THE LOCKS.
From the southern windows of The Locks, Allan Dorris looked with curious interest the day after his arrival, and the week and the month following, for he remained there for that length of time without going out, except to walk along the country roads for exercise, where he occasionally met wagons containing men who cursed the town they were leaving for its dullness.
The dwellings of Davy's Bend were built upon hills sloping toward the little valley where the business houses were, and which poured a flood of water and mud into the long streets in rainy weather through gaping gullies of yellow clay. The rains seemed to be so fierce and frequent there that in the course of time they had cut down the streets, leaving the houses perching on hills above them, which were reached by flights of steps; and this impression was strengthened by the circumstance that it was a wet time, for it rained almost incessantly.
The houses were a good way apart, so far as he could see from his southern windows; and this circumstance caused him to imagine that the people were suspicious of each other, and he noticed that while many of them had once been of a pretending character, they were now generally neglected; and that there was a quiet air everywhere that reminded him of the country visited in his walks.
The houses themselves appeared to look at him with a cynical air, as the people did, as if to intimate that he need not hope to surprise them with his importance, or with anything he might do, for their quiet streets had once resounded to the tread of busy feet, and they had seen strangers before, and knew the ways of men. Some of the dwellings perching on the hills, deserted now except as to bats and owls, resembled unfortunate city men in a village; for there was a conspicuous air of decayed propriety about them, and an attempt at respectability that would have been successful but for lack of means. These in particular, he thought, made faces at him, and sneered as he passed through their part of the town in his walks to and from the country roads.
Several times he heard parties of men passing his house at night, talking loudly to make themselves heard above the jolting of their wagons; and these usually had something to say about the new owner of The Locks, from which he imagined that there was much speculation in the town concerning him. The house in which he lived was such a gloomy place, and he was shut up in it alone for such a length of time, that he came to listen to the sound of human voices with pleasure, and often went to the windows to watch for the approach of wagons, that he might hear the voices of their occupants; for there were no solitary travellers that way, and while the men may have been dissatisfied with themselves and their surroundings, they at least had company. He longed to join these parties, and go with them to their homes, for he thought the companionship of rough men and their families would be preferable to the stillness of his house; but the wagons drove on, and Allan Dorris returned to his walk across the room, and back again.
From the window most patronized by him in his lonely hours he could see a long stretch of the river, and at a point opposite the town a steam ferry was moored. Usually smoke was to be seen flying from its pipes during the middle hours of the day, as it made a few lazy trips from one shore to the other; but occasionally it was not disturbed at all, and sat quietly upon the water like a great bird from morning until night.
From making excursions about his own premises, as a relief from doing nothing, he found that the house in which he lived was situated in a wooded tract of several acres in extent, entirely surrounded by a high stone wall, with two entrances; one in front, by means of a heavy iron gate, which looked like a prison door, and a smaller one down by the stable. The stable, which was built of brick, had been occupied by pigeons without objection for so many years that they were now very numerous, and protested in reels and whirls and dives and dips in the air against the new owner coming among them at all; perhaps they imagined that in time they would be permitted to occupy the house itself, and rear their young in more respectable quarters. There were a few fruit and ornamental trees scattered among the others, but they had been so long neglected as to become almost as wild as the native oaks and hickories. Occasionally a tall poplar shot its head above the others, and in his idleness Allan Dorris imagined that they were trying to get away from the dampness below, for in the corners, and along the stone wall, there was such a rank growth of vines and weeds that he was almost afraid to enter the dank labyrinth himself. There was a quaking asp, too, which was always shivering at thought of the danger that might be concealed in the undergrowth at its feet, and even the stout hickories climbed a good way into the air to insure their safety.
Close to the south wall, so close that he could almost touch it, stood a stone church, with so many gables that there seemed to be one for every pigeon from the stable, and on certain days of the week someone came there to practise on the organ. At times the music was exquisite, and in his rambles about the place he always went down by the south wall to listen for the organ, and if he heard it he remained there until the music ceased. The music pleased him so much, and was such a comfort in his loneliness, that he did not care to see the player, having in his mind a spectacled and disagreeable person whose appearance would rob the spell of its charm; therefore he kept out of his way, though, on the days when the music could be expected, Dorris was always in his place, impatiently waiting for it to commence. There was something in the playing with which he seemed to have been acquainted all his life; it may have been only the expression of weariness and sad melancholy that belongs to all these instruments, but, however it was, he regarded the organ as an old acquaintance, and took much pleasure in its company even when it was silent, for it occupied a great stone house like himself, and had nothing to do.
Between the stable and the house was the residence of Mrs. Wedge, the housekeeper—a building that had originally been a detached kitchen, but the cunning of woman had transformed the two rooms into a pleasant and cozy place. This looked home-like and attractive, as there were vines over it and flowers about the door; and here Allan Dorris found himself lingering from day to day, for he seemed to crave companionship, though he was ashamed to own it and go out and seek it. Instead of dining in the stone house, he usually sat down at Mrs. Wedge's table, which he supplied with a lavish hand, and lingered about until he thought it necessary to go away, when he tried to amuse himself in the yard by various exercises, which were probably recollections of his younger days; but he failed at it, and soon came back to ask the motherly old housekeeper odd questions, and laugh good-naturedly at her odd answers.
A highly respectable old lady was Mrs. Wedge, in her black cloth dress and snowy white cap, and no one was more generally respected in Davy's Bend. During his life Mr. Wedge had been a strolling agent, never stopping in a town more than a week; and thus she lived and travelled about, always hoping for a quiet home, until her good-natured but shiftless husband took to his bed one day, and never got up again, leaving as her inheritance his blessing and a wild son of thirteen, who knew all about the ways of the world, but nothing of industry. Hearing of Davy's Bend soon after as a growing place,—which was a long time ago, for Davy's Bend was not a growing place now,—she apprenticed her son to a farmer, and entered the service of the owner of The Locks, under whose roof she had since lived.
The wild son did not take kindly to farming, and ran away; and his mother did not hear of him again until four years after she was living alone in The Locks, when a little girl five years old arrived, accompanied by a letter, stating that the son had lived a wanderer like his father, and that the child's mother being dead, he hoped Mrs. Wedge would take care of his daughter Betty until the father made his fortune. But the father never made his fortune; anyway, he never called for the child, and Mrs. Wedge had found in her grand-daughter a companion and a comfort, passing her days in peace and quiet. Therefore when the new owner offered her a home there, and wages besides, in return for her agreement to undertake his small services, she accepted—having become attached to the place—and lived on as before.
The house itself, which was built of stone, and almost square, contained ten rooms; four of about the same size below, and four exactly like them above, and two in the attic or half story in the roof. There were wide halls up stairs and down, and out of the room that Allan Dorris had selected for his own use, and which was on the corner looking one way toward the gate in front, and the other toward the town, began a covered stairway leading to the attic.
In this room he sat day after day, and slept night after night, until he almost became afraid of the quiet that he believed he coveted when he came to Davy's Bend; and at times he looked longingly toward the speaking-tube behind the door, hoping it would whistle an announcement that a visitor had arrived; for his habit of sitting quietly looking at nothing, until his thoughts became so disagreeable that he took long walks about the place to rid himself of them, was growing upon him.
But no visitors came to vary the monotony, except the agent on the morning after his arrival, who received a quarter's rent in advance, and afterwards named a price so low that Allan Dorris bought the place outright, receiving credit for the rent already paid.
Had the dark nights that looked in at Allan Dorris's windows, and for which Davy's Bend seemed to be famous, been able to remark it, there would have been much mysterious gossip through the town concerning his strange actions. Whenever he sat down, his eyes were at once fixed on nothing, and he lost himself in thought; he was oblivious to everything, and the longer he thought, the fiercer his looks became, until finally he sprang from his chair and walked violently about, as if his body was trying to escape from his head, which contained the objectionable thoughts. At times he would laugh hoarsely, and declare that he was better off at The Locks than he had ever been before, and that Davy's Bend was the best place in which he had ever lived; but these declarations did not afford him peace, for he was soon as gloomy and thoughtful as ever. That he was ill at ease, the dark nights could have easily seen had they been blessed with eyes; for the dread of loneliness grew upon him, and frequently he sent for Mrs. Wedge, confessing to her that he was lonely, and that she would oblige him by talking, no matter what it was about.
Mrs. Wedge would politely comply, and in a dignified way relate how, on her visits to the stores to purchase supplies, great curiosity was everywhere expressed with reference to the new master of The Locks,—what business he would engage in; where he came from; and, most of all, there was a universal opinion that he had bought The Locks for almost nothing.
"A great many say they would have taken the place at the price themselves," Mrs. Wedge would continue, smoothing down the folds of her apron, a habit of which she never tired, "but this is not necessarily true. The people here never want to buy anything until it is out of the market; which gives them excuse for grumbling, of which they have great need, for they have little else to do. I believe the price at which you took the house was lower than it was ever offered before,—but that is neither here nor there."
Then Mrs. Wedge would tell of the queer old town, in a quaint way, and of the people, which amused her employer; and noticing that, in his easy chair, he seemed to enjoy her company, she would smooth out her apron once more, and continue:—
"They all agree,"—there would be an amused smile on Mrs. Wedge's face as she said it,—"they all agree that you do not amount to much, else you would have gone to Ben's City, instead of coming here. This is always said of every stranger, for Davy's Bend is so dull that its people have forgotten their patriotism. I have not heard a good word for the town in ten years, but it is always being denounced, and cursed, and ridiculed. I think we despise each other because we do not move to Ben's City, and we live very much as I imagine the prisoners in a jail do,—in cursing our home, in lounging, in idle talk, and in expecting that each one of us will finally be fortunate, while the condition of the others will grow worse. We are a strange community."
Dorris expressed surprise at the size of the church near The Locks, and wondered at the deserted houses which he had seen in his walks, whereupon Mrs. Wedge explained that Davy's Bend was once a prosperous city, containing five thousand busy people, but it had had bad luck since; very bad luck, for less than a fifth of that number now remained, and even they are trying to get away. What is the cause of this decrease in population? The growth of Ben's City, thirty miles down the river. The belief which existed at one time that a great town would be built at Davy's Bend turned out to be a mistake. Ben's City seemed to be the place; so the people had been going there for a number of years, leaving Davy's Bend to get along as best it could.
This, and much more, from Mrs. Wedge, until at a late hour she notices that Dorris is asleep in his chair, probably having got rid of his thoughts; so she takes up the lamp to retire with it. Holding it up so that the shade throws the light full upon his face, she remarks to herself that she is certain he is a good, an honorable, and a safe man, whoever he is, for she prides herself on knowing something about men, and arranging the room for the night, although it does not need it, she goes quietly down the stairs, out at a door in a lower room, and into her own apartment.