Joshua Marvel

It was on that same afternoon that Ellen was sitting in her bedroom looking at her face in the looking-glass. She was fair; and she knew it, and was proud of it. But it was not vanity that caused her to sit, with her chin upon her hands, looking into the glass. Of a very modest type a womanhood was Ellen; not a heroine of the Joan-of-Arc order, who, with all her false glitter about her, would have been a woman after very few men's hearts. Ellen was of the quiet order of women, of whom there are thousands growing up in happy English homes, thank Heaven! and who are blessed and contented and happy, notwithstanding their sisters' unwomanly cries about woman's rights. May English women like Ellen, modest and constant and loving, increase and multiply with every succeeding year! Ellen was thinking of herself a little, as she looked into the glass, and of Joshua a great deal. He had not spoken to her yet; but he would soon, she knew. And as she sat and saw her pretty face looking at her, whose step but Joshua's should she hear coming, up the stairs? He went into the adjoining room-Dan's room; and she heard him moving about, and-yes; singing! Singing what? Why, "Bread-and-Cheese and Kisses." The heroine's name in the song is Kate; but Joshua sang, -

"I said to Nell, my darling wife,In whom my whole life's bliss is,'What have you got for dinner, Nell?''Why, bread-and-cheese and kisses!'"

He said to Nell, his darling wife! The happy tears ran down Ellen's face; but they were soon dried; and Ellen kept very quiet, fearing that Joshua might hear her move. But Joshua went down stairs singing; and then Ellen smiled at herself in the glass, and peeped at herself through her fingers; and it wasn't an ugly picture to look at, if any one had been there to see.

It was all settled without a word passing between them. I don't believe there ever was such another courtship. They were sitting in Mrs. Marvel's kitchen only four of them-father, mother, Ellen, and Joshua. It really looked like a conspiracy that no other person came into the kitchen that night; but there they were, conspiracy or no conspiracy. There was Mrs. Marvel, knitting a pair of stockings for Joshua; not getting along very fast with them, it must be confessed: for her spectacles required a great deal of rubbing. And there was Mr. Marvel, smoking his pipe, throwing many a furtive look in the direction of Joshua and Ellen, who were sitting next to each other, happy and silent. There is no record of how long they sat thus without speaking; but suddenly, although not abruptly, Joshua put his arm round Ellen's waist, and drew her closer to him. It was only a look that passed between them; and then Joshua kissed Ellen's lips, and she laid her head upon his breast.

"Mother! father! look here!"

Mrs. Marvel rose, all of a tremble, and laid her hand upon Ellen's head, and kissed the young lovers. But Mr. Marvel behaved quite differently. He cast one quick satisfied look at the two youngsters; and then turned from them, and continued smoking as if nothing unusual had occurred.

"Well, father?" exclaimed Joshua, rather surprised at his father's silence.

"Well, Josh!" replied Mr. Marvel.

"Do you see this?" asked Joshua, with his arm round Ellen's waist.

Ellen, blushing rosy red, looked shyly at Mr. Marvel; but he looked stolidly at her in return.

"Yes; I see it, Josh," said Mr. Marvel, without any show of emotion.

"And what do you say to it?"

"What do I say to it, Josh?" replied Mr. Marvel with dignity. "Well, I believe I'm your father; and, as such, I think you should ask me if I was agreeable. I thought it proper to ask my father, Josh. It isn't because I'm a wood-turner" -

"No, no, father," interrupted Joshua; "I made a mistake. Ellen and I thought" -

"Ellen and you thought," repeated Mr. Marvel.

"That if you were agreeable" – continued Joshua.

"That if I was agreeable," repeated Mr. Marvel.

"And if you would please to give your consent" – said Joshua, purposely prolonging his preamble.

"And if I would be pleased to give my consent," repeated Mr. Marvel with a slight chuckle of satisfaction.

"That as we love each other very much, we would like to get married."

"That's dutiful," said Mr. Marvel, laying down his pipe, oracularly. "I'm only agreeable, Josh, because I am old, and because I am married. As I said to mother the other night, when we was talking the matter over-ah! you may stare; but we knew all about it long ago. Didn't we, mother? Well, as I was saying to mother the other night, if I was a young man, and mother wasn't in the way, I'd marry her myself and you might go a-whistling. Shiver my timbers, my lass!" he cried, breaking through the trammels of wood-turning, and becoming suddenly nautical, "come and give me a kiss."

Which Ellen did; and so the little comedy ended happily. Joshua, having a right now to sit with his arm round Ellen's waist, availed himself of it, you may be sure. If Ellen went out of the room, he had also a right to go and inquire where she was going; and this, curiously enough, happened four or five times during the night. If any thing could have added to the happiness of Mr. Marvel-except being any thing but a wood-turner, which, at his age, was out of the question-it was this proceeding of Joshua's. Every time Joshua followed Ellen out of the room; Mr. Marvel looked at his wife with pleasure beaming from his eyes.

"It puts me in mind of the time when I came a-courting you, mother," he said. "How the world spins round! It might have been last night when you and me were saying good-by at the street-door."

Mrs. Marvel had not spoken to her husband without cause of the change that had taken place in Basil Kindred. A very remarkable change had indeed taken place in him. A mistrustful expression had settled itself upon his face, accompanied by a keen hungry watchfulness of all that occurred around him. He gave short answers, and was snappish and morose. Yet not a look, not a word, not a gesture escape his notice. He did not avoid his friends; he rather courted their society. He repelled their advances, but he sat among them, watching. Every sense was employed in that all-absorbing task. What was it that he was trying to discover?

The change was so sudden. A few days ago he was as he had ever been hitherto, frank and cheerful, – even gay sometimes. Now, all that was gone. In place of frankness, mistrust; in place of cheerfulness, gloom. Susan was the only one, with the exception of his daughter, to whom he did not speak with a certain bitterness. His manner to all the others was as though some sensitive chord in his nature had been sorely wounded-as though all men were his foes-as though his faith in what was good and noble in human nature had been violently disturbed.

See him now. He and Minnie have been sitting together for hours. He has been strangely stern and strangely tender to her in turns, but she is used to his wayward moods. He has detained her by his side all the morning, upon one and another idle pretext; and she, as if wishful to please him, has humored him, and been wonderfully submissive and obedient. But once she had fallen into a reverie-not a happy one-and he had broken it by asking her in a harsh voice what she was dreaming about. She replied only by a startled look, and resumed her work, which had been lying idly in her lap. Repentant of his harshness, he turned his head from her to hide the sudden spasm which passed into his face.

"Are you ill?" she asked.

"No, dear child."

"In pain?"

"No, dear child."

Presently she put aside her work, and rose to leave the room.

"Where are you going?" he asked in a strangely anxious voice.

"To see Mrs. Marvel," was her answer.

"Sit you down," he cried sternly.

She hesitated and lingered by the door, beating the ground with her foot irresolutely. Seeing that, he grasped her wrist firmly, and hurt her without intending to do so. The muscles of her face quivered, but not from the pain.

"O Minnie, my child!" he cried; then, releasing her, "have I hurt you?"

"No," she answered in a hard voice. "Why do you not wish me to go to Mrs. Marvel's house? You have forbidden me before."

"You trouble them too much."

"That is not your reason, father," she said in the same hard voice. "You are hiding something from me."

"Are you not hiding something from me, Minnie?" he asked, looking anxiously into her face.

"What should I hide from you?" she asked, in reply, coldly and evasively. "I am not well, father. I can't stop in this room. I will not go where you do not wish me."

He did not detain her, and she glided swiftly out of the room. He was about to follow her, when a dizziness came upon him, and he sank into a chair. It was only by a strong effort of will that he kept himself from fainting.

"My strength is deserting me," he muttered, his breath coming thick and fast; "scarcely a day passes but this weakness comes upon me." He held up his hand; it trembled like a leaf. "Have I failed in my duty to her? Is it my fault that she does not confide in me? Or is this a wicked lie?" He took a letter from his pocket and read it, not once, but many times. "No," he groaned; "it is true. I feel that it is true." He rose to his feet and felt like one just risen from a sick bed. He was as weak as a child; so weak, indeed, that the consciousness of his weakness brought tears into his eyes; and he said in a voice of anguish, "Now, when my child's happiness-her honor, perhaps-depends upon my watchful care, I am helpless. If I had some one that I could trust some one to help me!" He heard a step upon the stairs. It was like an answer to his wish. "It is Susan," he muttered; "the one being that I know in the world who would serve me faithfully, Susan, Susan!"

She heard him, although his voice was faint and low, and entered the room. Alarmed by the traces of illness in his face, she hastened to his side.

"You are ill," she said, assisting him to a seat. "Can I do any thing for you?"

"Yes," he answered. "You can do much. You can be my friend."

"Your friend!" she exclaimed. Had she not always been his friend? But there was a deeper meaning in his voice than she had ever heard before, and his appeal sent thrills of pleasure to her heart.

"I am ill," he continued; "but it is more from weakness than any thing else. I am not in pain. A dizziness seizes me, as it seized me just now, and I feel as if my senses were leaving me. I can scarcely stand; and I have no one to trust to."

"Not Minnie?" she said softly and wonderingly.

"Hush! Minnie, of all others, must not be told of this. Can I trust you?"

"I would work till I dropped to serve you."

A flush came into his face.

"To serve me and Minnie?" he said.

"Yes; to serve you and Minnie."

"Give me your sacred promise that what passes between us now will never be divulged, will never be spoken of, by you, unless my tongue is sealed, and the time comes when it may be necessary to speak."

"Does it concern you?" she asked with a natural hesitation; for there was a feverishness in his manner that alarmed her.

"It concerns me and Minnie."

"I promise."

"Faithfully and sacredly?"

"Faithfully and sacredly."

He took her hand and pressed it, and then gave her the letter, and asked her to read it. It contained but a few words, but they were sufficient to cause a look of horror to start into her eyes.

"Can it be true?" she asked, more of herself than of him and her trembling lips turned white and parched in an instant.

"Susan," said Basil Kindred, "I have lived long enough in the world to know its falseness. In years gone by, men have smiled in my face and shaken me by the hand, and I have learned afterwards, that while their manner spoke me fair, there was treachery in their hearts. My life has been a hard one, what with false friends and bitter poverty; but I bore it all patiently, and lived-lived, when a hundred times voices have whispered in my ear, 'Die, and be at peace!' I had an object to live for-Minnie, my darling child! So I lived and suffered, rather than die and leave her unprotected. It was a bitter, bitter life. You can guess how hard a thing it was for me to find food for her, and how often she had to go without it, before the day when you and that boy-I cannot utter his name-came to our rescue. From that time until this dark cloud" – he placed his hand on the letter-"fell upon me, I have been happy. And now, when I need all my strength to fulfil my duty as a father-when it seems to me a crime that I should allow her to go from my side-this weakness strikes me down."

"Does she know?"

"She knows and must know, nothing. But she must be watched. If there be no truth in this letter-and there may not be" -

"I pray not! Oh, I pray not!" cried Susan. "For others' sakes as well as yours."

"I understand you; if there be no truth in it, no one need know of it but you and I."

"What shall I do?"

"Watch her and him, without seeming to do so," said Basil Kindred. "If she goes out, follow her if you can without letting her see you and let me know all you see and hear. Mind, I say all; keep nothing from me. You have promised sacredly."

"I will do what you bid me."

He raised her hand to his lips, and in the midst of her great sorrow his action brought a happy feeling to her heart. When she was gone, Basil Kindred unlocked a desk and took out a clasped book, in which he wrote a few lines. "It is necessary," he sighed, "for my memory is lost to me sometimes, and I cannot recall events; and it may save me from doing an injustice." Then he replaced the book and locked the desk.

That night, in her room, Susan sat upon her bed and bowed her head to her knees, sobbing, "O my poor Dan! O my poor, poor Ellen! if; after all these years, you should find him false!"

CHAPTER XX

THE ONLY DUTY THAT MINNIE CAN UNDERSTAND

The "Merry Andrew" was nearly ready for sea again, and Joshua, having been duly installed as third mate, was busily employed superintending cargo. The Old Sailor was immensely delighted, and took an active interest in Joshua's doings. When he was told of the engagement between Joshua and Ellen, he smacked Joshua on the back and shook his hand again and again, and kissed Ellen a dozen times, the old rogue! as if he were the lucky man, and Joshua had nothing to do with it. He took a private opportunity of entering into a confidential conversation with the young lovers, and told them he had made over his barge and all his little property to Ellen and Joshua jointly, "for better or worse," he added, with a vague idea that those words were necessary in the circumstances of the case. And he took many other opportunities of instructing Joshua in the duties of mate and master, and also in navigation and astronomy. He was more exacting than any Marine Board would have been, and his instructions and examinations were of a very severe and precise character. But he had a willing and apt pupil in Joshua; and he delighted Ellen by whispering to her confidentially that Joshua would make as fine a mariner as could be found in the service. The examinations generally took place when only the Old Sailor, Joshua, and Ellen were together; and then Joshua propounded, to the satisfaction of his teacher, such problems as, how he would send a top-gallant yard down in a gale of wind; what he would do if he wanted to shiver his main-topsail yard when the leeches were taut and the main yard could not be touched: how to turn in a dead-eye; what he would do if he wanted to tack on a lee shore, and the ship wouldn't come round, and there was not room to wear; and so on, and so on. The Old Sailor was not satisfied with simple answers, but insisted upon the why and the wherefore; so that what with working and studying and sweethearting, Joshua's time was well taken up. Ellen herself became quite learned in certain matters concerning Joshua's profession, and made him laugh heartily by the wise air she assumed when she repeated the twelve signs of the Zodiac, which she had learned by heart perfectly, from Aries to Pisces. Joshua, repeating after her, would purposely leave out Gemini or Aquarius, or another sign, and would instantly be taken to account. In this simple way many happy hours were passed. The Old Sailor had a great liking for Captain Liddle, because he was a thorough sailor, and Captain Liddle admired the Old Sailor for the simplicity of his character.

"You are in luck's way," said the Old Sailor to Joshua: "you are sailing under a good master-not a land saint and sea devil-but a good officer and a kind man; and you have the dearest and the truest-hearted lass in the world to stand by you through life. Do your duty, Josh, to her and to your ship."

"I will do my duty to both, sir, you may depend."

The Old Sailor took out his pocket-handkerchief, and thoughtfully dabbed his face. "I don't doubt that you will, my lad," he said, "and to Dan as well." Now the Old Sailor uttered these last words with a significance that seemed intended to convey a deep meaning. His action was appropriately mysterious. He looked round cautiously, after the best manner of stage robbers, and hooked Joshua nearer to him by a motion of his forefinger. "Hark ye, my lad," he whispered, guiding the words to Joshua's ear by placing his open palm on one side of his mouth; "Hark ye. Do you suspect any thing?"

Joshua opened his eyes very wide at this; he had not the slightest consciousness of the Old Sailor's meaning.

"You don't?" continued the Old Sailor in the same mysterious manner. "So much the better. I didn't suppose you did. Now, supposing-mind, I only say supposing, my lad-supposing you were asked to do a very out-of-the-way thing for Dan's sake, but a thing notwithstanding that you would be very glad to do" – this with a chuckle expressive of intense enjoyment-"would you do it?"

"Would I do it, sir!" exclaimed Joshua warmly. "I don't think you or any one could ask me to do a thing for Dan's sake, that I shouldn't be glad to do."

"Just my opinion," said the Old Sailor, still in the same charnel-house whisper; "and if Dan's happiness depended upon your doing this out-of-the-way thing" -

"Why, then, sir, more eagerly and willingly than ever."

"That's plain sailing; it might come to pass, or it mightn't," said the Old Sailor, returning his handkerchief to its abiding-place in the bosom of his shirt, to denote that the conversation was at an end.

But this did not satisfy Joshua. "What might come to pass, sir?" he asked.

The Old Sailor winked craftily at Joshua, and said, "All I've got to say is, that it might come to pass or it mightn't."

And try as he would, that was all the satisfaction Joshua could obtain from the Old Sailor.

In the mean time Basil Kindred's condition had become so serious, that he was unable to leave his room, and he was unreasonably obstinate in his refusal to see a doctor. He knew well enough what was the matter with him, he said, and doctors could not relieve him. But one day, urged by Dan, Minnie brought a doctor to his bedside without consulting him.

"Your daughter brought me," said the doctor, seeing that Basil was displeased, and wisely judging that mention of his daughter would calm him.

Basil called Minnie to him and kissed her. "Go out of the room, child," he said; "what passes between me and the doctor must be private."

Minnie obeyed, and went down stairs to sit with Dan, and the doctor remained with his patient for half an hour. As the doctor came down, Minnie opened the door of Dan's room, and the doctor entered.

"Well, sir?" asked Dan.

"Your father is suffering from rheumatism and low fever," said the doctor, addressing Minnie. "I have left a prescription in his room; run and get it."

Minnie went up stairs, and the doctor said to Dan, "You are very anxious about Mr. Kindred."

"Yes, sir, very anxious, both for his sake and for Minnie's."

"Minnie-ah! yes, his daughter. Well, I may tell you in confidence what I must not tell her. He is suffering from something more than rheumatic fever. He has a disease which may prove fatal at any moment. A strong mental shock would very likely prove fatal to him. His mind is far from tranquil at the present time, and it is absolutely necessary that he should have quiet and repose. Good-morning."

Grieved as Dan was to hear this, it relieved him, for it enabled him to account for the sudden change in Basil Kindred's manner which had so perplexed him. It also served to account for a change he had observed in Minnie. It was not that she was less friendly towards him; on the contrary, she had on many occasions been more tender to him than usual. But the frank cordiality of her manner was gone; she was more reserved, and an engrossed expression, evidently born of painful thought, had settled upon her face. Dan had watched it with the sensitive eye of love, wondering what had brought it into her face. Now he knew the cause: her father's illness brought gloomy forebodings to her heart and made her anxious. "Does she ever think that I love her?" thought Dan, "and that I am only waiting for the proper time to tell her that my life is devoted to her?" He would have spoken that very day, but a sentiment of true delicacy restrained him. The feeling that closed his lips upon the subject for the present could not have existed in any but a chivalrous nature.

When Joshua came home in the evening, Dan told him what the doctor had said. Joshua was silent for a little while before he spoke. "It is very singular," he then said, "that what you have told me should make me easier in my mind. Both Minnie's and Mr. Kindred's manner lately have given me great pain, filling me with uneasiness, which I have vainly struggled against. It is made clear to me now."

"Why, that was also my feeling, Jo," exclaimed Dan almost gayly. "Another proof of the sympathy between us."

"I shall go and see Mr. Kindred. I am ashamed of myself to have allowed such small feelings to exist. I ought to have made more allowance for his sufferings." His hand was resting upon Dan's shoulder. He inclined himself so that he could see the face of his friend. "And Minnie?" he asked in that attitude. "How is it with you and her?"

"I am more hopeful than ever, Jo; but it would not be right for me to speak to her in her trouble."

"That is like you, Dan," said Joshua approvingly. "Ever tender-ever considerate-ever just. No; you must not speak until Mr. Kindred is better. You must wait."

Dan nodded assent, and Joshua went up stairs to Basil Kindred's room. He paused at the door and listened. No sound came from within, and he received no answer to his knock. He opened the door softly. The room was in darkness.

"Who is there?" was asked in the abstracted voice of one just aroused from sleep.

"It is I-Joshua. Shall I get a light?"

"No;" with a sudden fierceness. "What brings you here?"

The want of friendliness in Basil Kindred's voice was very painful to Joshua, and it was only by a great effort that he was enabled to maintain his composure. "What is the meaning of this, sir?" he asked, very gently.

"Of what?"

"Of your changed manner towards me, sir. And not to me only, but to all of us. Have we done any thing wrong-have I done any thing wrong? If I have, it has been done unconsciously, and it is but just that you should not leave me in ignorance of my fault. I came up to you now, sir, to ask that we should be to each other as we once were-as we were before I went to sea-as we were on the first day of our meeting, when you said, 'God bless you, Joshua Marvel.' I have never forgotten that, sir. I do not speak to you for myself alone; I speak for all of us, who hold you, I am sure, in the tenderest respect and regard." Joshua spoke feelingly, and his words had the effect of softening Mr. Kindred's manner.

"You are right," he said softly and very "it is not just. Sit here by my side." Joshua sat where he was bidden, and waited for Mr. Kindred to resume. "Distemper of the mind accompanies distemper of the body," continued the sick man "and you must lay some part of my unfriendliness to that cause. I am sick in body, and therefore peevish, and therefore, perhaps, unjust. Sick men have sick fancies. They magnify straws, even as, lying here in the dark, I can by the power of my will, magnify the shadows that rest within this room and make them 'palpable to feeling as to sight.' Joshua Marvel, I owe you much; you saved me and mine from starvation. I am glad that you are here now, and that you met my fretfulness with patience; for there is that within my mind, not newly born, but newly risen that I would gladly not forget again. All the happiness of the last few years I owe to you, for it was for your sake we were welcomed here."