Chapter Fourteen.
An Unexpected Meeting.
The Rhode Island steamer was a splendid boat, Fritz found, when he came to look about him; for, she was a “floating palace,” every inch of her, with magnificent saloons and state-cabins stretching away the entire length of the vessel fore and aft. A light hurricane deck was above all, on which the passengers could promenade up and down to their hearts’ content, having comfortable cane-bottomed seats along the sides to sit down upon when tired and no gear, or rope coils, or other nautical “dunnage,” to interrupt their free locomotion on this king of quarter-decks, which had, besides, an awning on top to tone down the potency of the western sun.
With three tiers of decks—the lowermost, or main, containing the engine-room and stowage place for cargo, as well as the men’s quarters; the lower saloon, in which were the refreshment bars, and what could only appropriately be called the “dining hall,” if such a term were not an anachronism on board ship; and, thirdly, the upper saloon, containing the principal cabins and state-rooms, in addition to the graceful promenading hurricane deck surmounting the whole—the steamer had the appearance of one of those bungalow-like pretended “houses” which children build up with a pack of cards. Only that, this illusion was speedily destroyed by the huge beam of the engine, working up and down like a monster chain-pump on top of the whole structure—not to speak of the twin smoke-stacks on either side of the paddle-boxes emitting volumes of thick, stifling vapour, and the two pilot-houses, one at each extremity of the hurricane deck; for, like most American river steamers, the boat was what was called a “double-ender,” built whale-boat fashion to go either backwards or forwards, a very necessary thing to avoid collision in crowded waters.
Fritz could not but realise that the ingenious construction which he was gazing at was essentially a Yankee invention, resembling nothing in European waters.
If he had not yet been fully convinced of this fact, the eldritch screech which the steam whistle shortly evolved, in obedience to the pressure of the captain’s finger on a valve in the pilot-house forward—whence the vessel was steered—would have at once decided his mind on the point. It was the most fearful, ear-deafening, blood-curdling sound he had ever heard in his life!
Fritz thought something had happened—that the boiler was in danger of bursting, or the vessel sinking at the least—but, on making a startled inquiry of the nearest person, he was reassured by learning that the “whistle,” as the frightful noise was called, was only emitted in courteous salutation to another steamer passing in the distance, bound down to New York; and soon, an answering squeal from the boat in question,
mercifully tempered by the distance into a faint squeak that lent more “enchantment” to its notes than was possessed by the one which had just startled him, corroborated the truth of this statement.
After enjoying the scenery from the hurricane deck for some little time, Fritz made his way below to the forward part of the main deck running into the bows, where he had noticed, while looking down from above, his friend the deck hand of the Garibaldi shirt and blue cotton check trousers—or “pants” as the man would himself probably have called these garments.
He was busily engaged coiling down ropes and otherwise making himself useful, singing the while in a light-hearted way a queer sort of serio-comic and semi-sentimental ditty, the most curious composition Fritz had ever come across.
He, therefore, could not help laughing when the singer arrived at the end of his lay.
The man turned round at once on hearing the sound of his merriment.
“Nice song, that,” said Fritz, as soon as he could compose his face sufficiently to speak. “Just the sort of tender tone about it that I like!”
“None o’ your gas, mister,” replied the other with a smile, which showed that he was not offended at Fritz’s chaff. “It’s only a lot o’ nonsense I picked up somehow or other out West.”
“It is a very funny mixture,” said Fritz. “It is a wonder to me who imagines these absurd things and makes them up!”
“Right you air,” replied the man. “A heap more curious it is than the folks who write the clever things; and the queerest bit about it is, too, that the nonsense spreads quicker and faster than the sense!”
“Human nature,” said Fritz laconically, expressing thus his opinion of the matter.
“You’re a philosopher, I reckon?” observed the deck hand in reply.
“No, not quite that,” answered Fritz, rather surprised at such a remark from a man of the sort. “I merely form conclusions from what I see. I’m only a clerk—and you?”
“I’m a deck hand now,” said the other, speaking rather bitterly. “Last fall, I was a cow boy, Minnesota way; next year, I’ll be goodness knows what. Once, I was a gentleman!”
“And how—” began Fritz, when the other interrupted him brusquely.
“Put it all down to the cussed drink, mister, and you won’t be far out,” said he, laughing mockingly, so as to disguise what he really felt by the avowal; “but,” he added, to turn the conversation, “you speak very good English for a German, which I ken see you are.”
“I was educated partly in England,” said Fritz.
“Ah, that accounts for it. Been long in this country?”
“About six weeks,” replied Fritz.
“Travelling for pleasure, or looking about you?” was the next query from the deck hand, whom Fritz thought strangely inquisitive for an utter stranger. Still, the man did not mean any harm; it was only the custom of the country, as all new-comers speedily find out.
“I’m looking about for work,” he answered rather curtly. “I wish you would get me some.”
Fritz thought this would have silenced his interlocutor; but, instead of that, the deck hand proceeded with a fresh string of questions.
“What can you do?” he asked amiably, his smile robbing the words of any impertinence. “You don’t look like one who has roughed it much.”
“No?” said Fritz, somewhat amused. “You would not think, then, that I had been all through the terrible war we’ve had with France, eh?”
“Pst!” ejaculated the other. “You don’t call that a war, do you? Why, you don’t know what a war is in your miserable, played-out old continent! Look at ours, lasting nearly four years, and the battle of Gettysburgh, with thirty thousand dead alone! What do you think of that, hey?”
“Gravelotte had nearly as many,” said Fritz quietly.
“All right, mister; we won’t argy the p’int now; but you haven’t answered me yet as to what you ken do.”
“Well, then,” answered Fritz, “I can speak and write three languages, keep books, and act as a good correspondent and manager.”
“I like that,” exclaimed the other admiringly. “You speak slick and straight to the p’int, without any bunkum or blarney, like some of them that come over here. But, what line have you run on in the old country?”
“The shipping business is what I know best about,” replied Fritz.
“Ah, that’s the reason, I suppose, you asked me if thar wer any ships up to Providence, hey, mister?”
“Yes,” said Fritz. “I have applied to all the houses in New York in vain, and I thought I would try my chance at some other seaport town.”
“Didn’t like going inland, then!”
“No,” he answered.
“And so you selected Providence?”
“I only did so from chance. If I had not seen the name painted on the steamer, I would not have thought of speaking to you and asking where she was going.”
“And if you had not spoken to me again, why, I would not have known anything about you, nor been able to put you in the way of something,” replied the deck hand, more earnestly than he had yet spoken.
“You can do that?” said Fritz eagerly.
“Yes; but wait till we get to Providence. As soon as the old ship is moored alongside the wharf and all the luggage ashore, you come along of me, and I’ll show you whar to go. I shall be my own boss then, with no skipper to order me about.”
The man hurried off as he said these last words, in obedience to a hail from above—telling him to go and do something or other, “and look smart about it too”—which had probably influenced his remark about being his own “boss” when he got to land; and Fritz did not see him again until the next morning, by which time the steamer had reached its destination.
To Fritz’s eyes, Providence was more like a European town than New York, the more especially from his being accustomed to the look of seaports on the Baltic and banks of the Elbe; for the houses were mostly built of stone, and there was much less of that wooden, flimsy look which the newly sprung up cities of America possess.
This old-fashioned appearance is a characteristic of all the New England states—Rhode Island, Massachusetts, and Connecticut—for, here the original “Pilgrim Fathers” settled down and built unto themselves dwellings as nearly like those they had left behind them as it was possible with the materials to their hands, their descendants seemingly keeping up the habit of building in like manner. If this is not the case, then, most certainly, the old buildings of two centuries ago have lasted uncommonly well!
Fritz waited to go ashore until his friend the deck hand should be disengaged. He had seen him soon after they reached the steamer’s wharf; and, again, a second time when the crowd of passengers, with the exception of himself, brought up from New York had all disembarked—the man telling him he was just going to “clean himself down a bit,” and he would then be ready to take him to a decent place to stop, where he would not be charged too exorbitantly for his board.
And so Fritz waited on the steamer’s deck alongside the quay, gazing with much interest at the scene around him.
There were not quite so many ships as his casual acquaintance had led him to expect when he told him he would “see heaps up thaar”; but, still, the port evidently had a large import trade, for several big vessels were moored in the harbour and others were loading up at the wharves or discharging cargo, the latter being in the majority, while lots of smaller sailing craft and tiny boats were flying about, transporting goods and bales of merchandise to other places further up the river.
He had hardly, however, seen half what was in view when some one tapped him on the shoulder, and he turned round.
It was his friend the deck hand of the red flannel shirt and blue check cotton trousers; but, a wonderful transformation had taken place in his dress!
Clad now in an irreproachable suit of black, with a broad, grey felt hat on his head, the man looked quite the gentleman he had represented himself as once being. His manners, too, seemed to have changed with his outer apparel, the off-hand boorishness of the whilom “deck hand” having vanished with his cast-off raiment.
“I’m sorry to have kept you waiting, sir,” he said to Fritz, still, however, with the strongly accentuated “sir” he had noticed in those who had spoken to him at New York, “but I’ve hurried up as quickly as I could. Shall we now go ashore?”
“Certainly,” said Fritz, “although you’ve not detained me, I assure you. I have had plenty to look at during the little time I’ve been waiting.”
“Ah, you’ve not seen half of Providence yet,” replied the other, as the two stepped from the gangway that led from the deck of the steamer on to the stone quay alongside. “Why, some of the houses further up are finer than those of Broadway!”
“This is your native place, I suppose?” said Fritz slyly.
“Yes,” answered his companion, “but I do not flatter it on that account.”
The two walked on, until presently the Rhode Islander stopped in front of one of the smaller hotels. This looked, despite its lesser proportions, in comparison with its larger rivals, far more respectable and aristocratic—if such terms may be permitted to anything appertaining to the land of so-called “equality” and “freedom,” where, according to the poetical belief, there is no aristocracy save hat of merit and shoddy!
“Let’s go in here,” said the deck hand. “It is a great place for the merchants and sea-captains, and I might be able to introduce you to some one I know while we’re having a drink.”
“It’s too early for that,” said Fritz, feeling inclined to draw back, remembering what his companion had confessed the night before about his habits.
“Ah, I see,” exclaimed the other, colouring up as he took the hint, being evidently highly sensitive. “But you need not be afraid of that now. I’m always on my good behaviour whenever I come up to Providence. I’m really not going in here to drink now, I assure you; this is a house of call for business people, and I want to see some one just come home whom I know.”
“All right, then,” said Fritz, going into the hotel without any further protest; when, following his companion through several long passages, they at length entered a large room at the back.
“Jerusalem!” ejaculated the Rhode Islander almost the very instant he had crossed the threshold of this apartment. “If that aren’t the identical coon right oppo-site, mister!”
“Where?” asked Fritz.
“There,” said the other, pointing to where a rather short, broad-shouldered man was engaged in conversation with a lithe lad, whose back was turned but the colour of whose hair reminded Fritz of poor Eric.
“Hullo, Cap’en Brown,” sang out the whilom deck hand at this juncture; and, the broad-shouldered man looking round in the direction whence the voice proceeded, the lad also turned his face towards Fritz.
Good heavens! It was his brother Eric, whom he and every one at home had believed to be buried beneath the ocean with the rest of the boat’s crew that had escaped when the Gustav Barentz foundered, nothing of them having been heard since!
With one bound he was across the room.
“Eric!” he exclaimed in astonishment.
“Fritz!” ejaculated the other; and, forgetting their surroundings in the joy of thus meeting again, the two brothers fell into each other’s arms, almost weeping with joy.
“By thunder!” said the Rhode Islander to his friend the sea captain, both looking on with much interest at the affecting scene, “I’m glad I made him come in here anyhow, and we’ll have a licker-up on the strength of it, Cap’en Brown. It seems it wer a sort of providence that made him take our boat away haar, after all!”