CHAPTER VI
RELATING A MEETING BETWEEN UNCLE ARAD AND THE SAILOR
THE old man drove on through the mud and slush of the country road, the wheels of the rickety vehicle first rattling over outcropping rocks and boulders, and then splashing half way to their hubs in the yellow mire.
A mile beyond his own farm he turned into a broader highway which trended to the right—the city “pike.” Woods bordered the way on either side and although the rain had ceased, the drops fell in showers from the trees. It was a nasty day and the horse splashed itself to the belly with the mire.
Not many rods beyond the turn old Arad overtook a man walking in the same direction that he was driving, and as the farmer rattled up, the man stepped to one side and hailed him.
He was a bronzed and bearded fellow, dressed in garments about as seedy as the miser’s own clothing, and although he lacked all of twenty years of Arad’s age, his back, as he stood there beside the cart path, seemed almost as bent.
“Hullo, shipmate!” was the man’s greeting, raising his hand for the farmer to stop. “Goin’ toward the city?”
“Wal, I be a piece,” replied Arad grudgingly.
It was something of an effort for him to speak civilly to a casual stranger. I presume he was afraid of wearing out the small stock of civility he possessed.
“Ye’re goin’ in ballast, I see,” said the stranger. “Can’t ye stow me away there?”
“Hey?” responded the farmer, who did not understand the other’s figure of speech.
“I say ye’re goin’ in ballast,” repeated the man; “yer wagon’s empty, ye know. Give me a ride, will ye?”
“Wal, I dunno,” said Arad slowly, with a sudden avaricious twinkle in his eye. “I know the team’s empty, but th’ mare ain’t s’ limber ’s she might be, an’ it’s hard trav’lin’.”
“Got an eye on the main chance, ain’t ye, ye old land shark?” muttered the man. Then he said aloud: “How fur ye goin’ on this road?”
“’Bout three mile furder.”
“What’ll ye take me that fur, for?”
“Wall, I dunno,” began Arad.
“Come, I’ll give ye a quarter,” said the stranger, fishing a handful of silver from the depths of his pocket.
The old man’s eyes flashed.
“Jump aboard,” he said briefly, and the black bearded man sprang to the seat with great agility.
“Ye’re some limber,” said the old farmer, in admiration, pocketing the quarter and starting up his horse again.
“You’d be if ye’d shinned up as many riggin’s as I hev.”
“I be. No landlubber erbout me, is ther’? I reckon ye don’t see many sailors in these parts?”
“Ya-as we do,” snarled Arad impolitely; “more’n’ we wanter sometimes. I got a nevvy who was a sailor—a cap’n. Lost at sea erbout two months ergo. Lef’ me er great, hulkin’ boy ter take keer of.”
“Great Peter!” exclaimed the sailor, with some astonishment. “Ye don’t mean Cap’n Horace Tarr?”
“Yes, I do mean Cap’n Horace Tarr,” growled Arad. “He was my nevvy, an’ it’s his no ’count, wuthless boy I’ve got on my han’s. My name’s Arad Tarr—’n’ th’ only Tarr ’t ever knew ’nough ter make money an’ keep it.”
The sailor looked at the weazened old figure curiously.
“He didn’t favor you none,” he said.
“Who didn’t? Horace Tarr? I reckon he didn’t!” exclaimed Arad. “He favored a ca’f more’n he did anything else, ’cordin’ ter my notion. Did ye know him?” added the old man curiously.
“In course I did. I sailed with him—er—lots. Why, I was with him this ’ere las’ v’y’ge o’ his.”
“Ye don’t mean it!”
“I guess I do.”
“Wal, wal!” exclaimed Uncle Arad, roused out of himself for a moment. “So you was on that raf’ fur so long, eh? Must er been quite an experience. An’ Horace is really dead, is he?”
“Dead’s a door nail,” the sailor declared. “Can’t be no mistake erbout that. We had ter pitch him overboard—er—another feller and me; ’cause ’twas so all fired hot, ye know. Him and Paulo Montez both went ter the sharks.”
The old man shuddered.
“An’ he died without leavin’ a cent, eh? Poor’s poverty! I allus knew how ’twould be. ’N’ I s’pose Anson—fur he mus’ be dead by this time—died poor, too.”
The sailor looked at the old man sharply out of the corners of his eyes, and after a minute spoke again.
“Yes,” he said slowly, in confirmation of Uncle Arad’s remark. “I was with the cap’n at the last.”
“What ye doin’ ’way up here?” inquired the farmer, with sudden interest.
“Well, I come up ter see Cap’n Tarr’s boy.”
“Hey?” ejaculated the farmer. “Come ter see Brandon?”
“That’s it,” said the sailor, nodding.
“But ye didn’t see him?”
“Yes, I did; over yonder in the woods.”
“Why, he didn’t say nothin’ erbout it ter me,” gasped the old man.
“Mebbe ye ain’t seen him since,” suggested the sailor.
“When was yer er-talkin’ with him?”
“Long erbout two hours back, ’r so.”
“’Fore dinner?”
“I reckon so. I seen him over in the woods yonder, an’ talked with him quite a spell. I started ’long back towards the city a’gin, but I found out I’d lost—er—somethin’, an’ went back ter hev er look fur it.”
“What was it ye lost?” asked Uncle Arad, with perhaps a momentary thought that, if it was of value and had been lost on his farm, he might be able to find it himself.
“Nothin’ but a piece of paper.”
“Find it?”
“Not me. Must ha’ blowed away. Howsomever, that ain’t ter the p’int. It’s funny yer nevvy never tol’ erbout meetin’ me.”
Old Arad was silent for a minute.
“I wish ye hadn’t come ’round here, fillin’ up his head with fool notions,” he grumbled. “Seein’ you must be what set him up ter leavin’ so sudden.”
“Goin’ to leave ye, is he?” asked the sailor quickly.
“He thinks he is,” returned the farmer, with a snarl. “Th’ little upstart! But I’ll l’arn him who’s who, now I tell ye? Goin’ ter New York, is he? Wal, I reckon not.”
“To New York? What’s he goin’ there fur? I sh’d think ye’d want him right here on th’ farm,” said the sailor, with a cunning smile.
“So I do—an’ right here is where he’s goin’ ter stay,” declared Uncle Arad wrathfully. “I’m er-goin’ down ter Square Holt’s ter see erbout it now. I’m either goin’ ter hev him bound ter me till he’s twenty-one, ’r git p’inted him gardeen. Then, I reckon he won’t talk no more erbout runnin’ off ter New York.”
“Yes, I reckon this place is the best fur a boy like him,” acquiesced the sailor. “An’ then, ye orter be his guardeen. S’posin’ he had prop’ty fallin’ to him now—you’d orter hev th’ handlin’ of it till he’s of age.”
“Prop’ty! I guess ther’ won’t be none ter fall to him,” sniffed Uncle Arad. “I ain’t a dyin’ man, by no means, an’ his pa didn’t leave a cent. Didn’t even hev that brig o’ his’n insured.”
“I dunno erbout that,” said the sailor shrewdly.
“What don’t ye know erbout?” demanded Arad suspiciously. “The Silver Swan wasn’t insured, were she?”
“I reckon not.”
“Then what d’ye mean?”
Arad’s piercing eyes were fixed searchingly on his companion’s face, but the sailor was not easily disturbed.
“Well, now, I’ll put a case to ye—jest a s’posin’ case, now mind ye,” he said calmly, as Arad, now thoroughly interested in the matter, let the old horse walk along the muddy highway. “S’posin’ now this ’ere Cap’n Tarr had knowed erbout a buried treasure, ’r some sich thing, an’ he’d writ erbout it, an’ give the papers ter another man—his mate, fur instance—ter be given ter his son.
“Now, nat’rally, if ther’ was any money in it fur this Brandon, you’d orter know erbout it, hadn’t ye? You bein’ th’ boy’s guardeen, you’d orter handle that money; un’ if I could help you ter the gettin’ o’ that money, I’d orter hev a part of it, eh?”
Old Arad stared at him with wide open eyes, and the hand which held the reins trembled visibly.
“Now, s’posin’ the mate sends them papers to Brandon through the mail, ’r writes a letter erbout ’em—you’d orter know it, hadn’t ye? You’d orter see that letter, or them papers, an’ you’d jest drop me a line, an’ I c’d help ye get ’em, ’cause I know all erbout sich things, bein’ a sea farin’ man fur thirty year.”
Uncle Arad moistened his trembling lips before he could speak.
“But this is only s’posin’,” he said quaveringly.
“But, s’pose ’twas so! S’pose I seen them papers passed, an’ s’pose I heered Cap’n Tarr say with his own lips ther’ was ’nough suthin ’r other (I couldn’t ketch th’ word—gold, mebbe) there ter make a man fabulously rich?”
“Fabulously rich!” repeated Arad.
“That’s it; fabulously rich, is wot he said. An’ if it’s so, you orter to get the letters from the post office, an’ open every one of ’em, hadn’t ye?”
Uncle Arad nodded quickly.
“O course ye had; and if the letter or papers sh’d come from Caleb Wetherbee—thet’s the mate’s name; he’s in the ’orspital yet—you’d let me know, an’ then we’d see wot we sh’d see, eh?”
The sailor poked the old man familiarly in the ribs and slapped his own knee.
“That’s wot we’d do, shipmate,” he said. “Wot say ye? Ye’ll need me, fur I reckon wherever th’ money’s hid, ye’ll need a sailor ter go ’long with ye—er ter git it fur ye.”
“I—I couldn’t go; my health ain’t good ’nough,” declared the farmer. “Then—then—mebbe there ain’t nothin’ in it.”
“Well, mebbe there ain’t,” said the sailor calmly, preparing to dismount as the old man pulled up before a house; “an’ then ag’in mebbe there is. Leastways, I adwise ye ter jest keep yer eyes open fur letters f’om New York. An’ when one comes from Caleb Wetherbee, p’r’aps ye’ll want ter talk with me furder.”
“Where—where kin I find ye?” Arad asked, in a shaking voice.
“Jest write ter Jim Leroyd, New England Hotel, Water Street, New York—that’ll fetch me,” declared the sailor briskly. “Now remember, old feller,” he added meaningly, “ye won’t be able ter do nothin’ with them papers ’thout me. If ye try it ye’ll be up a stump ter oncet. Now, take keer o’ yerself!”
He turned away and rolled along the road toward the distant city, while Uncle Arad climbed down from the wagon.
“Fabulously rich!” he muttered to himself, as he fastened the horse to the hitching post with trembling hands.