第26章

"Let me see," he said musingly."About a shipwreck--something about a shipwreck in it, wasn't there?""I should say there was! My stars above! Not the common kind of shipwreck, neither, the kind they have down to Setuckit P'int on the shoals.No sir-ee! This one was sunk on purpose.That Joe Wylie bored holes right down through her with a gimlet, the wicked thing! And that set 'em afloat right out on the sea in a boat, and there wan't anything to eat till Robert Penfold--oh, HE was the smart one; he'd find anything, that man!--he found the barnacles on the bottom of the boat, just the same as he found out how to diffuse intelligence tied onto a duck's leg over land knows how many legs--leagues, I mean--of ocean.But that come later.Don't you remember THAT?"Albert laughed.The story was beginning to come back to him.

"Oh, sure!" he exclaimed."I remember now.He--the Penfold fellow--and the girl landed on this island and had all sorts of adventures, and fell in love and all that sort of stuff, and then her dad came and took her back to England and she--she did something or other there to--to get the Penfold guy out of trouble.""Did somethin'! I should say she did! Why, she found out all about who forged the letter--the note, I mean--that's what she done.'Twas Arthur Wardlaw, that's who 'twas.And he was tryin'

to get Helen all the time for himself, the skinner! Don't talk to me about that Arthur Wardlaw! I never could bear HIM."She spoke as if she had known the detested Wardlaw intimately from childhood.Young Speranza was hugely amused.Ivanhoe was quite forgotten.

"Foul Play was great stuff," he observed."When did you read it?""Eh? When? Oh, ever and ever so long ago.When I was about twenty, I guess, and laid up with the measles.That's the only time I ever was real what you might call down sick in my life, and I commenced with measles.That's the way a good many folks commence, I know, but they don't generally wait till they're out of their 'teens afore they start.I was workin' for Mrs.Philander Bassett at the time, and she says to me: 'Rachel,' she says, 'you're on the mendin' hand now, wouldn't you like a book to read?'

I says, 'Why, maybe I would.' And she fetched up three of 'em.Ican see 'em now, all three, plain as day.One was Barriers Burned Away.She said that was somethin' about a big fire.Well, I'm awful nervous about fires, have been from a child, so I didn't read that.And another had the queerest kind of a name, if you'd call it a name at all; 'twas She."Albert nodded.

"Yes," he said."I've read that."

"Have you? Well, I begun to, but my stars, THAT wasn't any book to give to a person with nerve symptoms.I got as far as where those Indians or whatever they was started to put red-hot kettles on folks's heads, and that was enough for ME.'Give me somethin'

civilized,' says I, 'or not at all.' So I commenced Foul Play, and I tell you I kept right on to the end.

"I don't suppose," she went on, "that there ever was a much better book than that wrote, was there?"Albert temporized."It is a good one," he admitted.

"Don't seem to me there could be much better.Laban says it's good, though he won't go so far as to say it's the very best.He's read lots and lots of books, Laban has.Reads an awful lot in his spare time.He's what you'd call an educated person, which is what I ain't.And I guess you'll say that last is plain enough without bein' told," she added.

Her companion, not exactly knowing how to answer, was silent for a moment.Rachel, who had picked up and was again twisting the dust-cloth, returned to the subject she so delighted in.

"But that Foul Play book," she continued, "I've read till I've pretty nigh wore the covers off.When Mrs.Bassett saw how much Iliked it she gave it to me for a present.I read a little bit in it every little while.I kind of fit the folks in that book to folks in real life, sort of compare 'em, you know.Do you ever do that?"Albert, repressing a chuckle, said, "Sure!" again.She nodded.

"Now there's General Rolleson in that book," she said."Do you know who he makes me think of? Cap'n Lote, your grandpa, that's who."General Rolleson, as Albert remembered him, was an extremely dignified, cultured and precise old gentleman.Just what resemblance there might be between him and Captain Zelotes Snow, ex-skipper of the Olive S., he could not imagine.He could not repress a grin, and the housekeeper noticed it.

"Seems funny to you, I presume likely," she said."Well, now you think about it.This General Rolleson man was kind of proud and sot in his ways just as your grandpa is, Albert.He had a daughter he thought all the world of; so did Cap'n Lote.Along come a person that wanted to marry the daughter.In the book 'twas Robert Penfold, who had been a convict.In your grandpa's case, 'twas your pa, who had been a play-actor.So you see--"Albert sat up on the sofa."Hold on!" he interrupted indignantly.

"Do you mean to compare my father with a--with a CONVICT? I want you to understand--"Mrs.Ellis held up the dust-cloth."Now, now, now," she protested.

"Don't go puttin' words in my mouth that I didn't say.I don't doubt your pa was a nice man, in his way, though I never met him.

But 'twan't Cap'n Lote's way any more than Robert Penfold's was General Rolleson's.""My father was famous," declared the youth hotly."He was one of the most famous singers in this country.Everybody knows that--that is, everybody but Grandfather and the gang down here," he added, in disgust.

"I don't say you're wrong.Laban tells me that some of those singin' folks get awful high wages, more than the cap'n of a steamboat, he says, though that seems like stretchin' it to me.

But, as I say, Cap'n Lote was proud, and nobody but the best would satisfy him for Janie, your mother.Well, in that way, you see, he reminds me of General Rolleson in the book.""Look here, Mrs.Ellis.Tell me about this business of Dad's marrying my mother.I never knew much of anything about it.""You didn't? Did your pa never tell you?""No."