Cap'n Warren's Wards Part 42

"Ya-as, I've left. That is, I left the way the Irishman left the stable where they kept the mule. He said there was all out doors in front of him and only two feet behind. That's about the way 'twas with me."

"Have your nephew and niece--"

"Um-hm. They hinted that my room was better than my company, and, take it by and large, I guess they was right for the present, anyhow. I set up till three o'clock thinkin' it over, and then I decided to get out afore breakfast this mornin'. I didn't wait for any good-bys. They'd been said, or all I cared to hear"--Captain Elisha's smile disappeared for an instant--"last evenin'. The dose was sort of bitter, but it had the necessary effect. At any rate, I didn't hanker for another one. I remembered what your landlady told me when I was here afore, about this stateroom bein' vacated, and I come down to look at it. It suits me well enough; seems like a decent moorin's for an old salt water derelict like me; the price is reasonable, and I guess likely I'll take it. I _guess_ I will."

"Why do you guess? By George, I hope you will!"

"Do you? I'm much obliged. I didn't know but after last night, after the sc.r.a.pe I got you into, you might feel--well, sort of as if you'd seen enough of me."

The young man smiled bitterly. "It wasn't your fault," he said. "It was mine entirely. I'm quite old enough to decide matters for myself, and I should have decided as my reason, and not my inclinations, told me. You weren't to blame."

"Yes, I was. If you're old enough, I'm _too_ old, I cal'late. But I did think--However, there's no use goin' over that. I ask your pardon, Jim.

And you don't hold any grudge?"

"Indeed I don't. I may be a fool--I guess I am--but not that kind."

"Thanks. Well, there's one objection out of the way, then, only I don't want you to think that I've hove overboard that 'responsibility' I was so easy and fresh about takin' on my shoulders. It's there yet; and I'll see you squared with Caroline afore this v'yage is over, if I live."

His friend frowned.

"You needn't mind," he said. "I prefer that you drop the whole miserable business."

"Well, maybe, but--Jim, you've taken hold of these electric batteries that doctors have sometimes? It's awful easy to grab the handles of one of those contraptions, but when you want to drop 'em you can't. They don't drop easy. I took hold of the handles of 'Bije's affairs, and, though it might be pleasanter to drop 'em, I can't--or I won't."

"Then you're leaving your nephew and niece doesn't mean that you've given up the guardians.h.i.+p?"

Captain Elisha's jaw set squarely.

"I don't remember sayin' that it did," he answered, with decision.

Then, his good-nature returning, he added, "And now, Jim, I'd like your opinion of these new quarters that I may take. What do you think of 'em?

Come to the window and take a look at the scenery."

Pearson joined him at the window. The captain waved toward the clothes-lines and grinned.

"Looks as if there was some kind of jubilee, don't it," he observed.

"Every craft in sight has strung the colors."

Pearson laughed. Then he said:

"Captain, I think the room will do. It isn't palatial, but one can live in worse quarters, as I know from experience."

"Yup. Well, Jim, there's just one thing more. Have I disgraced you a good deal, bein' around with you and chummin' in with you the way I have? That is, do you _think_ I've disgraced you? Are you ashamed of me?"

"I? Ashamed of _you_? You're joking!"

"No, I'm serious. Understand now, I'm not apologizin'. My ways are my ways, and I think they're just as good as the next feller's, whether he's from South Denboro or--well, Broad Street. I've got a habit of thinkin' for myself and actin' for myself, and when I take off my hat it's to a bigger _man_ than I am and not to a more stylish hat. But, since I've lived here in New York, I've learned that, with a whole lot of folks, hats themselves count more than what's underneath 'em. I haven't changed mine, and I ain't goin' to. Now, with that plain and understood, do you want me to live here, in the same house with you? I ain't fis.h.i.+n' for compliments. I want an honest answer."

He got it. Pearson looked him squarely in the eye.

"I do," he said. "I like you, and I don't care a d.a.m.n about your hat. Is that plain?"

Captain Elisha's reply was delivered over the bal.u.s.ters in the hall.

"Hi!" he called. "Hi, Mrs. Hepton."

The landlady had been anxiously waiting. She ran from the dining room to the foot of the stairs.

"Yes?" she cried. "What is it?"

"It's a bargain," said the captain. "I'm ready to engage pa.s.sage."

CHAPTER XV

Thus Captain Elisha entered another of New York's "circles," that which centered at Mrs. Hepton's boarding house. Within a week he was as much a part of it as if he had lived there for years. At lunch, on the day of his arrival, he made his appearance at the table in company with Pearson, and when the landlady exultantly announced that he was to be "one of our little party" thereafter, he received and replied to the welcoming salutations of his fellow boarders with unruffled serenity.

"How could I help it?" he asked. "Human nature's liable to temptation, they tell us. The flavor of that luncheon we had last time I was here has been hangin' 'round the edges of my mouth and tantalizin' my memory ever since."

"We had a souffle that noon, if I remember correctly, Captain," observed the flattered Mrs. Hepton.

"Did you? Well, I declare! I'd have sworn 'twas a biled-dinner hash.

Knew 'twas better than any I ever ate afore, but I'd have bet 'twas hash, just the same. Tut! tut! tut! Now, honest, Mrs. Hepton, ain't this--er--whatever-you-call-it a close relation--a sort of hash with its city clothes on, hey?"

The landlady admitted that a souffle was something not unlike a hash.

Captain Elisha nodded.

"I thought so," he declared. "I was sartin sure I couldn't be mistaken.

What is it used to be in the song book? 'You can smash--you can--' Well, I don't remember. Somethin' about your bein' able to smash the vase if you wanted to, but the smell of the posies was there yet."

Mr. Ludlow, the bookseller, supplied the quotation.

"'You may break, you may shatter The vase if you will, But the scent of the roses Will cling to it still,'"

he said, smiling.

"That's it. Much obliged. You can warm up and rechristen the hash if you will; but the corned beef and cabbage stay right on deck. Ain't that so, Mr. d.i.c.kens?"

The ill.u.s.trious "C." bowed.

"Moore?" he observed, with dignity.

"Yes. That's what _I_ said--'More!' Said it twice, I believe. Glad you agree with me. The hymn says that weakness is sin, but there's no sin in havin' a weakness for corned-beef hash."

Miss Sherborne and Mrs. Van Winkle Ruggles were at first inclined to snub the new boarder, considering him a country boor whose presence in their select society was almost an insult. The captain did not seem to notice their hints or sneers, although Pearson grew red and wrathful.

"Laura, my dear," said Mrs. Ruggles, addressing the teacher of vocal culture, "don't you feel quite rural to-day? Almost as if you were visiting the country?"