A Tangled Web (18 page)

“Likely a young God who hain't learned his business yet, by gosh,” said Mr. Conway.

Brian was too young himself to be scandalized by this. He rather liked the idea of a young god. He had always thought of God as a stern, bearded Old Man.

If Brian had not been so tired he would have enjoyed the walk to Little Friday cove. He loved to watch the harbor lights blossoming out in the blue of the twilight. He loved to watch the mysterious ships sailing out beyond the dunes to who knew what enchanted shores. He picked one that was just going over the bar and went with it in fancy. When he reached Little Friday Cove he found Big Sam alone and rather low in his mind. Trouble was coming; various signs and portents had pointed to it for days. No longer could he be blind to them. Salt, the dog, had howled dismally all Monday of the preceding week. On Tuesday Little Sam had smashed the looking-glass he had shaved by for forty years. On Wednesday Big Sam had failed to pick up a pin he had seen; on Thursday he had walked under Tom Appleby's ladder at the factory—and on Friday—Friday, mind you—Big and Little Sam between them had contrived to upset the salt at supper.

Big Sam was determined not to be superstitious. What did spilled salt and broken looking-glasses matter to good Presbyterians? But he did believe in dreams—having Biblical warrant for the same. And he had had a horrible one the night after Aunt Becky died—of seeing the full moon, one moment burning black, the next livid red, coming nearer and nearer the earth. He woke, just as it seemed near enough to be touched, with a howl of agony that shattered the stillness of the spring night at Little Friday Cove for yards around. Big Sam, who had kept a careful and copious diary of his dreams for forty years, looked them all over and concluded that none of them had been as awe-inspiring as this one.

Then there was that peculiar sound the gulf had been making of late. When the Old Lady of the Gulf skirled like a witch, somebody was going to sup sorrow.

“Little Sam sneaked off somewheres after supper,” he told Brian. “I kinder thought I'd go up to the run myself and dig some clams. But I didn't—felt a bit tired. I'm beginning to feel my years. But I've got the key of the fish-house and I'll get a cod out for you. They're all most too big for you to carry, though. Stay and have a saucer of clam chowder. There's some left. That man can make chowder, I'll admit.”

Brian would have liked the chowder well enough, for his supper had been of the sketchiest description, but it was getting dark. He must get home before it got very dark—he was afraid. He was ashamed of his cowardice, but there it was. Sometimes he thought if anyone really loved him he would not be afraid of so many things. He looked so small and wistful that Big Sam gave the poor little shrimp a nickel to buy a chocolate bar at the Widow Terlizzick's little store on the way home. But Brian did not stop at the store. He did not like the widow Terlizzick or the noisy crowd of loafers who were always in and around the store on summer nights. He hurried home with his heavy codfish and was told to clear off to bed—he would have to be up at four to help Mr. Conway take some calves to market. Brian would have liked to sit out under the big apple tree for a little while and play his jew's-harp. He liked the old apple tree. It seemed like a friend to him—a great, kindly fragrant, blooming creature stretching protecting arms over him. And he loved to play on his jew's-harp. Once he had played on his jew's-harp in the evening at a house where he was planting potatoes, and two young people—one of them a girl in a white dress—had danced to his playing in the moonlit orchard. It was one of the few memories of beauty in his life. When he played his jew's-harp now he saw them again—dancing—dancing—dancing. With the grace of wind-blown leaves—white and mystic and lovely—to his elfin tune.

But Aunt Alethea was inexorable and Brian climbed the ladder to the kitchen loft, where he always slept alone and which he hated. He was afraid of the rats that infested it. There was only one thing he liked about it—from its window he could get a glimpse of the sea and a misty blue headland beyond which were wonderful sunsets. Tonight there was a lovely rose and gold afterlight and the sea was blackly-blue under it. And he could see the pink-shaded lamp in the window of the Dollar house on the other side of the road. He loved to watch it, making a great glowing spot of color in the darkness. When it suddenly went out he felt terribly lonely. Tears came to his eyes. He was such a little creature, alone in a great, dim, hostile world. Brian looked up at the sky. How dark the night was! How fearfully bright the stars!

“Dear God,” he said softly, “dear
Young
God, please don't forget me.”

He lay down on his hard little mattress. He was glad there was no moonlight yet. Moonlit nights in the loft frightened him. The things hanging from the rafters took on such queer shapes. And that hole in the wall of the loft that opened into the unfloored attic of the main house—it was dreadful on moonlit nights, when it looked so black and menacing. Who knew what might pop out of a hole like that? When it was dark he could not see it. It was a long while before he fell asleep. But at last he did—just about the time that Little Sam came home to Little Friday Cove.

7

Little Sam had heard at the funeral that the raffle for which he had bought the ticket from Mosey Gautier, was to be held that night. So after supper he thought he might as well saunter around to Chapel Point and see if he had any luck.

He had.

Big Sam was sound asleep in his bunk, with Mustard rolled up in a golden ball on his stomach. Little Sam unwrapped something from the parcel he was carrying, looked at it rather dubiously, shook his head, and tried the effect of it on the clock shelf. Something in him liked it. Something else was uneasy.

“She's got a real fine fìgger,” he reflected, with a speculative glance at the unconscious Big Sam. “But I dunno what he'll think of her—I dunno. Nor the minister.”

These considerations did not keep Little Sam awake. He fell asleep promptly and Aurora, goddess of the dawn, kept her vigil on the clock shelf through the hours of darkness, and was the first thing on which Big Sam's eyes rested when he opened them in the morning. There she stood, her lithe lovely form poised on tiptoe, smitten by a red-gold beam from the sun that was rising across the harbor.

“What the devil is that?” said Big Sam, thinking this was another dream. He flung himself out of his bunk, upsetting an indignant cat, and walked across the room.

“It ain't a dream,” he said incredulously. “It's a statoo—a naked statoo.”

Salt, who had been curled up at Little Sam's feet, bounded to the floor after Mustard. He liked Mustard well enough but he wasn't going to have her sitting there on the floor grinning at him. The resultant disturbance awoke Little Sam, who sat up drowsily and inquired what the row was about.

“Samuel Beelby Dark,” said Big Sam ominously, “what's that up there?”

“Samuel Phemister Dark,” returned little Sam mockingly, “that's an alabaster statooette—genuine alabaster. I drew it for fifth prize at the Chapel lottery last night. Pretty, ain't it?”

“Pretty?” Big Sam's voice boomed out. “Pretty! It's indecent and obscene, that's what
it
is. You take it right down and fire it out in the gulf as far as you can fire it.”

If Big Sam had not thus flown off the handle it is probable that Little Sam would have done exactly that, being somewhat uneasy over the look of the thing generally and what Mr. Trackley might say about it. But he was not going to be bullied into it by that little runt of a Big Sam and he'd let him see it.

“Oh, I guess not,” he retorted coolly. “I guess it's going to stay right there. Stop yelping now and let your hair curl.”

Big Sam's scanty love-locks showed no signs of curling but his red beard fairly crackled with indignation. He began striding about the room in a fine rage, biting his right hand and then his left. Salt fled one way and Mustard another, leaving the Sams to fight it out.

“'Taint right to have any kind of statoos, let alone naked ones. It's agin God's law. ‘Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven immidge—'”

“Good gosh, I ain't made it and I ain't worshiping it—”

“That'll come—that'll come. And a Catholic geegaw at that. S'pose likely it's the Virgin Mary.”

Little Sam looked doubtful. He had been bred up in a good old Presbyterian hatred of Catholics and all their ways and works, but somehow he didn't think even they would go so far as to represent the Virgin Mary entirely unclothed.

“No, 'taint. I think her name's there at the bottom—Aurorer. Just a gal, that's all.”

“Do you think the Apostle Paul ever carried anything like that around with him?” demanded Big Sam. “Or”—as an afterthought that might carry more weight with Little Sam—“poor dear old Aunt Becky, who isn't cold in her grave yet?”

“Not likely. St. Paul was kind of a woman-hater like yourself. As for Aunt Becky, we ain't in the running for her jug, so why worry? Now stop chewing your fists and pretend you're grown up even if you ain't, Sammy. See if you can dress yourself like a man.”

“Thank you. Thank you.” Big Sam became ominously calm. “I'm entirely satisfied to be classed with the Apostle Paul. My conscience guides
my
conduct, you ribald old thing!”

“Been making a meal of the dictionary, it seems,” retorted Little Sam, yanking his pants off their nail, “and it don't seem to have agreed with your stomach. Better take a dose of sody. Your conscience, as you call it, hasn't nothing to do with it—only your prejurdices. Look at that writing man. Hain't he got half a dozen of them statoos in his summer shanty up the river?”

“If he's a fool—and wuss—is that any reason why you should be? Think of that and your immortal soul, Sam Dark.”

“This ain't my day for thinking,” retorted the imperturbable Little Sam. “Now that you've blown off your steam, just set the porridge pot on. You'll feel better when you've had your breakfast. Can't 'preciate works of art properly on an empty stomach, Sammy.”

Big Sam glared at him. Then he grabbed the porridge pot, yanked open the door, and hurled the pot through it. The pot bounded and clattered and leaped down the rocks to the sandy cove below. Salt and Mustard fled out after it.

“Someday you'll drive me too far,” said Little Sam darkly. “You're just a narrow-minded, small-souled old maid, that's what you are. If you hadn't a dirty mind you wouldn't be throwing a fit cause you see a stone woman's legs. Your own don't look so artistic, prancing around in that shirttail, let me tell you. You really ought to wear pajamas, Sammy.”

“I fired your old pot out to show you I'm in earnest,” roared Big Sam. “I tell you I won't have no naked hussy in this house, Sam Dark. I ain't over squeamish but I draw the line at naked weemen.”

“Yell louder, can't you? It's
my
house,” said Little Sam.

“Oh, it is, is it? Very well.
Very
well. I'll tell you this right here and now. It ain't big enough for me and you and your Roarer.”

“You ain't the first person that idee's occurred to,” said Little Sam. “I've had too many tastes of your jaw of late.”

Big Sam stopped prancing and tried to look as dignified as a man with nothing on but a shirt can look, as he laid down the ultimatum he never doubted would bring Little Sam to his senses.

“I've stood all I'm a-going to. I've stood them skulls of yours for years but I tell you right here and now, Sam Dark, I won't stand for that atrocity. If it's to remain—
I
leave.”

“As for leaving or staying, suit yourself. Aurorer stays there on that clock shelf,” retorted Little Sam, striding out and down the rocks to rescue his maltreated porridge pot.

Breakfast was a gloomy meal. Big Sam looked very determined, but Little Sam was not worried. They had had a worse row than this last week, when he had caught Big Sam stealing a piece of raisin pie he had put away for his own snack. But when the silent meal was over and Big Sam ostentatiously dragged an old, battered, bulging valise out from under his bunk and began packing his few chattels into it, Little Sam realized that the crisis was serious. Well, all right—all right. Big Sam needn't think he could bully
him
into giving up Aurorer. He had won her and he was going to keep her and Big Sam could go to Hades. Little Sam really thought Hades. He had picked up the word in his theological reading and thought it sounded more respectable than hell.

Little Sam watched Big Sam stealthily out of his pale woolly eyes as he washed up the dishes and fed Mustard, who came scratching at the window-pane. The morning's sunlit promise had been delusive and it was now, as Little Sam reflected testily, one of them still, dark, misty mornings calc'lated to dampen one's spirits. This was what came of ladders and looking-glasses.

Big Sam packed his picture of Laurier and the model of a ship, with crimson hull and white sails, that had long adorned the cater-cornered shelf above his bunk. These were indisputably his. But when it came to their small library there was difficulty.

“Which of these books am I to take?” he demanded frostily.

“Whichever you like,” said Little Sam, getting out his baking-board. There were only two books in the lot he cared a hoot about, anyhow.
Fox's Book of Martyrs
and
The
Horrible
Confession
and
Execution
of
John
Murdock
(one of the Emigrants who lately left this country) who was hanged at Brockville (Upper Canada) on the 3rd day of September last for the inhuman Murder of His own brother.

When Little Sam saw Big Sam pack the latter in his valise, he had much ado to repress a grisly groan.