to pay you for the four nice big pumpkins that rolled into our front yard this morning. ”

“ He had not yet escaped from the idea that because Father Marty was a Roman Catholic priest, living in a village in the extreme west of Ireland, listening night and day to the roll of the Atlantic and drinking whisky punch, therefore he would be found to be romantic, semi-barbarous, and perhaps more than semi-lawless in his views of life. ”

“ It wasn't Danglar, it wasn't one of the gang, or the watchman who was no better than an accomplice; it was Marty Finch, alias the Sparrow.
“Marty!” she exclaimed. “You! What are you doing here?”
“I'm here to keep you from goin' in there!” he answered excitedly. “And—and, say, I was afraid I was too late. Don't you go in there! For God's sake, don't you go! They're layin' a trap for you! They're goin' to bump you off! ”

“ So much for the teaching of Barty Josselin, whose books she knew by heart, and constantly read and reread.
And thus, in spite of all, the old, happy, resonant cheerfulness gradually found its way back to Marsfield, as though nothing had happened; and poor broken Marty, who had always been our idol, became our goddess, our prop and mainstay, the angel in the house, the person for every one to tell their troubles to—little or big—their jokes, their good stories ”

“ He was himself too fastidious to care to coerce her. To be an object of misgiving or dislike to a woman who shared his home was what he could not endure the thought of. Life as it stood was more tolerable.
When he was gone, Marty joined Mrs. Fitzpiers. She would fain have consulted Marty on the question of Platonic relations with her former husband, as she preferred to regard him. But Marty showed no great interest in their affairs, so Grace said nothing. ”

“ Marty, who turned her hand to anything, was usually the one who performed the part of keeping the trees in a perpendicular position while he threw in the mould.
He accompanied her towards the spot, being stimulated yet further to proceed with the work by the knowledge that the ground was close to the way-side along which Grace must pass on her return from Hintock House.
"You've a cold in the head, Marty," he said, as they walked. "That comes of cutting off your hair."
"I suppose it do. Yes; I've three headaches going on in my head at the same time." ”

“ Freddie had taken one of his papa's large handkerchiefs out of the lower drawer of the bureau, and spreading it out over his head was standing in the middle of the room, hiding. How he laughed when Marty found him! ”

“ When he reached the plantation he found that Marty had come back, and dismissing Creedle, he went on planting silently with the girl as before.
"Suppose, Marty," he said, after a while, looking at her extended arm, upon which old scratches from briers showed themselves purple in the cold wind—"suppose you know a person, and want to bring that person to a good understanding with you, do you think a Christmas party of some sort is a warming-up thing, and likely to be useful in hastening on the matter?"
"Is there to be dancing?" ”

“ He reached Northport, late at night, to roar at Jewel and the hot water she had heated for his frost-bitten feet—then to hug her with an embrace that she had not known since the days when her Marty wore a red undershirt.
"And do ye be hearin?" she asked. "The Blue Ribbon's tied up! Not a wheel——"
"Will ye shut up?" Martin suddenly had remembered something. The mail test! Not forty-eight hours away! He blinked. One big hand smacked into the other. "The pound of flesh!" he bellowed. "Be gar! The pound of flesh!"
"And what are ye talkin' ——"
"Woman, shut up," said Martin Garrity. ”

“ Stokes. “There's nothing like taking children to the country a spell after they've been sick. Makes 'em fat and rosy in less than no time.”
“Oh! mamma,” exclaimed Marty. “That makes me think of poor little Jimmy. I wish we could do something to get him sent to the country.”
“I wish we could, but I don't see any way to do it. I have given all I can afford this summer to the different Fresh-Air Funds.”
“Can't you think of anything, clothes or such things, that you were going to get me, and that I could do without, and send the money to Mrs. Watson?” pleaded Marty. ”

“ The great desire of Martyn’s heart was to excel at college, and to be foremost in his class, and this ambition occupied his mind so entirely, that he lived without God, and as if the world had been created for his honor, instead of the Maker’s. ”

“ No one is sacred in those days—not even Shakespeare and Michael Angelo.
We shall be hearing Schumann and Wagner on the piano‐organ, and "nous autres" of the cultured classes will have to fall back on Balfe and Byron and Landseer.
In a few months little Marty became famous for this extra beauty all over Henley and Maidenhead.
She soon grew to be the idol of her father's heart, and her mother's, and Ida's. But I really think that if there was one person who idolized her more than all the rest, it was I, Bob Maurice. ”

“ Marty pursued her occupation for a few minutes, then suddenly laying down the bill-hook, she jumped up and went to the back of the room, where she opened a door which disclosed a staircase so whitely scrubbed that the grain of the wood was wellnigh sodden away by such cleansing. At the top she gently approached a bedroom, and without entering, said, "Father, do you want anything?"
A weak voice inside answered in the negative; adding, "I should be all right by to-morrow if it were not for the tree!" ”

“ Well, I suppose they’re not exactly real boys, like Ned or Luis. They’re quite grown up and gray-headed, most of them. They all worked for my father, who found them scattered about the world, sort of ‘down on their luck,’ as Marty says, and brought them all to dear Sobrante to give them a home and ‘another chance.’ They just about worshipped my father, I guess, and I know they do my darling mother. ”

“ I’m going to work terribly hard, Janek. To sing, to think, to learn and everything. You know, I’d love to be a great lady like Marty. Come here, you silly. There’s room enough for you beside me. Nobody’s looking. Do you think she loves someone? ”

“ Martin dividing his cloak with the beggar second only, in Mediæval art, to the Gospel records of the Lord’s own acts of tender grace and Divine self-emptying. As we trace, step by step, the unceasing service of Henry Martyn to men for love of his Master, we shall find a succession of modern parallels to the act of St. Martin, who, when a lad of eighteen with his regiment at Amiens, himself moneyless, answered the appeal of a beggar, shivering at the city gates in a cruel winter, by drawing his dagger, dividing his military cloak, and giving half of it to the naked man. ”

“ New names, new saints, new heroes ever rise and dazzle the eyes of common men. So it should be, for God lives, and through Him men live and manifest His unexhausted power. But Martyn is a perennial. He springs up fresh to every generation. ”

“ Grace was naturally kind; but she could not help using a small dagger now.
"Pray don't distress yourself," she said, with exquisitely fine scorn. "You may keep him—for me." Had she been wounded instead of mortified she could not have used the words; but Fitzpiers's hold upon her heart was slight.
They parted thus and there, and Grace went moodily homeward. Passing Marty's cottage she observed through the window that the girl was writing instead of chopping as usual, and wondered what her correspondence could be. ”

“ Her fingers were blistered.
"They'll get harder in time," she said. "For if father continues ill, I shall have to go on wi' it. Now I'll help put 'em up in wagon."
Winterborne without speaking set down his lantern, lifted her as she was about to stoop over the bundles, placed her behind him, and began throwing up the bundles himself. "Rather than you should do it I will," he said. "But the men will be here directly. Why, Marty!—whatever has happened to your head? Lord, it has shrunk to nothing—it looks an apple upon a gate-post!" ”

“ She had, however, become aware before this that the driver of the approaching gig was Giles. She had shrunk from being overtaken by him thus; but as it was inevitable, she had braced herself up for his inspection by closing her lips so as to make her mouth quite unemotional, and by throwing an additional firmness into her tread.
“Why do you wear pattens, Marty? The turnpike is clean enough, although the lanes are muddy.”
“They save my boots.”
“But twelve miles in pattens—’twill twist your feet off. Come, get up and ride with me.” ”

“ Martyn had been so diligent in order to gain this supposed reward, that his fellow-students called him ‘the man who had not lost an hour;’ he found too late that he had for ever lost many hours of opportunity of acquiring the knowledge of divine truth, and of his own duty, and many hours of happiness, such as all the honours, and even all the pleasures [Pg 16] of learning, can never confer, or compensate a man for its loss. ”

“ Martyn was much dejected, in contemplating the vast multitude of idolaters amongst whom he was now placed.
“Every thing presented the appearance of wretchedness. I thought of my future labours among them with some despondency; yet I am willing, I trust, through grace, to pass my days among them, if by any means these poor people may be brought to God. The sight of men, women, and children, all idolaters, makes me shudder, as if in the dominions of the prince of darkness. I fancy the frown of God is visible;—there is something peculiarly awful in the stillness that prevails. ”

“ When we think of the bigotry and intolerance of these people and of Mr. Martyn's unflinching courage single-handed and alone, declaring the truth and preaching Christ, exposed to the greatest personal danger, contempt and insult, but unabashed, he stands before the world during his Shiraz residence as one of the bravest and grandest heroes that has ever lived. Such a spectacle is thrilling and sublime. God was with him to protect him and to inspire his magnificent confessions. A figure-head in history! A sight for angels and for men! ”

“ As soon as he saw a taxi, Martin hailed it and told the chauffeur to drive to the corner of Forty-second Street and Fifth Avenue. "We'll walk from there," he said to Joan, "—if you'd like to, that is."
"I would like to. I want to peer into the shop windows and look at hats and dresses. I've got absolutely nothing to wear. Marty, tell me, are we well off?"
Martin laughed. She reminded him of a youngster going for a picnic and pooling pocket money. "Yes," he said, "—quite."
She sat back with her hands crossed in her lap. "I'm so glad. It simplifies everything to have plenty to spend." ”