CHAPTER XII
A LITTLE POLITICS
Elsie, when she came down to breakfast next morning, was quieter than usual, and to the joking questions of Captain Jerry and Captain Perez, who were curious concerning her "errand" of the previous evening, and who pretended to believe that she had gone to a dance or "time" with some "feller" unknown, she gave evasive, but good-humored replies.
Captain Eri was on his usual fishing trip, and after breakfast was over Perez departed to the Barry place, and Jerry to his beloved schoolhouse.
The sacrifice, whose impending matrimonial doom had not been mentioned for some time by the trio interested, was gradually becoming his own garrulous self, and his principal topic of conversation recently had been the coming marriage of the "upstairs teacher"--that is, the lady who presided over the grammar grade of the school--and the question of her probable successor. In fact, this question of who the new teacher was to be was the prevailing subject of surmise and conjecture in the village just then.
When Captain Jerry came back to the house he went out to the barn to feed Lorenzo and the hens, and attend to Daniel's toilet. He was busy with the curry-comb when Elsie came in. She seated herself on a box, and watched the performance for a while without speaking. The Captain, who took this part of his duties very seriously, was too intent on crimping Daniel's rather scraggy forelock to talk much. At length Miss Preston broke the silence.
"Captain Jerry," she said, "you have never told me just where you found grandfather that night when he was taken sick. On the hill back of the post-office, wasn't it?"
"Yes, jest on the top. You see, he'd fell down when he was runnin' to the fire."
"Captain Eri found him, didn't he?"
"Yep. Whoa there, Dan'l; stand still, can't you? Yes, Eri found him."
"How was he dressed?"
"Who? John? Oh, he was bareheaded and in his shirtsleeves, jest as he run outdoors when he heard the bell. Queer, he didn't put on that old white hat of his. I never knew him to be without it afore; but a feller's li'ble to forgit 'most anything a night like that was. Did Eri tell you how Perez forgot his shoes? Funniest thing I ever see, that was."
He began the story of his friend's absent-mindedness, but his companion did not seem to pay much attention to it. In fact, it was evident that her thoughts were somewhere else, for when the Captain asked her a question that plainly called for a negative, she replied "Yes," very calmly, and didn't seem to know that she had said it. She went into the house soon after and Captain Jerry, after considering the matter, decided that she was probably thinking of Hazeltine. He derived much comfort from the idea.
When he, too, entered the dining room, Elsie said to him:
"Oh, Captain Jerry! Please don't tell the others that I asked about grandfather. They would think that I was worrying, and I'm not, a bit.
You won't mention it, will you? Just promise, to please me."
So the Captain promised, although he did not understand why it was asked of him.
When Captain Eri came home that afternoon, and was cleaning his catch at the shanty, he was surprised to receive a call from Miss Preston.
"Hello!" he exclaimed. "Come to l'arn the trade?"
Elsie smiled, and disclaimed any intention of apprenticeship.
"Captain Eri," she said, "I want to have a talk with you, a business talk."
The Captain looked at her keenly. All he said, however, was, "You don't tell me!"
"Yes, I want to talk with you about getting me a position."
"A position?"
"Yes, I've been thinking a great deal lately, and, now that grandfather seems to be a little better, and I'm not needed to help take care of him, I want to do something to earn my living."
"Earn your livin'? Why, child alive, you don't need to do that. You ain't a mite of trouble at the house; fact is, I don't know how we'd get along without you, and, as for money, why I cal'late your grandpa ain't so poor but what, if I let you have a little change once in a while, he'd be able to pay me back, when he got better."
"But I don't want to use your money or his either. Captain Eri, you don't know what he has done for me ever since I was a little girl. He has clothed me and given me an education, and been so kind and good that, now that he is ill and helpless, I simply can't go on using his money. I can't, and I won't."
The tears stood in the girl's eyes, as she spoke, and the Captain, noticing her emotion, thought it better to treat the matter seriously, for the present at any rate.
"All right," he said. "'Independence shows a proper sperit and saves grocery bills,' as old man Scudder said when his wife run off with the tin-peddler. What kind of a place was you thinkin' of takin'?"
"I want to get the appointment to teach in the grammar school here. Miss Nixon is going to be married, and when she leaves I want her place--and I want you to help me get it."
Captain Eri whistled. "I want to know!" he exclaimed. Then he said, "Look here, Elsie, I don't want you to think I'm tryin' to be cur'ous 'bout your affairs, or anything like that, but are you sure there ain't some reason more 'n you've told me of for your wantin' this place? I ain't no real relation of yours, you understand, but I would like to have you feel that you could come to me with your troubles jest the same as you would to your grandpa. Now, honest and true, ain't there somethin' back of this?"
It was only for a moment that Elsie hesitated, but that moment's hesitation and the manner in which she answered went far toward confirming the Captain's suspicions.
"No, Captain Eri," she said. "It is just as I've told you. I don't want to be dependent on grandfather any longer."
"And there ain't a single other reason for--Of course, I ought to mind my business, but--Well, there! what was it you wanted me to do? Help you git the place?"
"Yes, if you will. I know Captain Perez has said that you were interested in the town-meetings and helped to nominate some of the selectmen and the school-committee, so I thought perhaps, if you used your influence, you might get the position for me."
"Well, I don't know. I did do a little electioneerin' for one or two fellers and maybe they'd ought to be willin' to do somethin' for me.
Still, you can't never tell. A cat 'll jump over your hands if she knows there's a piece of fish comin' afterwards, but when she's swallowed that fish, it's a diff'rent job altogether. Same way with a politician. But, then, you let me think over it for a spell, and p'raps to-morrow we'll see. You think it over, too. Maybe you'll change your mind."
"No, I shan't change my mind. I'm ever and ever so much obliged to you, though."
She started toward the door, but turned impulsively and said, "Oh, Captain Eri, you don't think that I'm ungrateful, do you? You nor Captain Perez nor Captain Jerry won't think that I do not appreciate all your kindness? You won't think that I'm shirking my duty, or that I don't want to help take care of grandfather any longer? You won't?
Promise me you won't."
She choked down a sob as she asked the question.
Captain Eri was as much moved as she was. He hastened to answer.
"No, no, no!" he exclaimed. "Course we won't do no such thing. Run right along, and don't think another word about it. Wait till to-morrer. I'll have a plan fixed up to land that school-committee, see if I don't."
But all that evening he worked at the model of the clipper, and the expression on his face as he whittled showed that he was puzzled, and not a little troubled.
He came back from his fishing next day a little earlier than usual, changed his working-clothes for his second best suit, harnessed Daniel into the buggy, and then came into the house, and announced that he was going over to the Neck on an errand, and if Elsie wanted to go with him, he should be glad of her company. As this was but part of a pre-arranged scheme, the young lady declared that a ride was just what she needed.
Captain Eri said but little, as they drove up to the "main road"; he seemed to be thinking. Elsie, too, was very quiet. When they reached the fruit and candy shop, just around the corner, the Captain stopped the horse, got down, and went in. When he came out he had a handful of cigars.
"Why, Captain Eri," said Elsie, "I didn't know that you smoked cigars. I thought a pipe was your favorite."
"Well, gin'rally speakin', 'tis," was the answer, "but I'm electioneerin' now, and politics without cigars would be like a chowder without any clams. Rum goes with some kind of politics, but terbacker kind of chums in with all kinds. 'Tain't always safe to jedge a candidate by the kind of cigars he gives out neither; I've found that out.
"Reminds me of a funny thing that Obed Nickerson told me one time. Obed used to be in politics a good deal up and down the Cape, here, and he had consider'ble influence. 'Twas when Bradley up to Fall River was runnin' for Congress. They had a kind of pow-wow in his office--a whole gang of district leaders--and Obed he was one of 'em. Bradley went to git out the cigar-box, and 'twas empty, so he called in the boy that swept out and run errands for him, give the youngster a ten-dollar bill, and told him to go down to a terbacker store handy and buy another box.
Well, the boy, he was a new one that Bradley'd jest hired, seemed kind of surprised to think of anybody's bein' so reckless as to buy a whole box of cigars at once, but he went and pretty soon come back with the box.
"The old man told him to open it and pass 'em round. Well, everybody was lookin' for'ard to a treat, 'cause Bradley had the name of smokin'
better stuff than the average; but when they lit up and got a-goin', Obed said you could see that the gang was s'prised and some disgusted.
The old man didn't take one at fust, but everybody else puffed away, and the smoke and smell got thicker 'n' thicker. Obed said it reminded him of a stable afire more 'n anything else. Pretty soon Bradley bit the end of one of the things and touched a match to it. He puffed twice--Obed swears 'twa'n't more'n that--and then he yelled for the boy.