The Cruise of the Shining Light

“Dannie,” says she, in private, “God wouldn’t ’low un more’n a quarter of a inch at a time.”

“’Twas in the pantry while I got the bottle.”

“An’ how,” quoth I, “is you knowin’ that?”

“Why, child,” she answered, “God tol’ me so.”

I writhed. ’Twas a fancy so strange the maid had: but was yet so true and reverent and usefully efficient–so high in leading to her who led us with her into pure paths–that I must smile and adore her for it. ’Twas to no purpose, as I knew, to thresh over the improbability of the communication: Judith’s eyes were round and clear and unwavering–full of most exalted truth, concern, and confidence. There was no pretence anywhere to be descried in their depths: nor evil nor subterfuge of any sort. And it seems to me, now, grown as I am to sager years, that had the Guide whose hand she held upon the rough road of her life communed with His sweet companion, ’twould have been no word of reproach or direction he would whisper for her, who needed none, possessing all the wisdom of virtue, dear heart! but a warning in my uncle’s behalf, as she would have it, against the bottle he served. The maid’s whimsical fancy is not incomprehensible to me, neither tainted with irreverence nor untruth: ’twas a thing flowering in the eyrie garden of her days at Whisper Cove–a thing, as I cannot doubt, of highest inspiration.

“But,” I protested, glibly, looking away, most wishful, indeed, to save my uncle pain, “I isn’t able t’ measure a quarter of a inch.”

“I could,” says she.

“Not with the naked eye, maid!”

“Well,” says she, “you might try, jus’ t’ please God.”

To be sure I might: I might pour at a guess. But, unhappily (and it may be that there is some philosophy in this for a self-indulgent world), I was not in awe of Judith’s fantastic conception of divinity, whatever I thought of my own, by whom, however, I was not conjured. Moreover, I loved my uncle, who had continued to make me happy all my life, and would venture far in the service of his comfort. The twinkling, benevolent aspect of the maid’s Deity could not compel a lad to righteousness: I could with perfect complacency conduct myself perversely before it. And must we then, lads and men, worship a God of wrath, quick to punish, niggardly in fatherly forgiveness, lest we stray into evil ways? I do not know. ’Tis beyond me to guess the change to be worked in the world by a new conception of the eternal attributes.

“An’ will you not?” says she.

It chanced, now, that she held the lamp near her face, so that her beauty was illumined and transfigured. ’Twas a beauty most tender–most pure and elfin and religious. ’Tis a mean, poor justification, I know, to say that I was in some mysterious way–by the magic resident in the beauty of a maid, and virulently, wickedly active within its sphere, which is the space the vision of a lad may carry–that I was by this magic incapacitated and overcome. ’Tis an excuse made by fallen lads since treason was writ of; ’tis a mere excuse, ennobling no traitorious act: since love, to be sure, has no precedence of loyalty in hearts of truth and manful aspiration. Love? surely it walks with glorious modesty in the train of honor–or is a brazen baggage. But, as it unhappily chanced, whatever the academic conception, the maid held the lamp too close for my salvation: so close that her blue, shadowy eyes bewildered me, and her lips, red and moist, with a gleam of white teeth between, I recall, tempted me quite beyond the endurance of self-respect. I slipped, indeed, most sadly in the path, and came a shamefaced, ridiculous cropper.

“An’ will you not,” says she, “pour but a quarter of a inch t’ the glass?”

“I will,” I swore, “for a kiss!”

’Twas an outrageous betrayal of my uncle.

“For shame!” cries she.

“I will for a kiss,” I repeated, my soul offered on a platter to the devil, “regardless o’ the consequences.”

She matched my long words with a great one caught from my tutor. “God isn’t inclined,” says she, with a toss, “in favor o’ kisses.”

And there you had it!

When we sat late, our maid-servant would indignantly whisk Judith off to bed–crying out upon us for our wickedness.

“Cather,” my uncle would drawl, Judith being gone, “ye’re all wore out along o’ too much study.”

“Not at all, Skipper Nicholas!” cries my tutor.

“Study,” says my uncle, in solemn commiseration, “is a bitter thing t’ be cotched by. Ye’re all wore out, parson, along o’ the day’s work.”

My tutor laughed.

“Too much study for the brain,” says my uncle, sympathetically, his eye on the bottle. “I ’low, parson, if I was you I’d turn in.”

Cather was unfailingly obedient.

“Dannie,” says my uncle, with reviving interest, “have he gone above?”

“He have,” says I.

“Take a look,” he whispered, “t’ see that Judy’s stowed away beyond hearin’.”

I would step into the hall–where was no nightgowned figure listening on the stair–to reassure him.

“Dannie,” says he, wickedly gleeful, “how’s the bottle?”

I would hold it up to the lamp and rattle its contents. “’Tis still stout, sir,” says I. “’Tis a wonderful bottle.”

“Stout!” cries he, delighted. “Very good.”

“Still stout,” says I; “an’ the third night!”

“Then,” says he, pushing his glass towards me, “I ’low they’s no real need o’ puttin’ me on short allowance. Be liberal, Dannie, b’y–be liberal when ye pours.”

I would be liberal.

“’Tis somehow sort o’ comfortable, lad,” says he, eying me with honest feeling, “t’ be sittin’ down here with a ol’ chum like you. ’Tis very good, indeed.”

I was glad that he thought so.

And now I must tell that I loved Judith. ’Tis enough to say so–to write the bare words down. I’m not wanting to, to be sure: for it shames a man to speak boldly of sacred things like this. It shames a lad, it shames a maid, to expose the heart of either, save sacredly to each other. ’Tis all well enough, and most delightful, when the path is moonlit and secluded, when the warmth and thrill of a slender hand may be felt, when the stars wink tender encouragement from the depths of God’s own firmament, when all the world is hushed to make the opportunity: ’tis then all well enough to speak of love. There is nothing, I know, to compare in ecstasy with the whisper and sigh and clinging touch of that time–to compare with the awe and mystery and solemnity of it. But ’tis sacrilegious and most desperately difficult and embarrassing, I find, at this distant day, to write of it. I had thought much upon love, at that wise age–fifteen, it was, I fancy–and it seemed to me, I recall, a thing to cherish within the heart of a man, to hide as a treasure, to dwell upon, alone, in moments of purest exaltation. ’Twas not a thing to bandy about where punts lay tossing in the lap of the sea; ’twas not a thing to tell the green, secretive old hills of Twin Islands; ’twas not a thing to which the doors of the workaday world might be opened, lest the ribaldry to which it come offend and wound it: ’twas a thing to conceal, far and deep, from the common gaze and comment, from the vulgar chances, the laugh and cynical exhaustion and bleared wit of the life we live. I loved Judith–her eyes and tawny hair and slender finger-tips, her whimsical way, her religious, loving soul. I loved her; and I would not have you think ’twas any failure of adoration to pour my uncle an honest dram of rum when she was stowed away in innocency of all the evil under the moon. ’Tis a thing that maids have nothing to do with, thinks I; ’tis a knowledge, indeed, that would defile them…

“Dannie,” says my uncle, once, when we were left alone, “he’ve begun t’ fall.”

I was mystified.

“The parson,” he explained, in a radiant whisper; “he’ve begun t’ yield.”

“T’ what?” I demanded.

“Temptation. He’ve a dark eye, lad, as I ’lowed long ago, an’ he’ve begun t’ give way t’ argument.”

“God’s sake, Uncle Nick!” I cried, “leave the poor man be. He’ve done no harm.”

He scratched his stubble of hair, and contemplatively traced a crimson scar with his forefinger. “No,” he mused, his puckered, weathered brow in a doubtful frown; “not so far. But,” he added, looking cheerily up, “I’ve hopes that I’ll manage un yet.”

“Leave un alone,” I pleaded.

“Ay,” says he, with a hitch of his wooden leg; “but I needs un.”

I protested.

“Ye don’t s’pose, Dannie,” he complained, in a righteous flash, “that I’m able t’ live forever, does ye?”

I did not, but heartily wished he might; and by this sincere expression he was immediately mollified.

“Well,” says he, his left eyelid drooping in a knowing way, his whole round person, from his topmost bristle to his gouty wooden toe, braced to receive the shock of my congratulation, “I’ve gone an’ worked that there black-an’-white young parson along! Sir Harry hisself,” he declared, “couldn’t have done it no better. Nor ol’ Skipper Chesterfield, neither,” says he.

’Twas a pity.

“No,” he boasted, defiantly; “nor none o’ them wise ol’ bullies of old!”

I sighed.

“Dannie,” says he, with the air of imparting a grateful secret, “I got that there black-an’-white young parson corrupted. I got un,” he repeated, leaning forward, his fantastic countenance alight with pride and satisfaction–“I got un corrupted! I’ve got un t’ say,” says he, “that ’tis sometimes wise t’ do evil that good may come. An’ when a young feller says that,” says he, with a grave, grave nodding, so that his disfigurements were all most curiously elongated, “he’ve sold his poor, mean soul t’ the devil.”

“I wisht,” I complained, “that you’d leave the poor man alone.”

“Why, Dannie,” says my uncle, simply, “he’s paid for!”

“Paid for!” cries I.

“Ay, lad,” he chided; “t’ be sure, that there young black-an’-white parson is paid for.”

I wondered how that might be.

“Paid for!” my uncle repeated, in a quivering, indrawn breath, the man having fallen, all at once, into gloom and terror. “’Tis all paid for!”

Here again was the disquieting puzzle of my childish years: my uncle, having now leaned forward to come close to me, was in a spasmodic way indicating the bowels of the earth with a turned thumb. Down, down: it seemed he pointed to infinite depths of space and woe. Down, down–continuing thus, with a slow, grevious wagging of the great, gray head the sea had in the brutal passion of some wild night maltreated. The familiar things of the room, the simple, companionable furniture of that known place, with the geometrically tempestuous ocean framed beyond, were resolved into a background of mysterious shadows as I stared; there was nothing left within the circle of my vision but a scared gargoyle, leaning into the red glow of the fire. My uncle’s round little eyes protruded–started from the bristles and purpling scars and brown flesh of his broad face–as many a time before I had in sad bewilderment watched them do. Paid for–all the pride and comfort and strange advantages of my life! All paid for in the black heart of this mystery! And John Cather, too! I wondered again, with an eye upon my uncle’s significantly active thumb, having no courage to meet his poignant glance, how that might be. According to my catechism, severely taught in other years, I must ask no questions, but must courteously await enlightenment at my uncle’s pleasure; and ’twas most marvellously hard–this night of all the nights–to keep my soul unspotted from the sin of inquisitiveness.

“Paid for,” my uncle repeated, hoarse with awe, “by poor Tom Callaway!”

’Twas kind in my father, thinks I, to provide thus bounteously for my welfare.

“Poor Tom!” my uncle sighed, now recovering his composure. “Poor, poor ol’ Tom–in the place he’s to!”

“Still an’ all, Uncle Nick,” I blundered, “I wisht you’d leave my tutor be.”

“Ye’re but a child!” he snapped. “Put the stopper in the bottle. ’Tis time you was in bed.”

’Twas an unexpected rebuke. I was made angry with him, for the only time in all my life; and to revenge myself I held the bottle to the lamp, and deliberately measured its contents, before his astonished eyes, so that, though I left it with him, he could not drink another drop without my knowing it; and I stoppered the bottle, as tight as I was able, and left him to get his wooden toe from the stool with the least agony he could manage, and would not bank the fire or light his night-lamp. I loved my tutor, and would not have him corrupted; ’twas a hateful thought to conceive that he might come unwittingly to ruin at our hands. ’Twas a shame in my old uncle, thinks I, to fetch him to despair. John Cather’s soul bargained for and bought! ’Twas indeed a shame to say it. There was no evil in him when he came clear-eyed from the great world beyond us; there should be no evil in him when he left us, whenever that might be, to renew the life he would not tell us of. I looked my uncle in the eye in a way that hurt and puzzled him. I wish I had not; but I did, as I pounded the cork home, and boldly slipped the screw into my pocket. He would go on short allowance, that night, thinks I: for his nails, broken by toil, would never pick the stopper out. And I prepared, in a rage, to fling out of the room, when–

“Dannie!” he called.

I halted.

“What’s this?” says he, gently. “It never happened afore, little shipmate, betwixt you an’ me. What’s this?” he begged. “I’m troubled.”

I pulled the cork of his bottle, and poured a dram, most liberally, to delight his heart; and I must turn my face away, somehow, to hide it from him, because of shame for this mean doubt of him, ungenerous and ill-begotten.

“I’m troubled,” he repeated. “What’s this, lad?”

I could not answer him.

“Is I been unkind, Dannie?”

“No,” I sobbed. “’Tis that I’ve been wicked t’ you!”

He looked at me with eyes grown very grave. “Ah!” says he, presently, comprehending. “That’s good,” says he, in his slow, gentle way. “That’s very good. But ye’ll fret no more, will ye, Dannie? An’ ye’ve growed too old t’ cry. Go t’ bed, lad. Ye’re all wore out. I’ll manage the lamp alone. God bless ye. Go t’ bed.”

I waited.

“That’s good,” he repeated, in a muse, staring deep into the red coals in the grate. “That’s very good.”

I ran away–closed my door upon this wretched behavior, but could not shut its ghastly sauciness and treachery from the chambers of my memory. The habit of faith and affection was strong: I was no longer concerned for my friend John Cather, but was mightily ashamed of this failure in duty to the grotesque old hook-and-line man who had without reserve of sacrifice or strength nourished me to the lusty years of that night. As I lay in bed, I recall, downcast, self-accusing, flushed with shame, I watched the low clouds scud across the starlit sky, and I perceived, while the torn, wind-harried masses rushed restlessly on below the high, quiet firmament, that I had fallen far away from the serenity my uncle would teach me to preserve in every fortune.

“I’ll not fail again!” thinks I. “Not I!”

’Twas an experience profitable or unprofitable, as you shall presently judge.