Down The River Part 2

"I would have seen to the cakes, if you had spoken to me."

"I don't care anything about the cakes, anyhow," I interposed. "If you can't help scolding Flora, you must keep your hands off her."

"You don't care anything about the cakes! I should like to know! Well, we'll see about it! I'll know who rules here, I vum! I'll call Mr.

Fishley! We'll see if you don't care!" rattled Mrs. Fishley, as she bolted from the kitchen through the entry into the store.

"O, Buckland, what will become of us!" exclaimed Flora, rising with difficulty from her chair, and throwing herself upon my breast.

"Don't be afraid, Flora," I replied, pressing her to my heart, while the tears started in my eyes. "She shall not abuse you, whatever happens to me. While she did it only with her tongue, I bore it; but when she took hold of you, I couldn't stand that, Flora--no, I could not."

"I can bear it very well, Buckland." She never called me "Buck," as everybody else did about the place. "I only fear what they will do to you."

"I can take care of myself, dearest Flora. I am strong and tough, and I can stand almost anything," I answered, pressing her to my heart again, for she seemed to be the only person in the world who loved me.

And how I loved her--poor orphan child, weak, sick, and deformed! It seemed to me it would have been different if she had been well and strong, and able to fight her own battle with the hard and cruel world.

She was helpless and dependent, and that which shut her out from the rest of the world endeared her to me, and wound her in with every fibre and tendril of my heart.

Mrs. Fishley did not immediately return; neither did her husband appear upon the battle-field; and I concluded that she could not find him.

While, folded in each other's arms, we waited in almost breathless anxiety for the coming of our tyrants, let me give the reader a few necessary particulars in regard to our antecedents and surroundings.

Torrentville, where the story opens, is situated in the south-western part of Wisconsin, though, for obvious reasons, it will not be found on the map. It was located on a stream, which we called the "Creek," though it has since received a more dignified and specific name, about seven miles from Riverport, on the Wisconsin River. At the time of which I write it contained two thousand inhabitants. Captain Fishley--he had been an officer in the militia in some eastern state, and his t.i.tle had gone west with him--kept the princ.i.p.al store in the place, and was the postmaster.

My father had moved from the State of New York to Torrentville when I was eight years old, and soon after the death of my mother. He had three children, Clarence, Flora, and myself. He bought a farm just out of the village, employed a housekeeper, and for four years got along very well.

But he was too ambitious, and worked too hard for his const.i.tution.

After a four years' residence in the west, he died. That was a sad day to us, for he was the kindest of fathers. Poor Flora scarcely ceased to weep, at times, for a year, over the loss of her only parent.

Captain Fishley was appointed administrator of the estate, and when it was settled there was hardly fifteen hundred dollars left. My brother Clarence was just twenty-one when my father died, and he was appointed the guardian of Flora and myself. He was considered a very smart young man, and no one doubted his ability to take care of us. But he was dissatisfied with Torrentville; there was not room enough for a young man of his ability to expand himself. He had no taste for farming, and for two years had been a clerk in Captain Fishley's store. He wanted to go to New Orleans, where he believed he could make his fortune. About a year after the death of his father, he decided to try his luck in the metropolis of the south-west.

Clarence was a good brother, and I am sure he would not have gone, if he had not felt satisfied that Flora and myself were well provided for. I was then a boy of thirteen, handy at almost anything about the farm, the house, and the garden, and Captain Fishley wanted me to come and live with him. Clarence agreed to pay Flora's board, so that she was a boarder at the house of the Fishleys. It was stipulated that I should go to school, and do certain "ch.o.r.es" for my board, while Clarence paid for my clothes. My princ.i.p.al work, and all that the captain said I should be required to do, was to take care of the horse, and go after the mail every evening.

Instead of this, I was compelled to be at the beck and call of all upon the place, including Ham, the captain's only son, and miserably spoiled at that. Before I had been a year in my new home, I was dissatisfied, for the cloven heels of the three members of the family had appeared. I was crowded with work, picked upon, insulted, and trodden under foot.

Perhaps I could have endured my fate, if poor Flora, upon whom our tyrants had no claims, had fared well.

We heard from Clarence occasionally, and learned in general terms, from his letters, that he was doing very well. I did not like to bother him with complaints, and I did not do so till existence had become almost a burden. I think Clarence wrote back to the captain, and for a time there was some improvement in our condition; but it soon became worse than before. I repeated my complaint. My brother wished us to get along as well as we could till he could spare the time to visit us; but that time had not yet arrived.

A few days before my story opens, early in April, I had a letter from him, saying that he was well established in business for himself, and that he would certainly come to Torrentville in October, as soon as the sickly season was over, and take us to New Orleans. He added that he should be married before that time, and would bring his wife with him.

This was joyful news, but it was a dreary while to wait.

The door suddenly opened, and Mrs. Fishley bounced into the kitchen, followed by her husband, both of them apparently wrought up to the highest pitch of anger by my misdeeds.

CHAPTER III.

ON THE DEFENSIVE.

At the approach of Captain Fishley, I felt the shudder that swept through the feeble frame of Flora, as she stood infolded in my arms. I gently placed her in the chair again, and released myself from her clinging embrace; for I realized that, in the brief moment left to me, it was necessary to prepare for war. I knew the temper of Captain Fishley; and, though he had never yet struck me, I believed that it was only because I had been all submission.

I was fully resolved to defend myself, and especially to defend Flora. I picked up the heavy iron poker which lay on the back of the stove, and placed myself in front of my trembling sister. The captain was a brute, and his wife was hardly better than a brute. I feared that she, supported by her husband, would again lay violent hands upon Flora, knowing that such a course would sting me deeper than a blow upon my own head.

I did not flourish the poker, or make any irritating demonstrations with it; on the contrary, I held it behind me, rather for use in an emergency than to provoke my tyrants. I was not disposed to make the affair any worse than the circ.u.mstances required, and by this time I was cool and self-possessed. Perhaps my critical reader may wonder that a boy of my age should have set so high a value upon controlling his temper, and preserving the use of his faculties in the time of peril, for it is not exactly natural for boys to do so. Youth is hot-blooded, and age and experience are generally required to cool the impetuous current that courses through its veins.

My father--blessings on his memory--had taught me the lesson. One day, a fire in the long gra.s.s of the prairie threatened the destruction of all our buildings. Clarence and myself went into a flurry, and did a great many stupid things, so excited that we did not know what we were about.

Father stopped in the midst of the danger to reprove us, and gave us such a solemn and impressive lesson on the necessity of keeping cool, that I never forgot it. Then he told us to harness the horses to the plough. Clarence struck a furrow along the imperilled side of the house; my father mowed a wide swath through the tall gra.s.s, and I raked it away. Before the fire reached us, we had made a barrier which it could not pa.s.s. We kept cool, and fought the devouring element with entire success.

I do not mean to say that I never got mad; only that, when I had a fair chance to think an instant, I nerved myself to a degree of self-possession which enabled me to avoid doing stupid things. Such was my frame of mind on the present occasion, and I coolly awaited the coming of the tyrants. Both of them were boiling over with wrath when they entered the kitchen, and rushed towards me so fiercely that I thought they intended to overwhelm me at a single blow.

"What does all this mean, Buck? What have you been doing?" demanded Captain Fishley, as soon as he had crossed the threshold of the room.

I deemed it advisable to make no answer.

"I'll teach you to insult your betters!" he continued, as he rushed forward, with arms extended, ready to wreak his vengeance upon me.

I was satisfied that the blow was to come with the word, and I slung the poker over my shoulder, in the att.i.tude of defence.

"Hold on, Captain Fishley!" I replied.

He had evidently not expected any such demonstration. He had no occasion to suspect it, for previously I had been uniformly submissive, not only to him and his wife, but even to Ham, which had always been a much harder task. The tyrants halted, and gazed at me with a look of stupefied astonishment.

"What are you going to do with that poker?" asked the captain, after a long breath, in which much of his wrath seemed to have evaporated.

"Defend myself," I replied.

"Do you mean to strike me with that poker?"

"Not unless you put your hands on me or my sister. If you touch me, I'll knock you down, if I have to be hanged for it," was my answer, deliberately but earnestly uttered.

"Has it come to this?" groaned he, completely nonplussed by the vigorous show of resistance I made.

"Yes, sir."

"I think it is time something was done," he added, glancing around the room, apparently in search of some weapon.

"I think so too, and I am going to do something, if need be."

"What are you going to do?"

"If you want to talk, I'll talk. I wish you to understand that I'm just as cool as well-water, and this thing has gone just as far as it's going to."

"What do you mean by that, you scoundrel? What thing?"

"My sister Flora is a poor, weak, sick child. She isn't your servant, nor your wife's servant; and she shall not be kicked round by either one of you. That's all I have to say."

"Who has kicked her round?" growled the captain.