The Captain's Toll-Gate

by Frank R. Stockton

"Now, isn't this enough," cried Olive, "to make any girl spread her wings and fly to the ends of the earth? But I have no wings; they have all gone away in a dog-cart. But I don't feel about that as I used to feel," she continued, a little hardness coming into her face. "I am settled now just the same as if I were married, and father and Edith Malcolmsen may come just as soon as they please. They shall make no plans for me; I am going to stay here with Uncle John. This house is mine now, and I am seriously thinking of having it painted. I shall stay here just as if I were one of those trees, and my father and my new mother—"

Here tears came into Olive's eyes and Mrs. Easterfield stopped her.

"Olive," said she, "I will give you a piece of advice. When your father and his young wife come here, treat her exactly as if she were your old friend. If you do so I think you will get along very well. This is partly selfish advice, for I greatly desire the opportunity to treat your father hospitably. He was my friend when I was a girl, you remember, and I looked up to him with very great admiration."

And so these two friends sat and talked, and talked, and talked until it was positively shameful, considering that the Broadstone horses were accustomed to be fed and watered at noon, and that the coachman was very hungry.

When, at last, Mrs. Easterfield drove home, and it must have been three in the afternoon, she left Olive very much comforted, even in regard to the unfortunate obligations which had fallen upon her uncle. For now that her old father had gone, all intercourse with the Port woman would cease.

But in her own mind Mrs. Easterfield was not so very much comforted. It was all well enough to talk about Olive and her uncle and the happiness and safety of the home he had given her, but that sort of thing could not last very long. He was an elderly man and she was a girl. In the natural course of events, she would probably be left alone while she was very young. She would then be alone, for her father's wife could never be a mother to her when he was at sea, and their home would never be a home for her when he was on shore. What Olive wanted, in Mrs. Easterfield's opinion, was a husband. An uncle, such as Captain Asher, was very charming, but he was not enough.

During this pleasant afternoon, when Captain Asher was in town attending to some arrangements for the burial of Mr. Port, Miss Maria was sitting discreetly alone in her darkened chamber. She had a great many things to think about, and if she had allowed her conscience full freedom of action, there would have been much more upon her mind. She might have been troubled by the recollection that since her father's very determined treatment of her when she had endeavored to fix herself upon the affections of Captain Asher, she had so conducted herself toward her venerable parent that she had actually nagged the life out of him; and that had she been the dutiful daughter she ought to have been he might have been living yet. But thoughts of this nature were not common to Maria Port. She had made herself sure that the will was all right, and he was very old. There was a time for all things, and Maria was now about to begin life for herself. To her plans for this new life she now gave almost her sole attention.

She had one great object in view which overshadowed everything else, and this was to marry Captain Asher. This she could have done before, she firmly believed, had it not been for her old father and that horrid girl, the captain's niece. As for the elderly man who kept the toll-gate she did not mind him. If not interfered with, she was sure she could make him marry her, and then the great ambition of her life would be satisfied.

Unpretentious as was her establishment in town, she did not care to spend the money necessary to keep it up, and although she was often an unkind woman, she was not cruel enough to think of inflicting herself as a boarder upon any housewife in the town. No, the toll-gate was the home for her; and if Captain Asher chose to inflict himself upon her for a few years longer, she would try to endure it.

One obstacle to her plans was now gone, and she must devote herself to the work of getting rid of the other one. While Olive Asher remained at the tollhouse there was no chance for her in that quarter.