Duffels Part 3

"Never mind," said the wife, stroking her husband's arm, "you are getting rich now, and your hard times are over."

"Yes, but everybody will always remember that I was a bought redemptioner, and your folks will hardly ever forgive you for marrying me."

"Oh, yes, they will some day. If you keep on as lucky as you are, I shall live in a bigger house than any of them, and drive to church behind six horses. That'll make a great difference. If the Nancy Jane fetches me a London bonnet and a wide, wide petticoat such as the Princess Augusta wears, so that I can brush against the pews on both sides with my silk frock when I go down the aisle, my folks will already begin to think that Sanford Browne is somebody," and she made little motions of vanity as she fancied her entrance into Duck Creek parish church on the Sunday after the arrival of the tobacco s.h.i.+p, arrayed in imitation of the Princess of Wales, the news of whose recent widowhood had not yet reached Judy Browne.

"There comes the Nancy Jane now," called the boy from the dooryard, pointing to a sloop on the other side of the wide estuary, bowling in with topsail and jib furled, and her rusty mainsail bellying under pressure of a wind dead aft.

"That's not the Nancy Jane," said the father; "only a sloop. But I don't know whose. Oh, yes; it must be that Yankee peddler back again.

There's his codfish ensign at his masthead. He's making for the other side now, but he'll come over here to sell his rum and kickshaws before he goes out."

"h.e.l.lo, Mr. Browne!" It was a voice coming from the river in front of the house. The owner of the voice was concealed by some bushes at the margin of the water.

"h.e.l.lo!" answered Browne to the invisible caller. "Is that you, Mr.

Wickford?"

"I've got some letters for you, Mr. Browne," came back from the water.

"The Nancy Jane ran in on the east wind this morning before daylight, and anch.o.r.ed in the little oyster bay below Manley's. She brings news that the Prince of Wales died last Spring. I happened to come past there this morning, and I brought some things Captain Jackson had for you. I reckon there's something pretty here for Mrs. Browne, too. Send one of your boys down."

"I'll come myself," said Browne, going down the bank, followed eagerly by the little Sanford, who had also his interest in the arrival of the parcels from London. There came after them presently a lithe young negro boy of fifteen, not yet two years out of Africa. He was clad in nothing but his native blackness, which was deemed sufficient for a half-grown negro in that day. Mrs. Browne had sent black Jocko after the others with orders to bring up her things "without waiting for the gentlemen to get done talking."

But the gentlemen did not talk very long. The neighbor was desirous of getting on to have the first telling of the news about the death of Prince Frederick, and Mr. Browne was impatient to open the packet from his factor.

"Good-by, Mr. Wickford. Come down and see us some time, and bring all your family," he called as the neighbor's canoe shot away in answer to the l.u.s.ty paddle strokes of his men.

"I reckon we'll come, sir," answered the receding neighbor. "My wife'll want to see what Mrs. Browne got from London. Tell Mrs. Browne we're afraid she'll be too fine to know her neighbors when she puts on her new bonnet."

The last words of this neighborly chaff were shouted over a wide sheet of water, and Sanford Browne, halfway up the bank, made no reply, but went back to his chair in the pa.s.sage and opened his packet. Kid that he had been, Browne had contrived to learn to read and write from a convict bought for a schoolmaster by the planter to whom Browne had been sold. This lettered rogue took pity on the kidnaped child, and gave him lessons on nights and Sunday, because he was well born and not willing to sink to the condition of the servants about him.

Browne found his factor's letter occupied at the outset with an account of the tobacco market and congratulations on the high price obtained for the last year's crop. Then the factor proceeded to give a bill of sales, and then a list of things purchased for Browne and his family, with the price set down for the hoop skirt and the new bonnet and the silk frock, as well as for a c.o.c.ked hat and dress periwig necessary to Sanford Browne's increasing dignity, and some things for the little Sanford. Browne studied each successive page of the letter in hope of finding a word on the subject in which he was most deeply interested, stopping reluctantly now and then to look up when his wife would break in with:

"Mr. Browne! Mr. Browne! won't you just look this way a minute? Isn't this fine?"

"Yes, Judy; it surely is," he would say absently, keeping his thumb on the place in the factor's letter, and resuming his reading as soon as possible, without having any definite idea of what Mrs. Judith had been showing him.

On the very last page he found these words:

"I have made most diligent searche for your family as you required b.u.t.t I have not discovered muche that will be to your satisfaction.

I send you, Sir, a coppie of certain things sette down in the Parish Register of St. Clement Danes, wch I thoughte most like to be of interest to you. Bye these you will discover that Walter Sanford Browne was born the 27 daye of the moneth of Febuarie 1721--wch will no doubt give you exacte knowledge of your owne age.

The father and mother of Walter Sanford Browne bore the names Walter and Susan respectively wch is a fact that will not be indifferent to you I suppose. I finde that Walter Browne aforesd, who is sette down a scrivener, was married at this same church of St. Clements on the 22 daye of Marche in the year 1720 to Anne Sanford of the same parish. Theire daughter Susan was borne in Aprill 1725, as you will see by this transcripte made by the clarke of the parish. The clarke cannot discover any further mencion of this familie nor of the name of Sanford in this register downe to this present time, from wch he deems it is to be inferred that sd.

Walter Browne long since removed out of that parish, in particular as the present wardens and sidesmen of the parish afresd do not know any man of that name now residente there. It is a probabilitie that yr. father has removed to one of the plantations. I have made public advertis.e.m.e.nt in the Gazettes for your father or any neare kinsman but w'out any successe whatsoever."

There followed a memorandum of pounds, s.h.i.+llings, and pence paid to the "clarke" of the parish of St. Clement Danes, of money paid for advertis.e.m.e.nts in the gazettes, and of expenses incurred in further searches made by a solicitor. That was all--the end of hope to Sanford Browne. He went into the sitting-room and put the factor's letter into a little clothespress that stood beside the chimney, and then strode out into the air, giving no heed to Judith, who had gone up the stairs at the side of the pa.s.sage, and come down again wearing a hideous pannier petticoat under her new frock. She guessed her husband's disappointment, and, though she longed for a word of admiration, or at least of wondering attention, for her square-rigged petticoat, she thought best to be content with the excited prattle of her maid, a young bond-servant bought off the Nancy Jane the year before.

"Here, Jocko," said Browne, standing in front of his house and calling to the Adamite negro lad, "you go and call Bob, and get the sloop ready. I'm going down to the s.h.i.+p."

"Get sloop, ma.s.sa?" said the negro, speaking English with difficulty.

"Ma.s.sa say sloop?"

Sanford Browne looked at the black figure inquiringly. It was not often that poor, cringing Jocko ventured to question him. "Yes, sloop," he said with an emphasis born of his irritating disappointment.

"Much great big wind blow--blow right up river. Tack, tack, all day,"

muttered the black boy timidly.

"You're right," said the planter, who had not observed that the strong wind would be dead ahead all the way to the anchorage. "Tell Bob to put the canoe in the water." And then to himself: "The negro is no fool."

"Bob, Bob, ma.s.sa him want can-noo go see great big s.h.i.+p mighty quick."

"Come, Sanford; you may go too," said the planter to his son. "We'll carry the fowling piece: there'll be ducks on the water."

SCENE II.

The time is the same day, and the place the deck of the Nancy Jane, at anchor. The captain is giving orders to the cook: "I want a good bowl of b.u.mbo set here on deck against the planters come aboard." Then turning to the mate: "Have the decks squeegeed clean, an' everything s.h.i.+pshape. Put the rogues in as good garb as you can. You'll find a few wigs in a box in my cabin. But these on the likeliest, and make 'em say they're mechanics, or merchants' clerks, and housemaids. Tell 'em if they don't put out a good foot and get off our hands soon we'll tie 'em up and make 'em understand that it's better to lie to a planter than to stick on s.h.i.+pboard too long. Make the women clean themselves up and look tidy like ancient housemaids, and don't allow any nonsense. Tell 'em if they swear or quarrel while the planters are aboard they'll get a cat-o'-nine-tails well laid on. We've got to make 'em more afraid of the s.h.i.+p than they are of the plantations."

The convicts were in the course of an hour or two ranged up against the bulwarks forward, and they were with much effort sufficiently browbeaten to bring them into some kind of order.

"They're a sorry lot of Newgate birds," said the captain to the mate.

"I'm afraid we'll have a time of it before we change 'em off for merchantable tobacco. Here, you Cappy," he said to one of the older convicts. "Look here! Don't you tell anybody to-day that you're a seaman. They'll swear you are a pirate, and that you'll be off with one of their country sloops, and go a-blackbearding it down the coast.

You're to be a schoolmaster to-day."

"I can't read much, and I can't hardly write a word," said the man, a burly fellow of about sixty, whose heavy jaws and low brows would look brutal in spite of the brand-new periwig put on him that very morning to make him salable.

"That don't matter," said the captain. "You're schoolmaster enough for a tobacco country. You can navigate a s.h.i.+p by the sun and compa.s.s, and that's education enough. If you go and let it out that you're a sailor, I'll--well, you've been a captain or mate, and you know devilish well what I'll do with you. I'll serve you as you have served many a poor devil in your time."

Then, catching sound of a quarrel between two of the women, the captain called the mate, and said: "Give both of the wenches a touch off with your rope's end. Don't black their eyes or hit 'em about the face, but let 'em just taste the knot once over the shoulders to keep 'em peaceable. Be in haste, or they'll scratch one another's eyes."

The mate proceeded to salute the two women with a sharp blow apiece of the knotted rope, and thus changed their rising fury into sullenness.

Planters came and went during the forenoon, and cross-questioned the convicts, threatening to make it hard for them if they did not tell the truth. The visitors drank the captain's b.u.mbo, but the convicts were slow of sale. Some of the planters announced their intention not to buy any more convicts, meaning for the future to purchase only freewillers, or bond servants voluntarily selling themselves, and some had made up their minds not to buy any more Christian servants at all, but to stock their places with blacks.

It was mid-afternoon when Sanford Browne arrived in his dugout, propelled against a head wind and heavy seas by Bob, the white redemptioner, and Jocko, the negro boy. The planter himself sat astern steering, with little Sanford crouched between his knees. Leaving the two servants in the canoe, the planter and his son went aboard the s.h.i.+p, while the convicts crowded against the guard rail to get a look at the naked figure of Jocko, his black skin being a novel sight to their English eyes.

There was recognition between the captain of the Nancy Jane, who had sailed to the Potomac for many years, and Sanford Browne. While the two stood in conversation by the bowl of strong rum punch, little Sanford strolled about the deck, shyly scrutinizing the faces of the convicts and being scrutinized by them. The women tried to talk with him, but their rather battered countenances frightened the boy, and he slipped away. At last he planted himself before old Cappy, whose bronzed face under a new powdered wig produced a curious effect.

"Where did you come from?" demanded the child, with awakened curiosity.

The would-be schoolmaster started at this question, gazed a moment at the child, and said, "G.o.d!" between his teeth.

"Lawr! 'e's one uv yer scholars, Cappy," said one of the women, in derision. "Ye'll be a-l'arnin' 'im lots uv words 'e ain't never 'eerd uv afore. Yer givin' the young un a prime lesson in swearin' to begin."

But Cappy made no reply. He only looked more eagerly at the child, and wiped his brow with his sleeve, disarranging his periwig in doing so.

Then, changing the form of his exclamation but not its meaning, he muttered, "The devil!"

"W'atever's the matter?" said the woman. "You're fetching in G.o.d an'

the devil both. Is the young un one uv yer long-lost brothers, Cappy?"

"What's your name?" demanded Cappy of the boy, without heeding the woman's gabble.