Master Hezekiah Tipton lives?” he asked in a hoarse, rattling voice.
“Why, yes, I do,” said Jack. “This is his wharf, and I’m his nephew.”
“Well, then,” said the man, “I wish you’d show me to him.”
As Jack accompanied the other up the stony street to his uncle’s house, he turned to look at his companion every now and then.
“Where do you hail from, captain?” said he.
“I hail from the land where every man minds his own business,” said the other in his rattling voice. “Where do you hail from, my hearty?”
Jack did not know just what to reply at first. “Oh, well,” he said, “if you don’t choose to give me a civil answer, why, then you needn’t.”
After that they walked in silence till they reached the house. Jack looked into the office, but Hezekiah was not there. “If you’ll come into the parlor,” said he, “I’ll go and tell him you’re here, only I don’t know who you are, to be sure.” He opened the door of the room as he spoke, and showed the captain into the darkened parlor. It always smelled damp and musty and unused, and the fireplace had a cold, dark look as though no comforting fire had ever burned there.
“Tell Master Tipton ’tis Captain Butts of the Arundel wants to see him,” said the stranger, laying aside his hat with its tarnished gilt lace and wiping his partly bald head with the corner of his red neckerchief. All the time he was looking strangely about him at his unfamiliar surroundings.
There was the sound of a knife and fork rattling against a plate in the distance, and Jack, following the sound, went along the passage to the room beyond, where he knew Hezekiah was sitting at supper.
“There’s a man in the parlor,” said Jack, “would like to see you. He says his name’s Captain Butts of the Arundel.”
Hezekiah was looking at Jack as he spoke. He laid down his knife and fork immediately, and pushed back his chair and arose. Jack followed him back to the parlor. He stood outside of the door, looking in. The stranger arose as Master Tipton came in, holding out to the old America merchant a big, brown, hairy hand with a hard, horny-looking palm.
“How d’ye do, Master Tipton?” said he in his rattling voice. “I be mightily glad to see you.”
“Well, then, Master Captain Butts,” said Hezekiah, giving him a limp, reluctant hand, “I be mightily glad to see you, too, – more glad than you are to see me, like enough, for I’ve been looking for you these three days past, and wondering where was the Arundel. There be them nineteen servants down at the ‘Duck and Doe’ that should have been took away yesterday morning. Their lodging at the inn is a matter of ten pence a day each. Now, who do you think’s to pay for that there?”
“Well, well, Master,” said the other, “‘tweren’t no fault of mine that I weren’t here yesterday. Wind and tide be to blame, so whatever ye lose ye may just charge up ag’in’ them. We can’t sail without wind, can we? and we can’t sail ag’in’ the tide, can we? As for the men, why, the sooner I get my clearance papers and the men aboard the better ’twill suit me. The tide turns at eight o’clock, and if the wind comes up, as ’tis like to do, why, I’ll drop out and away with the turn o’ the water.”
Master Hezekiah looked around. Jack was still standing in the doorway. “You go in and get your supper, Jacky,” said he, and then he got up and closed the door, and Jack went back into the supper-room.
All the time that Jack sat at his meal old Deborah scolded him ceaselessly for being so late.
“’Tis always so,” said she, her voice growing shriller and shriller. “You be always late, and think of nobody but your own self.”
“No, I’m not always late, neither,” said Jack; “I wasn’t late to breakfast, or to supper either, yesterday.”
“But you didn’t come home to dinner at all,” said old Deborah, “and I kept it for you, and I kept it for you, and the ’taties all like wax in the oven, and not fit to eat.”
“I didn’t want any dinner,” said Jack. “I had something to eat down at the wharf.”
“Well,” said old Deborah, “you might just as well have been late as not to come at all, for I kept a-waiting and a-waiting for you till it was all dried up and wasted – aye, all wasted, and it what many a pore body ’u’d’a’ been glad enough to ’a’ had, too.”
In the interval of her scolding Jack could occasionally hear the distant rumbling of Captain Butts’s voice in the office.
It grew darker and darker in the twilight gloom of the kitchen, until Jack could hardly see the food upon his plate.
“I wish you’d bring a candle, Deborah,” said he, “I can’t see to find the way to my own mouth.”
“A candle!” said Deborah; “if you’d come to your supper in time you’d not need a candle to see. Now you may just go without.”
“Very well,” said Jack, “I don’t care, for I’m done.”
“Then, if you’re done, you may go down to the pump and fetch back some water.”
Jack took the pail and went off with it. He was gone a long time, and the night was fairly settled when he came stumbling back into the kitchen, slopping the water upon the steps and the floor.
“Why,” said Deborah, “I thought you was never coming. Your uncle’s asking for you. He’s over in the office now, and he wants to see you there.”
“Very well,” said Jack, “if I’d known that, may be I’d hurried and may be I wouldn’t.”
In the office he found Captain Butts seated at the tall desk, with a bottle of Hezekiah’s old Jamaica rum before him. They had been looking over some papers, and the Captain had evidently been helping himself very freely to the rum. He smelt strong of the liquor. He was leaning over the desk, his chin resting upon his fists. He looked up at Jack with his keen gray eyes from under his bushy eyebrows. “Is this the boy?” said he. Hezekiah, who sat opposite to his visitor, nodded without speaking.
“Come hither, my hearty,” said Captain Butts, beckoning to Jack. Jack came forward slowly. “And so ye’re a hard one to manage, be ye? By blood! if I had ye aboard the Arundel for a few days, I’d manage ye.”
“Who says I’m hard to manage?” demanded Jack, indignantly.
“That does your good uncle,” said the Captain. As he spoke he reached out suddenly, and catching Jack by the arm held him tight, feeling up and down the length of his arm. “Ye be well put together, my hearty,” said he; “ye’d make a valuable servant in the tobacco-fields,” and he winked tipsily as he spoke. “Now, being as ye’re so hard to manage, how’d you like it if you was to take a cruise to the Americas with old Benny Butts?”
Jack could smell the rum heavy upon the captain’s breath, and he saw that he was a little tipsy. He jerked his arm away from the other’s grasp.
“I am well enough off here as I am, thank you, Master Captain,” said he, “and I don’t choose to go to the Americas at all.”
The Captain burst out laughing. He fetched a thump upon the desk before him that made the bottle of rum and
