STAGE VIII.—IN WHICH YOUNG MR. HERON COMES TO A TURN IN THE ROAD
FTER breakfast I found the handmade gentleman at his factory, and went with him into all its departments, and saw a hundred men and women at work.
“I want you to go and ride behind my trotter with me,” said Mr. McCarthy, presently. “Every gentleman has a trotter these days, and bets a little money on him once in a while.”
The hand-made gentleman lived at an inn not far from Saratoga, and one could not even enter it without getting a touch of the gay spirit of the summer capital.
As we opened the shop door a drunken wretch in dirty clothing sat on the porch. He rose, clinging to a column, and asked for a dollar.
“Well, uncle, back again, eh?” said the handmade gentleman. “No more to-day—no more to-day.”
He spoke in a kindly tone, and said to me, as he went on:
“I know it's a disgrace, but I can't help it; and maybe he can't. He's my uncle, and very fond o' me, after all. Followed me down here. Has a spree every little while, and spends all he has earned in a day or two. If I don't give him money he curses me, and goes about the place and runs me down, and does all he can to make me ashamed o' myself. Many a time I've felt like shooting him, but by-and-by I forgive the poor man and lift him out o' the gutter and buy him new clothes and set him to work again. And, do you know, he's been a great help to me, as ye might say? Lord Chesterfield says that a gentleman should forgive injuries, and I guess it's so. He's given me practice in the art of forgiving. It's done me good. I kind o' think, sometimes, that when you help another fellow to get on his feet you do more for yourself than ye do for him.”
His trotter, hitched to a light buggy, was waiting at the door of the inn, and we drove away.
“This is a daughter of one of the Morgans,” he said, as the mare began to show her stride. “They're breeding for less weight and more power and quicker action. It's a tendency of the times. Foot and wheel are beginning to move faster. Everybody is tired of going slow. Mr. Bonner says that he'll show us a horse by-and-by that can trot in 2.15.
“It's a funny thing,” he added, after a moment's pause; “my factory kind o' sets the pace for this town. It starts the day and ends it. My whistle sends every one to work, and tells 'em when to knock off, in and out o' the shop. When it sounds in the morning you'll see men who started a little late running to get to their jobs. It's brought new ideas and business methods and a quicker step into the old town.” The hand-made gentleman took me to my train soon after dinner. Pearl was there to see me off.
“I'm glad you're comin' here, Jake,” he said, as he shook my hand. “You've always been a great help to me.”
“I don't see how,” was my answer.
“You've helped me to live,” he said, with a sober look. “As soon as you get back you and McCarthy will go down and see Vanderbilt. I've got it all arranged. The medals helped me. It's the only time I ever used 'em. They landed me in the Commodore's office, and I had a talk with him straight from the shoulder. Told him if he went into the transatlantic ferry business he'd lose every dollar he had, as Collins had done. He wanted to know what made me think so, an' I told him that he couldn't compete with the English, who had been doing that job for centuries with cheaper labor than we could hire. I explained to him that the business was a growth and not a product; that one might as well try to compete with the forest by planting trees. He agreed with me.”
At Heartsdale I found my sister in love with her work, and had a talk with the superintendent in Montreal, who promised to retain her. That evening, as we sat by the fire at home, I got a view of myself that was quite new to me. For a time it filled me with bitterness, but taught me what I had to know, and set me forward in the race a little.
Report of my adventure on the back of the rope-walker had got to Heartsdale—to this day I know not how, although I suspected Bony. It had set idle tongues wagging. A letter to my sister, from one of her friends on a far side of the county, told how she had heard the story, and, of course, I confessed the truth. The harm it did lay in this: It singled me out and stood me up for scrutiny. Follies which would have been forgotten were enlarged and raked together and made to shine forth. The undertaker and the carver of epitaphs had marked me for execution, and, assisted by the Heartsdale Comet Band, had made hopeful progress. They had travelled far, and everywhere people had wished to know about me, and I had been well set off as a conceited, dare-devil sort of a ne'er-do-well who had been concerned in the smuggling business.
I began to understand why Colonel Busby thought so ill of me, and there was only one way to correct his opinion, and my mother made that clear. I must needs go to work and make a character for myself and show it in my conduct—as the hand-made gentleman had done. My way would not be quite like his, but I must be hand-made and upon honor, as he put it. The ready-made article had not stood the wear.
“Perhaps you had better put the pretty girl out of your head for a while,” said my mother. “You can keep her in your heart, and that will give you something to work for. But you mustn't give your brain to her. You've got to make a man of yourself, and you need your brain for your work.”
“Suppose she marries somebody else,” I suggested.
“Then you should not be sorry, because if she loves you she will wait for you.”
That seemed like rather cold philosophy. Its power over me grew as I thought of it, however, and by-and-by it began to have a sustaining force.
“I wish I could go to the war,” I remarked, with a sigh, for I longed to be a hero and show my courage, as my father had done.
“That's a wicked business,” said my mother, sadly. “I hoped that you would never want to go. I think it would be wise for you to go with Mr. McCarthy. He is fond of you and has good principles, and I presume it is best for you to leave this town; but I can't spare you for the war.”
I told them all about my visit to the handmade gentleman.
“Is he as homely as ever?” my sister asked.
“No, he has grown good-looking,” I answered. “He is going to be married.” And I told of his engagement.
“My land! I wouldn't marry him if he were the last man in the world!” Sarah exclaimed.
“Why?” was my query.
“He looked and talked so funny—just like a young old man. Then he was so afraid of me—hardly dared to look me in the face. I don't see how he had the courage to ask her.”
“I presume she furnished all the courage that was necessary. But you'd be surprised to see him. He's handsome, and can walk as well as anybody; and I believe he's going to be a great man.”
“I'm sure I wish him well.”
“Pearl says that he is a born leader—that the new spirit is in him. I think that girl is lucky.”
“I hope that you will stick to him,” said my mother. “You see I have a new motto on the wall.”
It occupied a prominent place above the mantel—a yard of wisdom in letters of red silk:
STICK TO NOTHING AND NOTHING WILL STICK TO YOU
It was rather good counsel for a boy, and, in truth, I had begun to share the uneasiness which, beyond doubt, had inspired this gentle reproof.
“I'm glad you thought of that motto, for I want you to stick to me,” I suggested. “Mr. Pearl says that as soon as I get my hand in you should come and live with me, both of you.”
“Mr. Pearl is a mystery,” said my mother. “Sometimes I think I have seen him before, but I cannot place him. The goggles cover his eyes so, and I have heard his voice but once.”
I gathered all my clothing and treasures and packed them into my trunk, and when we were ready to go to bed my mother gave me the horruck.
“One night I found you asleep in your chair,” she said, “and the horruck lay beside you. I saw it was robbing you of rest, and so I put it away.”
“The horruck!” I exclaimed. “What can it mean?”
“Your teacher put the coin in your pocket that day before Christmas, years ago. It is one of a number of silver pieces that were marked by an old and kindly man who lived in Hearts-dale years ago. They taught his religion, and he used to slip them into the pockets of needy people, who wondered where they came from. We used to call them the ghost riddles.”
That night I solved the riddle of the horruck by writing down the alphabet and discarding x and choosing letters to the right and left of m, the middle letter. So I got this message:
Love is the key of heaven.
I love you.
It made me know that Jo loved me, and I went to bed happier than I had ever been.
It was my last night in the Mill House for many a long year. The cry of the wind in the chimney and the sound of the falling water put a new prayer in my heart and a solemn sense of the dearness of my old home, not to be lost in care and toil, in pleasures and palaces.
Next day I returned the horruck to Jo, so as to let her know, plainly, that I loved her also.