A LAW UNTO HERSELF.
CHAPTER III.
Captain Swendon, with the majority of his sex, was never less a hero than when at home. Brute force, od, backbone, whatever you call the resistant power which keeps a man erect among other men, weakens under the coddling of feminine fingers and the smoke of conjugal incense. The aching tooth, the gnawing passion or the religious problem that strikes across his life like a blank wall, all of which he pooh-poohs out of sight in the street, master him indoors. A woman puts on her noblest virtues with the fireside slippers, but to a man they are a chance for remorse, for repining, for turning God's mighty judgments on himself into a small drizzling shower of miseries for his wife and the children. Give the same man his boots and the fresh air, and he will go to the stake gallantly.
The captain, pacing up and down the garden-alleys that night, thinking of the blow which would fall on his daughter in Laidley's threatened disposal of his property, was not altogether unheroic. There was nothing mean in the big gaunt figure with its uncertain strides, or in the high-featured, mild-eyed face: neither was there anything mean in his wrath. It was all directed against himself. His Swedish blood had infused a gentle laziness into his temper, and he had forgiven Laidley long ago for his lifelong swindle, as no American with English grandfathers would have done.
"It's Will's nature," he said now. "Will's a coward and desperately ill. He wants to pay his way into heaven, and I can't blame him. But I—I'm an incompetent fool! I can't even pay my girl's way on earth!" The captain's life, in fact, was a long ague of feverish conceit and chills of humility. Yesterday he was an inventor who would benefit the world: to-day he was fit for nothing but to dig clams. Going up and down the lonely walk, he summed up all the capital he had had to make his fortune in the world's market—the education, the opportunities, the great inventions that all fell just short of their aim. For himself, he did not want money. His work-bench, his iron bed, a bowl of Jane's soup, a fishing-rod and a tramp into the hills now and then with the girl,—if he had millions they could buy him nothing better. But she—Why should she not be as other women? Why could he not work for her as other fathers—?
He raised his right arm, and the empty sleeve fell back from the stump, which burned and throbbed impotently. There was will enough in it to conquer the whole world for her. There was that aching love which mothers feel in his breast for her, as though his heart were physically wrenched.
But at breakfast the next morning, while quite as ready to die for her, he nagged and scolded incessantly, and threw the blame of their ill-luck on her, his voice sounding like the clatter of a brass kettle: "Omelette? No—no omelette for me. I am quite content to breakfast on dry bread and coffee. It is time we practiced economy. I'll make out a system for you, Jane. A system, and I desire you to follow it."
Jane laughed and helped him to cherries, and then devoted herself in earnest to her own breakfast. She never argued with anybody, and had that impregnable good-humor which so often passes for lack of feeling. Little griefs, either her own or those of other people, dwindled out of notice in the atmosphere about her, like mosquitoes buzzing in a large sun-lighted room.
"We certainly must practice economy. God knows where to-morrow's meals may come from!"
"Jane's hens are in good laying condition, and there are the cherries on the tree," said Miss Fleming tartly. She did not like Jane nor any other woman, but she usually fought for her sex against men in a mannish way—for the pleasure of fighting for the weaker party.