Freaks of Fortune Part 16

Mr. Ebenier was not a poet himself, but he was fond of the poets, and had perused Milton, Shakspeare, Beattie, Cowper, and Keats with real pleasure, to say nothing of having read Corneille and Racine in the original. The steward, therefore, was prepared to appreciate the poet's sentiment, "Oft from apparent ills our blessings rise." His impatient gesture and his petulant exclamation when the board scratched his head, indicated that he regarded the accident as "an apparent ill;" but, as he wrenched the board, a shot-bag, plethoric with gold coin, tumbled, with a clinking clang, upon the ground at his feet, narrowly avoiding his head, and thus saying him from being knocked senseless a third time.

The steward opened his eyes, and regarded the bag as the blessing. He shook the board again, and another bag came this time. Then he pulled it away, and the sail which had formed his bed in the loft rolled down.

Overhauling this, he found a third bag; and this was the last he could find. Picking up the lamp till it blazed like a torch, he renewed the search; but no more of these heavy blessings were available.

Mr. Ebenier was satisfied, and he set his lamp down on the ground, intending to open one of the bags, and ascertain the nature of its contents. Under ordinary circ.u.mstances the steward would have been too careful to set his lamp down so near a pile of dry seaweed as he did on the present occasion. But his mind was, probably, so confused by the hard knocks his head had received, and by the excitement of finding the gold, that he took little note of his surroundings. His thought was concentrated upon the bags of gold. He did not even think of the two men whose conference he had disturbed, and did not seem to fear that they would return and deprive him of his booty.

He was about to untie the string of one of the heavy bags, when a bright glare overspread the s.p.a.ce before him. The pile of dry seaweed, which had been used to cover a sail-boat in the winter, was all in a light blaze. The steward tried to quench the flames with his feet, but his efforts were unavailing. The dry stuff burned like shavings, and the more he kicked, the more the fire leaped up and spit at him. He fought the flames as long as his courage held out, and then he "allowed" that the Hotel de Poisson was a doomed structure.

Taking the money-bags, he retreated down the peninsula towards the landing-place at the Point, lighted on his way by the burning building.

Crossing the plank, he reached the sh.o.r.e. There was a dory there, and putting the three bags into it, the steward launched it, and pulled off to the yacht. The treasure was conveyed to the cabin, and deposited temporarily in a locker under a berth. The dory was towed back to the sh.o.r.e, and placed where the steward had found it, that no early fisherman might be deprived of his morning trip. Augustus was in a flurry of excitement all this time, and had not even considered what he should do with the bags. His present object was to secure the plunder so that it could not be recovered by the robbers; and, having done this, he was entirely satisfied with himself, and everybody else, except Dock Vincent, to whom he owed a balance on account, for that night's business.

There was an alarm of fire on sh.o.r.e. The bright glare of the flames from the Hotel de Poisson penetrated the windows of a house near Dock Vincent's, and lighted up the bed-chamber of a sleeping stone-cutter.

He gave the alarm; the bells rang, the engines rattled, and the whole town was aroused from its peaceful slumbers. Hundreds of men, who had worked hard all day, lost two hours of sleep for an old shanty which was not worth five dollars.

The Hotel de Poisson was burned to the ground before many people had gathered. Some good men thanked G.o.d that it had not been a poor man's house; young men enjoyed the excitement of "running with the machine,"

and those with an eye for the picturesque were thankful that the unsightly shanty had been removed from a place where it disfigured the landscape. No one appeared to be sorry; but every one wondered how the fire had caught. Various conjectures were suggested; but, after all, no one knew anything about it. Some thought a straggler had used it as a lodging, and set it on fire in lighting his pipe. Others thought some bad boys had set the fire for fun.

If the two men who had met there to confer about their ill-gotten gold were in the crowd, doubtless they were sadder and wiser men. Probably they thought that the breaking of the lantern had communicated the flame to the shanty. The people present knew nothing of the event in the Hotel de Poisson wherein Mr. C. Augustus Ebenier had been the princ.i.p.al actor. The finding of the half-melted remains of a lantern had no significance or suggestiveness to them. The building burned up clean, and there was nothing left of it but a few smoking timbers, and a thin sprinkling of ashes on the ground and the rocks.

If the robbers, whoever they were, went to the fire, it is more than likely that they searched eagerly among the ruins for the gold. If they did, they saw nothing which looked like the fused coins of the treasure. The old sail, in which the gold appeared to have been concealed, or which had been thrown over its place of concealment, was burned to tinder, and there was not a vestige of the bags or the money.

CHAPTER XIV.

"LOSE HIS OWN SOUL!"

The steward of The Starry Flag, after he had returned the dory to the rocks, and secured the jolly-boat of the yacht, had an opportunity to rest his fevered, mixed-up brain, and to consider his next step. The four seamen of the schooner slept on sh.o.r.e, at their own homes, and there was no one on board but the cook, who slumbered heavily in the forecastle, and did not hear Augustus when he conveyed the bags to the cabin.

Mr. Ebenier lighted a lamp, closed the cabin doors, and drew the silken curtains over the ports in the upper part of the trunk, so that no one could see what he was doing. Though it was not lawful for the steward to use the wash-bowl in Mr. Watson's stateroom, he considered that the present emergency would justify him in doing so. He performed his ablutions with the utmost care, paying particular attention to his wounded head. He then changed his clothing throughout, and devoted half an hour to cleansing his plaid pants, which had been somewhat soiled by contact with the burning seaweed. He even polished his boots before he put them away.

So far as cleanliness was concerned, the steward was a gentleman, which no unclean person can be. Having completed his toilet, and removed all signs of the operation from the state-room, he sat down on a locker in the cabin. He was thinking of the extraordinary incidents of the night.

He was fully satisfied that he had found Mr. Fairfield's treasure, and that the opportunity entirely to free his young captain from suspicion was within his grasp. It was a pleasant thought; but, after all, who was Captain Fairfield? Only a young fellow behind whose chair at dinner he was privileged to stand. He had seen him for the first time but a few days before, and he did not feel under any peculiar obligations to him.

Mr. Ebenier took the three bags of gold from the locker, and laid them on the cabin table. It was midnight by the clock which hung in the cabin--the dead hour of night, when all were sleeping. The fire on sh.o.r.e had burned out, and all was still save the rolling sea. The steward went to the door, opened it, pa.s.sed up to the deck; there was no one in sight, and hardly a light to be seen on the land. Returning to the cabin, he poured out the contents of one of the bags on the table, and proceeded to count the gold. It was a long job, and there was more money than the steward had ever before seen together. On a piece of paper he noted each hundred dollars with a tally-mark. His last pile contained but fifty dollars. Counting up his marks, he made thirty-eight of them; and the whole sum, according to his reckoning, was thirty-eight hundred and fifty dollars.

The old man had lost four thousand dollars, and the steward, concluding he had made a mistake, performed the agreeable task of counting the gold a second time, but with the same result as before. After making the allowance for the fifty dollars found in the captain's state-room, the amount was one hundred dollars short. Mr. Ebenier had the impudence to ask himself if this could be the miser's money, since it did not hold out in the sum he had lost. But the bags were plainly marked, as the fourth had been, "N. Fairfield," in the cramped handwriting of the miser. Of course there could be no doubt in regard to the owners.h.i.+p of the treasure, and Mr. Ebenier could not but wonder at the stupidity of the thieves in hiding it in or under the old sail in the Hotel de Poisson. But he did them the justice to conclude that it had only been placed there for a short time, perhaps for but a few hours; at any rate, their presence in the shanty indicated that it was to have been removed during the night.

It had been removed during the night! The steward chuckled when he thought of it, but his capacious intellect was agitated by a great moral question. Thirty-eight hundred and fifty dollars was an immense sum to a person in his station, who had never had even a hundred dollars in his possession at one time. Honesty was a precious jewel, but it was not possible for him to make thirty-eight hundred and fifty dollars, at one stupendous haul, by being honest. He did not steal the money. He did not rob the old man. If the steward had not suffered the perils and discomforts of two broken heads, or rather one head broken twice, the robbers, whoever they were, would doubtless have divided the money between them, and the old man would never know what had become of his cherished gold.

Mr. Ebenier asked himself if this was not a freak of fortune in his favor; if the money was not a providential compensation for his twice-broken head. Thirty-eight hundred and fifty dollars would be a very handsome atonement for two such raps as he had received, and he was Mammon-wors.h.i.+pper enough to feel willing that his head should be pounded to a jelly at this rate, so long as the germ of his mighty intellect was not extinguished.

The steward was a man of exquisite tastes, and was ambitious for social recognition and distinction. In Paris a colored man was just as good as, if not a little better than, a white man. His former master, in Louisiana, had believed in Paris, and seeing with his eyes, he had been fully converted to his master's faith. Mr. Ebenier wanted to go to Paris, wanted to live there, even as a waiter in a _cafe_, if no better situation presented itself. With the money before him, he could realize his dream of luxury and splendor. He could convert these half eagles into napoleons, and revel like a prince in the gay metropolis of France. He would wear the finest of broadcloth, eat the most sumptuous of dinners, and saunter up and down the Champs Elysees like a gentleman. In short, thirty-eight hundred and fifty dollars, or nearly twenty thousand francs in the currency of France, would make a gentleman of him.

Mr. C. Augustus Ebenier was sorely tempted. It might be only once in his lifetime that such a chance to be a gentleman would be presented to him. He could put the gold into his carpet-bag, walk over to Gloucester, and take the first train for Boston. No one would know what had become of him; or, if they did, he would not be suspected of having the gold. But he would be missed, and his absence might cause a commotion. It would be better not to leave at present. The money could be concealed on board of the yacht, and when he was disposed to abandon the vessel it would be within his reach.

After more reflection on this important matter, the steward became convinced that it would be safer and better to hide the gold on board.

At the stern of the vessel, under the standing-room, there was a s.p.a.ce not available for cabin use, which formed a kind of store-room for extra supplies. It was reached by removing the cabin steps. The tempted man entered this contracted and low apartment with the lamp in his hand. He found a narrow aperture, which led to the s.p.a.ce under the cabin floor, where the ballast was deposited, and over which a board had been nailed to prevent the odor of bilge water from penetrating the apartment of the pa.s.sengers. He removed this board, and reaching down into the hold, placed the bags in a position where they were not likely to be discovered, even by a person searching for them. Nailing on the board again, he covered it with various articles, and returned to the cabin.

On the table lay a Bible, which the steward occasionally read. Though it was now two o'clock in the morning, he was not sleepy; he was too much excited to think of slumber. He opened the good book mechanically, turned its leaves, and read a verse here and there; but he was thinking all the time of the luxurious gayety of the French capital, and the pleasures which thirty-eight hundred and fifty dollars would purchase.

"For what is a man profited if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul?"

This was the last verse he read, and he closed the book, as though this appeal of Holy Writ grated harshly on his feelings.

"Lose his own soul," repeated he, almost in spite of himself.

He tried to think of the Boulevards and the gardens of the Tuileries again; but "lose his own soul" came up to his lips still, as though some invisible power compelled him to whisper the impressive sentence.

He attempted to whistle, and then to sing an air; but "lose his own soul" came up to his lips, and he could not help whispering the sentence again.

"This money don't belong to me," said he, in audible words. "I am not the happy owner of this princely sum. Unto but few is it appointed to be both rich and good-looking, and I am not of the number. I must be contented with my good looks."

It was no use to say it; he did not mean it, and the idea of Paris and its luxuries still haunted his imagination. He turned in, but it was only to think what thirty-eight hundred and fifty dollars would purchase; and "lose his own soul" not only came to his lips, but the solemn sentence seemed to be printed, in sombre-hued capitals, all over the cabin. He went to sleep at last; but "lose his own soul" followed him into his dreams, yelled in the distance and muttered in his ears by grinning demons, such as those with which his fancy peopled the realms of the lost. But he slumbered uneasily till the sun was far up on his day-journey. When he went on deck, he saw The Starry Flag, Jr. almost alongside. Captain Fairfield and the four seamen came on board.

The young skipper announced that the trip to the eastward, which had been postponed from the day before, would be commenced at once, and the party would be on board at eight o'clock. The steward had enough to do to keep his hands, if not his mind, engaged in making preparations for the occupants of the cabin. At the time appointed the party came on board, and the yacht sailed on her cruise.

Our story need not follow them during the ten days to which the trip was prolonged. It is enough to say that the party enjoyed every moment of the time. Even Mrs. Watson, who had no taste for the sea, was delighted; for Levi, at her request, was careful to bring the yacht to anchor in smooth water every night, and to stay in port when the sea was very rough.

During those ten days Mr. Ebenier considered and reconsidered, and then considered again, what he should do with the money that had so strangely come into his possession. He was disposed to use it; but the gospel sentence thundered in his ears, and trembled upon his lips, and rolled like the chariot of an avenger through his mind. Once or twice he was on the point of telling the captain all about the gold, but the vision of Parisian luxury checked him.

When the yacht entered Sandy Bay, the Caribbee lay anch.o.r.ed off the Point, and The Starry Flag moored a couple of cables' length from her.

CHAPTER XV.

ANOTHER LITTLE PLAN.

When The Starry Flag returned from her pleasant excursion to the eastward, Mr. Fairfield had so far recovered from the effects of his fall as to be out, and to be making his preparations again to catch dog-fish. It seemed to him to be absolutely necessary that he should make some more money. He felt like a poor man, and his stocks and bonds, notes and mortgages, afforded him but little comfort. His heart seemed to have been lost with the four thousand in gold.

When the yacht made her moorings, the old man was at the landing-place, getting ready to go dog-fis.h.i.+ng the next day. His bones still ached, and nothing but bitter necessity could have induced one so feeble as he was to think of going off in a dory, miles from the sh.o.r.e, braving the perils of ocean and storm. He believed that poverty and want stared him in the face, and that he must go to the poorhouse if he did not make an effort to retrieve his great misfortune.

Dock Vincent was never far off when a vessel came into port; and, though he was very busy in making the preparations for his departure, he hastened down to the Point when The Starry Flag hove in sight.

"That's Levi's vessel, Squire Fairfield," said he.

"I s'pose 'tis," replied the old man, casting an indifferent glance to seaward.

"I sold my house to-day, Squire Fairfield," continued Dock, seating himself by the sh.o.r.e.

"Did ye? What d'ye git for 't?"

"Fifteen hundred dollars. It was worth two thousand; but, as I'm going to Australia right off, I couldn't afford to hold it for a better price."