Cursed
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“Probably not, when dealing with a gentleman,” retorted Filhiol, “but this case is different. My acquaintance with your grandfather dates back more than half a century, and when my duty requires me to speak, no young bully like you is going to stop me. No, you needn’t double your fist, or look daggers, because I’m not in the least afraid of you, sir. And I’m not going to mince matters with you. What did you do with the captain’s five hundred dollars?”
Hal felt himself lost. He had effectually closed Ezra’s mouth, but now here stood the doctor, accusing him. One moment he had the impulse to do murder; but now that all things were in readiness for his flight, he realized violence would be a fatal error. His only hope lay in diplomacy.
“What five hundred dollars?”
“You know very well what five hundred! Come, what did you do with it?”
“Really, Dr. Filhiol, this is a most astonishing accusation!” said Hal. “I don’t know anything about any five hundred. Is that amount gone?”
“You know very well it’s gone!”
“I know nothing of the kind! How should I?”
“You can’t fool me, young man!” exclaimed the doctor hotly. He raised his cane in menace.
“Put that stick down, sir,” said Hal in a wicked voice. “No man living can threaten me with a stick and get way with it. I tell you I don’t know anything about the money! I’ve been out of this house for some time, and you and Ezra have been here. Now you tell me there’s five hundred dollars gone. By God, if you weren’t an old man and a guest, you’d eat your words damned quick!”
“I – you – ” stammered the doctor, outgeneralled.
“I’ve wasted enough time on you now!” Hal flung at him. “It’s time for you to be going.” He gripped Filhiol by the wrist with a vise-pressure that bruised. “And one thing more, you!” he growled. “You’d just better not go stirring up gramp against me, or accusing me to Ezra. It won’t be healthy for you to go accusing me of what you can’t prove, you prying gray ferret!”
“Ezra knows all about it already!” retorted the doctor, tempted to smash at that insolent, evil face with his cane.
“Knows it, does he?” Hal could not repress a start.
“Yes, he does. He’s already sworn to a falsehood to me, to save your worthless hide!”
“What d’you mean?”
“I mean he’s accused himself of the theft, you scoundrel!”
“Let him, then! If the shoe fits him, let him put it on!”
“Oh, let him, eh? Yes, and let him beggar himself. Let him try to get his pitiful life-savings back into the safe in time to save you! A man who’ll stand by and let a poor old servant, more faithful than a dog, bankrupt himself to cover up a sneaking crime – a man who’ll pack up and run away – ”
“I’ve had enough o’ you!” snarled Hal. He pushed the doctor out into the hall. “Ezra’s admitted it, and gramp wouldn’t believe I did it, even if he saw the money in my hand. Get out now, and if you cross my path again, look out!”
The doctor met his threat unflinchingly.
“Young man,” said he, “I sailed harder seas, in the old times, than any seas to-day. I sailed with your grandfather when he was a bucko of the old school, and though we didn’t usually agree and once I nearly shot him, I never knuckled under. Maybe the bullet that just missed cutting off your grandfather’s life is still waiting for its billet. Maybe that’s part of the curse on you!”
His eyes were cold steel as he peered at the menacing, huge figure of Hal.
“Be careful, sir,” he added. “Be very careful how you raise your hand against a man like me!”
“If I ever do raise my hand, there’ll be no more threats of shooting left in you!” Hal flung at him. With a sudden flare of rage he pushed old Filhiol through the door and turned the lock. The doctor stumbled, dropped his cane and fetched up against the balustrade of the stairs. Ashen and trembling he clung there a moment. Then he raised his shaking fist to heaven.
“Oh, God,” he prayed, “God, give me power to stamp this viper’s head before it poisons the captain – before it poisons Laura and old Ezra – the town, the very air, the world! God, give me strength to stamp it in the dust!”
Within the room sounded the tread of Hal, going, coming as he growled to himself, packed up his things for flight.
“Aye, go!” thought the doctor. “Go, and devil take you! Go, and if there’s any curse, carry it with you to the end of the world!”
The doctor realized that nothing better than this departure could happen. The boy would undoubtedly come to his end before long in some drunken brawl. Sooner or later he would meet his match; would get killed, or would do murder and would finish on the gallows or in the chair. That over-mastering physical strength, backed by the arrogance of conscious power, could not fail to ruin him.
“The world will soon settle with you, Hal Briggs,” said he, as he made his way down-stairs. “Soon settle, and for good. It will break the captain’s heart to have you go, but it would break it worse to have you stay. This is best.”
Calmer now, he stopped a moment at the cabin door to assure himself Captain Briggs was sleeping.
“Lord!” he thought. “I hope Hal gets away before the old man wakes up. It will spare us a terrible scene – a scene that might cost the captain his life!”
His eye caught a glint of red. Oddly enough, firelight, reflected from one of the captain’s brass instruments, ticked just a tiny point of crimson on the blade of the old kris.
The doctor shuddered and passed on, failing to notice the open window in the room. He felt oppressed and stifling. Air! he must have air! He got into a coat hanging on the rack, put on his hat and limped out upon the porch.
Up and down walked Dr. Filhiol a few times, trying to shake off heavy bodings of evil. A curious little figure he made, withered, bent, but with the fires of invincible determination burning in his eyes. The time he had passed at Snug Haven had brought back his fighting spirit. Dr. Filhiol seemed quite other from the meek and inoffensive old man who had so short a time ago driven up to the captain’s gate. Even the grip of his hand on his cane was different. Hal Briggs might well look out for him now, if any turn of chance should put him into Filhiol’s power.
The doctor paused at last on the sheltered side of the porch, near the captain’s windows and away from that side of the house where Hal’s room was located. More heavily than ever the rain was sheeting down, and from the shore a long thunder told of sea charges broken against the impenetrable defenses of the rocks.
All at once the doctor saw a figure coming along the road, head down to wind and rain – a figure in a mackintosh, with a little white hat drawn down over thick hair – the figure of a woman.
Astonished that a woman should be abroad in such weather, he peered more closely. The woman came to the side gate, stopped there, and, holding her hat and flying hair with one hand, looked anxiously over the hedge at Snug Haven.
Then Dr. Filhiol recognized her.
“Laura! What the devil now?” said he.
The doctor seemed to read her thought, that she was afraid of being seen by Hal, but that she greatly desired speech of some one else. With raised hand he beckoned her; and she, perceiving him, came quickly through the gate to the porch.
Wild-tossed and disheveled she was with frightened eyes and wistful, pleading face. Filhiol’s heart yearned to her, filled with pity.
“You’re Laura, aren’t you?” asked the doctor, taking her hand and steadying her a little. “Laura Maynard? Yes? I’m Dr. Filhiol, a very old and confidential friend of the captain’s. What can I do to help you?”
“The captain!” she panted, almost spent with exertion and chill. “I’ve got to – see the captain right away!”
“My dear, that’s quite impossible,” said Filhiol, drawing her more into shelter. “He’s asleep, worn out with exertions concerning Hal. You’ve come to see him about Hal. Yes, I thought so. Well, the captain can’t be disturbed now, for any reason whatever. But you can tell me, Laura. Perhaps I may do quite as well.”
She pondered a moment, then asked with a strong effort: “Where is Hal now?”
“Up-stairs. Do you want to see him?”
“No, no, no!” she shuddered. “God forbid! But – oh, doctor, please let me see the captain, if only for a minute!”
“He’s ill, I tell you, Laura.”
“Not seriously?” she asked with sudden anxiety.
“Perhaps not yet, but we can’t take any chances.”
The girl took his hand in a trembling clasp.
“Don’t let anything happen to the captain!” she exclaimed, her rain-wet face very beautiful in its anxiety. “Oh, doctor, he’s the most wonderful old man in the world, the finest, the noblest! Nothing, nothing must happen to him!”
“Nothing shall, if I can help it. If I can stand between him and – and – ”
“And Hal?” she queried. “Yes, I understand. What a terrible curse to love a man like that!”
“The captain must soon find it so,” said Filhiol. “Every one who loves that boy has got to suffer grievously. You, too, Laura,” he added. “You must steel your heart to many things. The captain will soon need all your strength and consolation.”
“You know the bad news, too?”
“I know much bad news. But if you’ve got any more, tell me!”
“You know about the fight he had this afternoon and about his buying Gordon’s boat, the Kittiwink?”
“No. Nothing about that. But I know Hal’s packing some things now to make what they call a getaway. And – ”
“And you’re not going to stop him?” exclaimed the girl, clutching his arm. “You’re not?”
“Shhh, my dear!” warned Filhiol. “We mustn’t wake the captain in there! Stop Hal? No, no! Nothing better could happen than to have him go before he does murder in this town.”
“He almost did murder this afternoon! He ran into three of McLaughlin’s men down at Hadlock’s Cove, and they twitted him about apologizing to McLaughlin. Then – ”
“Say no more,” interrupted the doctor, raising his hand. “I understand.”
“Yes, doctor, but the news has spread, and the rest of the crew have sworn vengeance on Hal. They’ll surely kill him, doctor!”
“God grant they may!” the doctor thought, but what he said was:
“The quicker he goes, then, the better.”
“But isn’t there any way to bring him to reason, doctor? To make him like other men? To save him?”
“I see none,” Filhiol answered. He pondered a moment while the rain-drums rolled their tattoos on the roof of the porch and the sea thundered. “The curse, the real curse on that boy, is his unbridled temper, his gorilla-like strength. His strength has unsettled his judgment and his will. Ordinary men rely on their brains, and have to be decent. Hal, with those battering-ram fists, thinks he can smash down everything, and win, like one of Nietzsche’s supermen. If something could drain him of strength, and weaken and humble him, it might be the salvation of him yet.”
“God grant it might!”
“You still love him, girl?” asked Filhiol, tenderly as a father. “In spite of everything?”
“I love the good in him, and there’s so wonderfully much!”
“I understand, my dear. Just now, the bad is all predominant. There’s nothing to do but let him go, Laura. Because – he’s determined to go, at all costs. Where, I don’t know, or how.”
“I know how!” exclaimed the girl. “He’s bought the Kittiwink and laid in supplies. My father’s in the boat-brokerage business, and he’s got word of it.”
“Bought it?” interrupted the doctor. “How? On credit?”
“No, cash. He paid four hundred and seventy-five dollars for it, in bills.”
“He did? By – h-m!”
“What is it, doctor? Where could Hal get all that money? Do you know?”
“I know only too well, my dear.”
“Tell me!” she exclaimed eagerly, and took him by the hand.
So absorbed were they that neither heard a slight sound from the captain’s window, like the quick intake of a breath. How could they know the old man had wakened, had heard their voices; how could they know he had arisen, and, all trembling and weak, was now standing hidden inside the window, listening to words that tore the heart clean out of him?
CHAPTER XXXVII
THE CAPTAIN SEES
Anguished the captain listened. He heard Laura question:
“Where did Hal get that money? Where’s he going, and what does it all mean?” Her trembling voice echoed its woe in the captain’s tortured soul.
“Where Hal’s going I don’t know, Laura,” the doctor answered, “except it’s evident he’s planning to escape from here for good. He may be bound for the South Seas with some crazy, wild notion of a free-and-easy buccaneering life. Hal’s going, and it’s evident he doesn’t intend to come back. The best thing we can do is just let him go. It seems hard, but there’s no other way. As for where he got the money – well – Why not speak plainly to you? It’s the best way now.”
“Tell me, then!”
Within his cabin, old Captain Briggs clutched his hands together in agony. But still he held himself that he might stand there and hear this revelation to the end.
“I will tell you, Laura. The money – there’s only one place where it could have come from.”
“The captain? He gave it to him?”
“It came from the captain, but not as a gift.”
“You – don’t mean – ”
“It’s terribly hard to speak that word, Laura, isn’t it?” pitied the old doctor. “Yet the money’s gone from the captain’s safe. Ezra accuses himself, but that’s mere nonsense. Every finger of certainty points to Hal Briggs as a thief. And not only an ordinary thief, but one who’s taken advantage of every bond of confidence and affection, most brutally to betray the man who loves him better than life itself!”
“Oh, you – you can’t mean that– ”
“I’m afraid I can’t mean anything else. Hal’s up-stairs now, unless he’s already gone. He’s trying to escape before the captain wakes up.”
“And you’re not going to stop him?”
“Never! You mustn’t, either!”
“But this will break the old man’s heart – the biggest, most loving heart in the world! This will kill him!”
“Even that would be less cruel than to have Hal stay, and have him torture the old captain.”
“And there’s nothing you can do? Nothing you’ll let me do?”
“There’s nothing any one can do now, but God. And God holds aloof, these days.”
For a minute Laura peered up at him, letting the full import of his words sink into her dazed brain. Then, sensing the tragic inevitability of what must be, she turned, ran down the steps and along the rain-swept path.
He dared not call after her, to bid her take no desperate measures, for fear of waking the captain – the captain, at that very moment shivering inside the window, transfixed by spikes of suffering that nailed him to his cross of Calvary. In silence he watched her, storm-driven like a wraith, grow dim through the rain till she vanished from his sight.
Alone, Dr. Filhiol sank heavily into a wet chair. There he remained, thinking deep and terrible things that wring the heart of man.
And the captain, what of him?
Dazed, staggered, he groped toward the desk. From the drawer he took the slip of paper bearing the combination. With an effort that taxed all his strength he opened the safe, opened the money-compartment. His trembling fingers caught up the few remaining bills there.
“God above!” he gulped.
Then all at once a change, a swift metamorphosis of wrath and outraged love swept over him. He seemed to freeze into a stern, avenging figure, huge of shoulder, hard of fist. The bulk of him loomed vast, in that enfolding bathrobe like a Roman patrician’s toga, as he strode through the door and up the stairs.
Silent and grim, he struck Hal’s door with his fist. The door resisted. One lunge of the shoulder, and the lock burst.
Hal stood there in corduroy trousers, heavy gray reefer and oilskin hat. Two strapped suit-cases stood by the bureau. Over the floor, the bed, lay a litter of discarded clothes and papers.
“What the hell!” cried the thief, clenching angry fists.
“You, sir!” exclaimed old Captain Briggs, in a voice the boy had never yet heard. “Stand where you are! I have to speak with you!”
Not even the effrontery of Hal’s bold eyes could quite meet that blue, piercing look. Had the old man, he wondered, a revolver? Was he minded now to kill? In that terrible and accusing face, he saw what Alpheus Briggs had been in the old, barbarous days. The brute in him recognized the dormant passions of his grandfather, now rekindling. And, though he tried to mask his soul, the fear in it spied through his glance.
“You snake!” the captain flung at him. “You lying Judas!”
“Go easy there!” Hal menaced. That he had been drinking was obvious. The scent of liquor filled the room, abomination in the old man’s nostrils. “Go easy! I’m not taking any such talk from any man, even if he is my grandfather!”
“You’ll take all I have to say, and you can lay to that, sir!” retorted the old man. Toward Hal he advanced, fists doubled. The boy cast about him for some weapon. Not for all his strength did he dare stand against this overpowering old man.
Below, on the porch, the doctor had heard sounds of war, and had pegged into the hall at his best speed. There he met Ezra, who had just come from the cabin.
“Great gulls! The safe’s open – the cap’n – knows! Hell’s loose now!” Ezra gasped.
He made for the stairs. The doctor tried to clutch him back.
“No use, Ezra! Too late – you can’t stop it now with all that nonsense about your being the thief!”
“Let me up them stairs, damn you!”
“Never! They’ve got to settle this themselves. You’ll only make things worse!”
With an oath, a violent wrench, Ezra tore himself away, and scrambled up the stairs.
“Cap’n Briggs! Hal!” he shouted, torn by conflicting loves. “Wait on, both o’ ye. I done it —nobody but me– ”
“There now, how does that strike you?” sneered Hal, respited by the shock of this self-accusation that dropped the captain’s fists. “The son-of-a-sea-cook owns up to it, himself!”
“Me, me, nobody but me!” vociferated Ezra, who had now reached the room. He clawed at the captain’s arm. “Not him, cap’n! Me!”
“If that’s true, Ezra, how the devil does Hal, here, know what you’re talking about, so slick?”
“Ezra lent me five hundred, when it comes to that,” put in Hal, “and told me it was his savings. But I see now – he stole it, the damned, black-hearted thief! Didn’t you, Ezra?”
“Sure, sure! Cap’n, you listen to me now. Hal, he never – ”
“Ezra,” said old Briggs, holding his rage in check, “you’re wonderful!” He laid a hand of affection on the shoulder of the trembling old man. “It’s your heart and soul that’s speaking falsehood – falsehood more white and shining than God’s truth. But I can’t take your word, given to shield this serpent we’ve been nursing in our bosom. I know all about everything now. I know why Hal robbed me.”
“Like hell you do!” the boy blared out.
“Yes, even the name of the very boat he’s bought with my hard-saved money. Money that was meant to help him up and on again. It’s no use your lying to me, Ezra.” He pointed a steady, accusing finger. “There’s the thief, Ezra, standing right before you – standing there for the last time he’ll ever stand under this roof of mine, so help me God!”
“Cap’n, cap’n,” implored the old man sinking to his knees, hands clasped, face streaming tears. “Don’t say that! Oh, Lord, don’t, don’t say that!”
“I don’t give a damn what the old stiff says now,” sneered Hal, picking up his baggage. His red face was brutalized with rage and drink. “Let him go to it. He said a mouthful when he said I grabbed the coin. Sure I did – and I’m only sorry it wasn’t more. Wish I’d grabbed it all! I’d like to have cleaned the old tightwad for a decent roll, while I was at it!”
“Hal! Master Hal!”
The doctor, listening from below, quivered with rage, but held himself in check. What, after all, could his weak body accomplish? And as for speech, that was not needed now.
“Get out o’ my way, the pair o’ you, and let me blow out o’ this namby-pamby, Sunday-school dump!” snarled Hal, shouldering forward. “I’m quitting. I told you yesterday I was sick of all this grandpa’s-darling stuff. If I can’t get out and live, I’ll cash in my checks. College – apologies – white flannels —urrgh!”
The growl in his deep chest and sinewed throat was that of a wolf. Silent, cold, unmoved now, the old captain studied him.
“None o’ that for mine, thanks!” Hal threw at him with insolence supreme. “Wait till I catch McLaughlin! I’ll apologize to him! Say! I’ve already apologized to three of his men, and Mac’ll get it, triple-extract. And then I’ll blow. I’ve got a classy boat that can walk some, and let ’em try to stop me, if they want to. I’m not afraid of you, or any man in this town, or in the world!”
He dropped one of the suit-cases, raised his right arm and swelled the formidable biceps, glorying in the brute power of his arm, his trip-hammer fist.
“Afraid? Not while I’ve got this! Go ahead and try to get me arrested, if you think fit. It’ll take more than Albert Mills to pinch me, or Squire Bean to hold me for trial – it’ll take more than any jail in this town to keep me!
“Now I’ve said all I’m going to, except that I took the coin. Yes, I took it. And I’ll take more wherever I find it. Money, booze, women – I’ll take ’em all. They’re mine, if I can get ’em. That’s all. To hell with everything that stands in my way! You two get out of it now before I throw you out!”
He brutally struck the kneeling old Ezra down and picked up the suit-cases. The captain quivered with the strain of holding his hand from slaughter, and stood aside. Not one word did he speak.
Hal blundered out into the passageway, and, panting with rage, started to descend the stairs.
Old Ezra, crawling on hands and knees, tried to follow.
“Hal! Master Hal, come back! I got money! I’ll – I’ll pay!”
The captain lifted him, held him with an arm of steel.
“Silence, Ezra! Remember, we’re not children. We’re old deep-water sailormen, you and I. This is mutiny. The boy has chosen. It’s all over.”
Ezra sank into a chair, covered his face and burst into convulsive sobs, rocking himself to and fro in the excess of his grief.
Alpheus Briggs walked to the top of the stairs, and silently watched Hal descend. At the bottom, Dr. Filhiol confronted the swearing, murderous fellow. He, too, kept silence. Only he stood back a little, avoiding Hal as if the very breath of him were poison.
Hal flung a sneer at him with bared teeth, and paused a moment at the door leading into the cabin. A thought came to his brain, crazed with whisky, rage and the obscure hereditary curse that lay upon him. Something seemed whispering a command to him, irrational enough, yet wholly compelling.
To the fireplace Hal strode, snatched down the kris, opened one of the suit-cases, and threw the weapon in. He locked the case again, and slouched out on to the piazza, defiantly and viciously.
“Might come handy, that knife, if the fists didn’t get away with the goods,” he muttered. “Take it along, anyhow!”
The Airedale, hearing Hal’s step, got up and fawned against him. Hal, with an obscene oath, kicked the animal.
“Get out o’ my way, you – ” he growled. The dog, yelping, still cringed after him as he descended the steps. Mad with the blind passion that kills, Hal flung down his suit-cases, snatched up the dog and dashed it down on the steps with horrible force.
“Damn you, don’t you touch that dog again!” shouted old Dr. Filhiol, hobbling out the door.
He brandished his cane. In his pale face flamed holy rage. With a boisterous, horrible laugh, Hal snatched the cane from him, snapped it with one flirt of his huge hands, and threw the pieces into the doctor’s face.
The dog, still crying out with the pain of a broken leg, tried to drag himself to Hal. Another oath, a kick, and Ruddy sprawled along the porch.
“I’ve fixed you a while, you fossil quack!” gibed Hal at the doctor. “Maybe you’ll butt in again where you’re not wanted! Lucky for you I’m in a hurry now, or I’d do a better job!”
Again Hal picked up his cases, and strode down the walk, against the rain and gale. At the gate he paused, triumphant.