CHAPTER II.
AN UNGODLY PERFORMANCE.
ADAM RUST knew the Crow and Arrow more by that repute which had traveled back to England, through the medium of young stalwarts and sailors, than he did from personal acquaintance with its charms. He had seen the place frequently enough, when first he came to Boston with William Phipps, but the town had expanded much since then and bore an air of unfamiliarity. The young man and his beef-eaters therefore wandered somewhat from their course.
Being overladen and dressed out of the ordinary fashion, the trio soon found themselves attracting attention, particularly from certain of the youths of the quarter and the rough characters incidental to shipping and the neighborhood thereof. Adam was carrying a long box, somewhat decrepit with age. It swung against his legs and struck an occasional post, or a corner, held insecurely as it was by his little finger only, which was passed through a brass handle. In this manner, and with a growing cluster of curious persons beginning to follow on behind, the party were in sight of the tavern at last, when this long box of Adam’s abruptly opened and spilled out a richly darkened old violin.
With a short exclamation of impatience, Adam halted and dropped his other bundles. Over these tall Halberd fell, with a great clatter of weapons, tin box and shaken bones. Adam fended him off from the violin, snatched it up and scrutinized it with the eager concern which a mother might bestow upon a delicate child. He found it uninjured, but, as it might have been smashed, he clung to it fondly, reluctant to place it again in its treacherous case.
Naturally the downfall of Halberd had delighted the gamin and the sailors following. These formed a cluster about the party, and their numbers drew additional spectators rapidly. A number of seafaring men shoved stoutly forward, their eyes glistening at sight of the musical instrument.
“I say, give us something, then, on that there red boy!” demanded one of the men, as healthy a looking rascal as ever drew breath.
“You look a bonny lad, come on—there’s a good un,” said another.
“Rattle her guts,” said a third. “We ain’t heard the like of a fiddle since we came to this town of preachers.”
Adam looked quietly about him. He knew most of the fellows about in the rude circle for rough English rovers who would love him if he played, or knock him and his belongings playfully into the street if he refused. He was not accustomed to churlishness; moreover, he felt particularly in the mood for playing. The ruddy sunset, the warm breath of the passing day, the very taste of American air, seemed lusty and joyous, despite the rigid Puritanical spirit of the mirth-denying people of the colony. He took up the bow, twanged the strings, tightened two that had become laggard, and jumped into the middle of a rollicking composition that seemed to bubble up out of the body of the violin and tumble off into the crowd in a species of mad delight.
Had the instrument been a spirit of wine, richly dark red as old port, and rendered alive by the frolicking bow, it could not have thrown off more merry snatches of melody’s mirth. It chuckled, it caught its breath, like a fat old monk at his laughing, it broke out in guffaws of hilarity, till not a soul in the audience could keep his feet seemly beneath him.
The sailors danced, boldly, though clumsily. Their faces beamed with innocent drunkenness, for drunk they were, with what seemed like the fumes and taste of this wine of sound. They had been denied it so long that it went to their heads at the first draught.
Across the street, issuing quietly and, he hoped, unobserved, from a door that led into the tavern, a Puritan father now appeared, wiping his mouth as a man has no occasion for doing unless he had recently dipped his upper lip into a mug. He suddenly halted, at the sound of music from over the way. He frowned at the now somewhat dense assemblage of boys and citizens surrounding Adam Rust, and worked up a mask of severity on his face from which it had been temporarily absent. He opened his mouth, as if to speak, and then, realizing that he might not be heard at this distance from them, moved a rod toward his fellow-beings and took a stand in the street.
At this moment an ominous snap resounded above both the playing and its accompaniment of scuffling feet and gruff explosions of enjoyment and hearty appreciation. Instantly Adam ceased playing. He had felt a string writhe beneath his fingers. The man in the roadway grasped at the moment instantly, to raise his voice.
“Begone, disperse, you vagabonds!” he said. “What is the meaning of this ungodly performance? Disperse, I say, you are bedeviled by this shameless disciple of Satan!”
Adam, intent on his violin, which he found had not broken but had merely slipped a string, heard this tirade, naturally, as did all the others. A few boys sneaked immediately about the cluster of men and sped away, as if from some terrible wrath to come.
“Who is yon sufferer for melancholy?” said Adam, looking carelessly at the would-be interrupter. Then suddenly a gleam came into his eye, as he recognized in the man one of the harsh hypocrites who had been among the few zealots who had imprisoned him, years before. “Halberd,” he added, “fetch the gentleman forward. Methinks he fain would dance and make merry among us.”
His opening question had been hailed with snorts of amusement; his proposal ignited all the roguishness in the crowd. Halberd, nothing loth to add his quota to the general fun, strode forward at once, way being made by the admiring throng, and he bowed profoundly before the bridling admonisher in the street. Then without warning, he scampered nimbly to the rear of the man of severity, took him by the collar and the slack of his knickerbockers and hustled him precipitately into the gathering.
Adam began to play at once. The spectators gathered about the astonished and indignant person of severity, thirsty for fun.
“You evidently wanted to dance, therefore by all means commence,” said Adam.
“You are a veritable limb of Satan!” said the man. “You shall be reported for this unseemly——”
“Halberd,” interrupted Adam, “the gentleman is as shy and timid as your veriest girl. Could you not persuade him to dance?”
“I was born for persuasion,” said Halberd. Thereupon he drew from his belt a pistol, most formidable, whether loaded or not, and pushed its metal lips against the neck of the hedged-in Puritan, whom he continued to restrain by the collar. “Make merry for this goodly company by doing a few dainty steps,” he requested.
The crowd pushed in closer and roared with delight. Some one among them knocked the reluctant dancer’s knees forward. He almost fell down.
“He’s beginning!” cried Adam, and he went for his fiddle with the bow as if he were fencing with a dozen pirates.
“Dance!” commanded Halberd, “dance!”
Terpsichore’s victim was not a man of sand. Drops of perspiration oozed out on his forehead. A look of abject fear drove the mask of severity from his face. He jumped up and down ridiculously, his knees knocking together for his castanets.
“Faster!” cried Adam, fiddling like a madman.
“Faster!” echoed Halberd, with his pistol-muzzle nosing in the dancer’s ribs.
The man jumped higher, but not faster; he was too weakened by cowardice. The sailors joined in. They could not keep their feet on the ground. The contagion spread. Pike and Halberd joined the hopping. The offending admonisher looked about at them in a frenzy of despair, afraid of who might be witnessing his exhibition. He was a sorry dancer, for he was so eager to please that he flopped his arms deliriously, as if to convince his beholders of his willingness to make himself as entertaining as possible. When he suddenly collapsed and fell down, Adam ceased playing. The crowd settled on the pavement and applauded.
“For shame, good friend,” said Adam, solemnly, “now that I observe your garb, I am shocked and amazed at your conduct. Friends, let us go to the tavern and report this gentleman’s unseemly behavior. In payment for the fiddling, you may fetch my bales of goods and merchandise.” He waved to his shabby baggage and led the way to the Crow and Arrow, which had long before disgorged nearly all of its company, and its landlord, to add to the audience in the street.
Flinging up his only piece of gold, the young rover ordered refreshment for all who crowded into the tavern, and while they were drinking, he dragged the beef-eaters, with all the “bales of merchandise,” away to the meager apartments provided above stairs in the sorry hostelry.
In the darkness of the hall, he ran heavily against some one who was just on the point of quitting a room. The innocent person was bowled endways.
“Confound your impudence!” said the voice of a man. “Why don’t you look where you are going?”
“I couldn’t see for fools in the way,” retorted Adam. “I am no king, requiring you to fall before me.”
“I can’t see your face, but I can see that you are an arrant knave,” said the other hotly. “You never could have had a proper drubbing, or you would be less reckless of your speech!”
“I have always been pitted to fight with bragging rascals of about your size and ability with a weapon, else I might have been drubbed,” Adam flung back, laying his hand on his sword as he spoke. “It shames my steel to think of engaging a ten-pin!”
“By all tokens, sir, you are blind, as well as idiotic, to walk into death so heedlessly. Be good enough to follow me into the yard.”
“Oh, fie on a death that flees and entreats me to follow,” was Adam’s answer. “I rolled you once in this hall; I can do so again. Halberd—Pike, candles to place at the head and feet of death!”
The beef-eaters, having reached the apartments appointed for their use, had heard the disturbance in the hall, and expecting trouble, had already lighted the candles. With three of these they now came forth. The hall would have been light enough had it been in communication with the outside world and the twilight, but as it was, it was nearly dark.
“I grieve for your mother,” sneered the stranger, whose sword could be heard backing out of its scabbard. “You must be young to be so spendthrift of your life.”
“On the contrary, you will find what a miser I am, even as to the drops of my blood,” said Adam. “No one ever yet accused the Sachem——”
“The Sachem!” interrupted the other voice.
Halberd, who had sheltered the candle he bore with his hand, now threw its light on the face of the man near by him.
“Shatter my hilt!” exclaimed young Rust, “Wainsworth!”
“Odds walruses!” said the man addressed as Wainsworth, “what a pretty pair of fools we are. By gad, Adam, to think I wouldn’t know you by your voice!”
Adam had leaped forward, while his sword was diving back into its sheath. He caught Wainsworth by the hand and all but wrung it off.
“Bless your old soul,” he said, “why didn’t you say who you were?”
“I was kept busy listening to you telling me who and what I was,” Wainsworth assured him, good-naturedly. “I never heard so much truth in all my life.”
“I never thought to be so incontinently found out myself,” Adam confessed contritely. “But as long as I have found you, I feel as good as if I had fought a good fight and wiped my blade. Indeed, Henry, I am tremendously glad to see you. How did you get here? When did you come? What a blundering fool I was!”
“Come in, come in to my castle,” said Wainsworth, turning back to the apartment he had been quitting when knocked over. “Bring in your friends. You shall all share in my dinner. I’m a ship, burdened with news for cargo to be unloaded. Come in here; we’ll talk all night.”
“But I am due at a dinner already, with my beef-eaters,” said Rust. “I have been delayed past all reason now, but——”
“You weren’t delayed by our duel of words, I trust?”
“No, no, but I have kept our host waiting, nevertheless. I shall be back before the night’s worn through, however, and then I am yours till breath fails me.”
“Haste away then, Sachem Rust, for the sooner you are gone the sooner I shall see you returned; and I shall consume myself with impatience till I can tell you of the sweetest plight mortal man ever got himself tangled in. I’ve got to tell you, for no one else on earth would answer. Begone, then. Good-by, and hasten back.”
Adam bade him au revoir, for he felt that already William Phipps must be thinking him sadly remiss and ungracious.
Preparations as to evening dress were soon completed. They consisted in a brisk wash of face and hands for the trio, not one of the party being endowed with a second suit of clothing. Thus they were upon the road, walking soberly, though diligently, toward the Captain’s residence, before the twilight had begun to fade.