Reels and Spindles: A Story of Mill Life

This better man did arrive, just as the evening fell, in the person of Uncle Fred, riding up the driveway in old Israel Boggs's farm wagon. Amy was first to discover their approach and ran gayly to meet them, beginning her tale of the afternoon's adventure with her very salutation; but long before she reached the side of the wagon she saw that something was amiss with her jolly uncle. His face was very grave, and even his voice was hushed, so that though his greeting to his niece was even kinder than usual, it startled her by its solemnity.

"Why, Uncle Fred, what is the matter? What has happened?"

"I'll tell you presently. But how come so many here? I thought the picnic was at 'Treasure Island.'"

She nodded cheerfully to Israel, whose face was even more sad than Frederic Kaye's, and gave a rapid history of events. Strangely enough, neither of the two newcomers appeared much interested. It was as if some greater matter absorbed them, and their manner subdued Amy to silence; while the farmer tied old Fanny, and then followed his friend into the front part of the house, quite away from the excited groups surrounding Fayette and his wonderful exhibit.

Once inside the shelter of the passage, Mr. Frederic laid his hand upon Amy's shoulder, and said, very gently: —

"Prepare for a great sorrow, Amy dear. I have just come from the death-bed of our good friend, Adam Burn."

Never till that moment had the girl known how well she loved the saintly old man. Rarely meeting, he had still exercised over her young life one of its most powerful influences, and an influence all for good.

"Oh, Uncle Fred, it can't be. It mustn't be. He was so good, so kind, so – "

"Altogether lovely. Yes, dear, all that. Old Israel, here, needs comfort. Talk to him a little."

So she led the heart-broken Israel into the farthest room, and sitting down beside him persuaded him to speak with her of the one that had passed on, and in the act to find relief. Then she slipped away a moment and found Hallam, who, when he had heard this later news, quietly dismissed the club and brought the happy holiday to a reverent close.

"Land! that makes all such ilk," said Teamster John, pointing to Fayette's glittering heap, "to seem of small account. What's a litter of gold alongside of such as him?"

And not one among them all who had ever known Adam Burn found anything now worth discussing save the goodness and simplicity of their dead neighbor and friend.

But late that night, after Israel had gone back to the desolate Clove, to make such arrangements for the old man's burial as his friends at "Charity House" had deemed fitting, Uncle Frederic remarked, casually: —

"By the way, Amy, Mrs. Burn ('Sarah Jane,' you know) told me a bit of news, to the effect that you are the old man's heiress, because of your name that was his wife's. She says he gave you a sealed letter before he left Ardsley, which letter explained everything, – where the will was to be found, and the few directions necessary for the settlement of the estate. Your father and I are trustees, she thinks, until you come of age, but you are the heir. Good night."

"No, no, uncle, I don't want to be! I want nothing that is gained by his death. And – I lost that letter, anyway."

"Lost it? That's serious. However, it can doubtless be arranged. Good night."

CHAPTER XXVIII.

ONE WONDERFUL AUTUMN DAY

The months flew by. The summer came and went. It was the hour for closing on a "Saturday-half," a whole year since Amy Kaye first visited the mills of Ardsley, and now she felt as they were a part of her very life. Beginning at the bottom she had industriously worked her way upward till she had just been promoted to the pleasant and well-paying task of "setter," in the big clean room, where the open windows admitted the soft air of another Indian summer.

Away, at the extreme end of the long apartment, was a sunshiny office, lately constructed for the personal use of Archibald Wingate. This office was partitioned from the setting room by a glass sliding door, and through this, as Amy now lifted her eyes, she could see the broad back of her relative bending above a desk full of correspondence.

At every setting frame there are two operators, for left hand and for right; and it was Amy's good fortune to have Mary Reese for her comrade, and a more sunshiny pair of workers could be found nowhere.

For Hallam, also, it had been a busy, happy year. Like Amy, having begun with the humblest task and smallest wage, he had now advanced to be bookkeeper in one department, while he still retained his work of coloring and preparing the patterns for use in the weaving of the famous Ardsley carpets. He looked a far stronger, healthier lad than of old, and his disposition to think upon the dark side of things had now no time to develop, for activity effectually prevents brooding.

Fayette was still a member of the Kaye household, and seemed to belong there as much as any of the others. He had been busy, too, all the year through, with his mushroom-raising, his gardening, and now that the autumn had come round again, with odd jobs at the mill. His deftness would always procure him employment of some sort, yet only that morning Mr. Metcalf had remarked to Hallam, confidentially: —

"Queer, but I can never trust 'Bony.' He seems as honest and reliable as possible for a time, and then, suddenly, he will do something to disappoint me. I don't like his demeanor toward the 'boss.' Ever since Mr. Wingate returned, late this summer, and took to coming here every day, 'Bony' has come too. Have you noticed?"

"I know he comes. I hadn't connected the two comings, however. I guess he's all right. There's a splendid side to that poor lad's nature, if you but knew it. Some day, I hope before very long now, he and I are to surprise the world."

"Why, Hal, you're as gay as a blackbird. What's the surprise, eh? Too precious to disclose even to me?"

"At present, yes. In a little while, a few days – Heigho!" and the lad looked significantly toward his crutches, leaning against the desk where he wrote.

But the superintendent did not observe the glance. His mind was full of misgiving. Within a day or two he had had occasion to suspect that the half-wit had some uncanny scheme on hand. The lad's dislike of the old mill owner appeared to grow with the passage of time. The dull brain never forgot an injury, and it always seemed to Fayette that Mr. Wingate had wronged him. From the old days of his "bound out" life on the farm, when whippings and punishments were of almost daily occurrence, to the present, there had been no diminution in the mill boy's resentment. Now there was this later injury, or injustice, as he believed, about the money found in the cellar of "Charity House."

The facts were these: the glittering coins had, when estimated, been of about one thousand dollars' value. To Fayette this seemed an enormous sum; to Mr. Wingate, a trifle. In the chest with the treasure had been also a time-yellowed letter, or memorandum, signed by the wife of Jacob Ingraham, and decreeing that the property thus hidden had been placed by her own hands in the wall of the cellar of "Spite House" for the "benefit of my nearest of kin."

The document, in itself, was as curious as its hiding-place, and proved that the ancient dame had been a keen observer of men's failings, if not their virtues.

"For I have seen, in this, my lifetime, that gold profits a man nothing. It is ever a bone of contention, and he who has it is poorer than he who has it not. I hope this chest will do him good who finds it; and if it is never found, then the earth will be so much the richer by this small portion of the wealth it has lost. In any case, to prevent evil, and, if possible, to secure a blessing, I have said one prayer over each coin herein disposed, and so, in duty to my conscience, I lock the box and throw the key down the old well of this Bareacre knoll."

The letter had further added that nobody, not even Jacob Ingraham, had known of this bestowal of the chest, because had anybody, "most of all, he," so known, it would have been excavated and its contents scattered.

Now Archibald Wingate was, on his mother's side, the last direct descendant of Mrs. Ingraham, and the property was clearly his. To him, as soon as he returned from his prolonged stay out of town, the broken chest and intact contents had been given by the superintendent, who, Mr. Kaye promptly decided, would be the proper guardian of the treasure until his employer returned.

There had been a terrible scene with Fayette when Cleena told him this decision, and for several days thereafter the lad had not been visible. Some thought he had gone off in one of his wanderings through the woods and fields; but the truth was, he had been kept under lock and key by the energetic and masterful Cleena Keegan. She had assured that patient listener, herself, that: —

"Sure, it do be right. Will I lose all the good we have gained for the sake o' bad temper? The end's in sight, – the blessed end o' the secrecy, an' the weary struggle o' keepin' me gineral's nose to the grindstone, and now to leave go? Not while Cleena Keegan draws a free breath, an' can handle a silly gossoon, like him yon."

From the first it had been a strange and powerful influence that this good woman exercised over the foundling she adopted, and fortunately his imprisonment was not so very long, else it would have been impossible to conceal it from the rest of the household; not one of whom did, however, suspect such a proceeding.

When the object for which she had restrained him of his liberty seemed quite gained, Cleena let Fayette go; and, oddly enough, after his liberty was granted him, he no longer cared for it. He kept close to Bareacres, bare no longer, but teeming with the rich vegetation resulting from his own labor, guided by Frederic Kaye's trained judgment. The summer had proved a most interesting as well as busy one to both these gardeners. The results of their mutual labor were harvested and stored for the family's winter use, and Fayette had returned to the mill. Idleness, or the want of that regular employment he had enjoyed, now reawoke the dark thoughts which had disturbed his clouded brain during the time of his "retreat" under Cleena's compelling will.

This day, when Amy watched her cousin through the glass partition, and waited with Mary for Hallam to complete his own task in a room adjoining the private office of Mr. Wingate, Fayette was hanging about the mill, as if himself waiting for some one.

Amy called to him once, and received a surly answer: —

"I'll go when I get ready. I ain't hurting nobody – yet."

"Of course not, who'd suppose so? I'd think you'd like a run in the woods after hours. There was a frost a few nights ago. There may be hickory nuts to gather."

"Gather 'em, then, if you want 'em. I don't. I've got other fish to fry. I'll fry 'em, too."

"Well, you're cross, 'Fayetty, me gineral.' I'll not wait much longer, even for Hal. You can come home with him, and help him bring the patterns he is to show father, please."

"I thought you wanted to see Mr. Wingate, too, Amy," observed Mary, "about that legacy of yours. You're the queerest girl. Any other would be wild to have things fixed, but you don't seem to care a bit."

"Why should I? We are very comfortable at 'Charity House.' Mrs. Burn, dear Adam's daughter-in-law, has gone abroad again. If she had time, she'd cheerfully help us – if she could. We think the letter of instruction will sometime be found, and that will make all clear. We don't like law, and Adam would have hated it. No; we'll wait for a time longer, but I promised father I'd consult Cousin Archibald, and see when he would meet either father or Uncle Fred to discuss it.

"Meanwhile, old Israel and his wife are doing just the same at Burnside as if their master were still there. All I could think of taking the property for, it seems to me, would be to give my father such a lovely home again."

"Well, Amy, I must go. I want to finish reading that book Mr. Kaye lent me, this afternoon. I'll see you at the club to-night. Good-by."

With a kiss and a hand pressure, which revealed the depth of their friendship, Mary departed, and Amy turned to the open window to watch the cloud shadows drift over the lovely valley, wherein the Ardsley leaped and sparkled. As she gazed, thinking of many things, she became conscious, in an idle sort of fashion, that Fayette had passed out of doors, and was walking close beneath, or along the building's wall, and in a stealthy manner, suspicious in itself.

"Heigho! What now, I wonder. He's up to some mischief, I'm afraid. How queer he is at times. Why, even when he was told that Mr. Wingate knew him for the person who horsewhipped him last Christmas and had refused to take any notice of it, except to thank Uncle Fred for his rescue – even then Fayette would not say that he thought my cousin good. All he did say was: 'Well, he better not. He knows too much. If he locked me up or had me fined, I'd lick him again soon's I got out. He ain't no fool. But that don't make me feel any different. He ain't jailed me, but he's got my money. Mine; I dug it out the cellar an' blasted, to the risk o' my life. He keeps it, when he's got a bank full, they say. Kept Balaam, too, or give him to one of them Metcalf youngsters. Well, his time'll come. I'm not forgettin', if I do keep my mouth shut for a spell.'"

Recalling this speech, Amy tried to put herself in the half-wit's place, which effort made her pity him the more, yet watch his present man[oe]uvres none the less closely. But presently he disappeared in a distant lower doorway, and she forgot him and returned to her happy day-dreams.

Fayette had bided his time. On such an afternoon, at such an hour, he judged that nobody would be in the mill building save the distant watchman and that indefatigable toiler, Archibald Wingate, with whom was the half-wit's present business. He had seen the last whisk of Mary's blue skirt disappearing above the back-stairway, and, knowing that Amy and she were waiting for Hallam, concluded that the trio had departed together.

So he entered the little basement door gleefully. All seemed propitious, yet he meant once more and carefully to examine the preparations he had made, to see if there was any flaw anywhere. He was so absorbed, so excited, that he scarcely breathed as he crept slowly along the inside of the wall, just as a moment before he had passed along its outer surface. At one spot he paused and tried a simple-looking tube that had been brought from the outside, through a convenient aperture, into the inside of the building. The thing looked harmless, yet it ran along the groove where the floor and wall joined, clear into that cheery inner office, where Archibald Wingate sat that very moment, signing his name to one of the most generous letters of his life.

"There," he reflected, as he leaned back in his chair and tossed aside his pen; "there, that is foolish enough to satisfy even my impractical small kinswoman, bless her! A thousand dollars isn't much, but it's – a thousand dollars; and when I double it by another thousand, which has never been buried by any ancient ancestress, it makes a tidy sum for a foundling lad. Poor 'Bony,' he hates me like poison. I wonder, when he finds out that I've done this for him, when I place it in his hands myself, and tell him, furthermore, that I have asked Fred Kaye to send west for several more of those burros he's given us a sample of, and that one is for the 'Rep-Dem-Prob' himself – I wonder, will there rise in his stunted heart some perception of what life should mean; of what it shall mean, during my last brief hold of it, to me? and all because of a girl's bright trustfulness and love."

It was a day for musings. Even Fayette, intent on evil, had his own – like Amy and the lonely old man in the silent office. He wondered, pausing for a moment, how "it would feel to be blown up. That day when I found the money he's took from me, if I'd had a bigger charge of powder, would I ha' knowed what struck me, if it had gone off sudden? Hmm. I almost hate to do it. He seems – he'll never guess, though, and he hadn't any right. He's been again' me from the first. I'll do it. He hain't had no mercy – I won't, neither."

So he crept softly back to the low entrance, and stooping, struck a match. The match burned well, and in an instant had communicated its own flame to the cheap fuse that ran along the wall. In the far-off office, concealed beneath the mill owner's desk, there was already waiting a powerful explosive, which Fayette had purloined from the store of the workmen who were excavating for the new wing of the building. In a moment more the fuse would have burned unnoticed to its fatal end, and an awful crime, of whose enormity the dull criminal had no real comprehension, would have been committed.

But Hallam had caught the prevailing mood. He, like the others left lingering about the silent building, had fallen into a reverie which, judging by his bright expression, was full of happiness. For many months, and for the first time in his life, he had kept a secret from his father and Amy. If that can be called a secret which was known also to Cleena, to Uncle Frederic, and to Fayette, upon whose aid alone the success of this mystery had depended. The lad had been faithful. At most times his help had been rendered freely, out of love and sympathy; at others there had been compulsion on Cleena's side and from the other one of the quartette, who had himself suffered false blame and the disgrace of suspicion because of the secret.

"To-morrow, please God, it shall end. I couldn't bear to tell them, who love me so, until I was sure, sure. The old surgeon said it might be a miracle would be enacted for my benefit. Well, it has, it has! I've known it, really, almost from the beginning, though it's been so hard and at times so seemingly hopeless. But if I hadn't loved them even more than myself, I wouldn't have kept on trying. To-morrow – the experiment in their presence! Will it ever come!"

The lad stood up and arranged the papers in his own desk. Then he heard, or fancied that he did, a slight sound in the deserted building. The corps of operatives had been well drilled to watch for any sign of that dreaded element, fire, and he was alert now, – the more that, following this, there was a slight odor, pungent and more alarming than even the first sound.

He wheeled about and – what was that? In the dimness of the angle where it lay, away out toward that closed office with its unsuspecting occupant, a tiny spark was making its steady, creeping progress. For an instant Hallam gazed at it astonished, the next he realized its full meaning and horror. Could he reach it? Was there time?

With a shriek of warning he rushed forward, – stumbling against, leaping over obstacles, – gaining upon that menacing point of fire and fume, which now seemed to race him like a living thing.

The miracle was wrought – two miracles! A few more seconds, and it would have been too late; but now the lame walked and, as it were, the dead came back to life.

Hallam's shriek, the uproar of overturned obstructions, reverberated through the empty building and brought Archibald Wingate, Amy, and poor Fayette face to face with the panting, excited rescuer. All comprehended at once what had been attempted and how prevented. The mill owner laid an iron grip upon the half-wit's shoulder, who made no effort to escape; for at last, at last, there had penetrated to his dim intelligence the wide, the awful difference between good and evil. When he saw the once crippled lad, whom his own hands had restored to health, thus fling away his life with unstinted hand, that he might save the life of another, – once his enemy also, – there had roused within the dormant brain of the foundling a sudden perception of Hallam's nobility and his own baseness. Therefore, stunned by this new knowledge, he stood humble and unresisting.

Amy's great heart comprehended just what and how her poor protégé was suffering. With her, to think was to act. She sprang to him and laid her small hand on his other shoulder, and the tender sympathy of this touch thrilled him more than the hard grasp of his master.

"Oh! but Hallam – Hallam – you walked! walked! you ran! You – you – who never – "

Her voice choked, ceased, and she turned from Fayette to fling herself headlong into her brother's arms. For the first time in their lives he could receive her and support her firmly. Then she stepped back and shook him. Gently at first, then violently. His crutches were – nobody cared where, though certainly not at hand; yet he stood fixedly, resisting her attacks, and again catching her to him with that overflowing joy that only such as he could guess.

"But I don't understand. Tell – tell; not here, though. Is all safe? No danger any more?"

"No," said Fayette to her demand, "there ain't no danger. Not 'less the fuse had burned out to the end. It's under the desk. He'll find it. I – I – but it's put out. I – "

"You didn't mean it, did you, boy? You could not. You didn't understand."

"No, I didn't, I didn't," whimpered the stricken fellow.

Mr. Wingate relaxed his hold. How could he retain his fury against such an enemy? It was too unequal. The lad was dangerous, he must be punished, he —

Hallam read these unspoken thoughts.

"For my sake, Cousin Archibald, forgive him. It is he who has made me able to save you this day, even though it was he who put you in such peril. Months ago, Amy read in a paper how a lad was cured whose case was just like mine. There was only will power on the cripple's part, and the daily, sometimes hourly massage by one of those persons whose physical magnetism, or whatever it is, was strong. 'Bony' was such a person, and I just such a cripple. We began. For weeks I couldn't move my legs without using my hands to help. Then one day I found, just after the rubbing was over, that I could push one foot along the floor a tiny way. That gave us both courage. He has been untiring. We were soon on the road to what I believed, though with lots of set-backs, would be a cure. Uncle Fred knew; that's why he wouldn't let Fayette be arrested or punished for assaulting you. He took the blame himself, if the boy would stick to me. Cleena knew, too – "

"And not us, father nor me!" exclaimed Amy, in a hurt tone.

"No; that was to be my blessed surprise for you two. It was to your own suggestion, which I suppose you forgot soon after, with the newspaper scrap you brought, that I owe the beginning. It was Cleena kept us at it. She wouldn't let us give it up, – no, not if she had the whole crowd under lock and key on a bread and water diet; eh, Fayette?"

The shamefaced fellow looked up, with a slight gleam in his eye, then dropped his gaze again.

Hallam went on: "To-morrow, the First Day that mother loved, I was going to make an experiment before you all – my surprise. I have practised in private continually, and uncle, as well as Cleena, has urged me to tell you before; but I kept it till the anniversary – you know."

"Ah," said Archibald Wingate, with a sudden recollection, "so it is. She was my best friend, my best beloved. You are her children. All my hard middle life seems to have slipped out of my memory, like a bad dream, and I am back in our youth-time again, with Salome and Cuthbert and Fred, – all gay and glad together. I wonder, I wonder what she would bid me do to you, poor fellow," he finished, regarding the abject natural with a pitying air.

"I know! Forgive him, else thy Salome and my mother were not one."

"Amy, thee is right. Come into the office, all of you."

"Is it safe?" she asked, hanging back.

"We'll make it safe. 'Bony,' or Fayette, take that stuff you put under the desk and step out there to the Ardsley. Behind that rock is a deep hole. I used to fish there as a lad. I can see if you obey. Drop that death powder into the stream and come back."

Fayette obeyed, and they watched him, shivering. But when the water flowed on after an instant, undisturbed and merrily singing its deathless song, they breathed deeply and with complete relief.

"Look here, Fayette; you think I've been a hard man. So I have – so I have. You've been a bad boy too, eh?"

"Yes; I won't never – "

"Of course you won't. Look here, I say. What's this – this heap of stuff I took out of the safe? Did you ever see it before?"