CHAPTER 24
THE LIFE-BOOK OF CAPTAIN JIM
"I have a little brown cocoon of an idea that may
possibly expand into a magnificent moth of
fulfilment," Anne told Gilbert when she reached home.
He had returned earlier than she had expected, and was
enjoying Susan's cherry pie. Susan herself hovered in
the background, like a rather grim but beneficent
guardian spirit, and found as much pleasure in watching
Gilbert eat pie as he did in eating it.
"What is your idea?" he asked.
"I sha'n't tell you just yet--not till I see if I can
bring the thing about."
"What sort of a chap is Ford?"
"Oh, very nice, and quite good-looking."
"Such beautiful ears, doctor, dear," interjected Susan
with a relish.
"He is about thirty or thirty-five, I think, and he
meditates writing a novel. His voice is pleasant and
his smile delightful, and he knows how to dress. He
looks as if life hadn't been altogether easy for him,
somehow."
Owen Ford came over the next evening with a note to
Anne from Leslie; they spent the sunset time in the
garden and then went for a moonlit sail on the harbor,
in the little boat Gilbert had set up for summer
outings. They liked Owen immensely and had that
feeling of having known him for many years which
distinguishes the freemasonry of the house of Joseph.
"He is as nice as his ears, Mrs. Doctor, dear," said
Susan, when he had gone. He had told Susan that he had
never tasted anything like her strawberry shortcake and
Susan's susceptible heart was his forever.
"He has got a way with him." she reflected, as she
cleared up the relics of the supper. "It is real queer
he is not married, for a man like that could have
anybody for the asking. Well, maybe he is like me, and
has not met the right one yet."
Susan really grew quite romantic in her musings as she
washed the supper dishes.
Two nights later Anne took Owen Ford down to Four Winds
Point to introduce him to Captain Jim. The clover
fields along the harbor shore were whitening in the
western wind, and Captain Jim had one of his finest
sunsets on exhibition. He himself had just returned
from a trip over the harbor.
"I had to go over and tell Henry Pollack he was dying.
Everybody else was afraid to tell him. They expected
he'd take on turrible, for he's been dreadful
determined to live, and been making no end of plans for
the fall. His wife thought he oughter be told and that
I'd be the best one to break it to him that he couldn't
get better. Henry and me are old cronies--we sailed in
the Gray Gull for years together. Well, I went over
and sat down by Henry's bed and I says to him, says I,
jest right out plain and simple, for if a thing's got
to be told it may as well be told first as last, says
I, `Mate, I reckon you've got your sailing orders this
time,' I was sorter quaking inside, for it's an awful
thing to have to tell a man who hain't any idea he's
dying that he is. But lo and behold, Mistress Blythe,
Henry looks up at me, with those bright old black eyes
of his in his wizened face and says, says he, `Tell me
something I don't know, Jim Boyd, if you want to give
me information. I've known THAT for a week.' I was
too astonished to speak, and Henry, he chuckled. `To
see you coming in here,' says he, `with your face as
solemn as a tombstone and sitting down there with your
hands clasped over your stomach, and passing me out a
blue-mouldy old item of news like that! It'd make a
cat laugh, Jim Boyd,' says he. `Who told you?' says I,
stupid like. `Nobody,' says he. `A week ago Tuesday
night I was lying here awake--and I jest knew. I'd
suspicioned it before, but then I KNEW. I've been
keeping up for the wife's sake. And I'd LIKE to have
got that barn built, for Eben'll never get it right.
But anyhow, now that you've eased your mind, Jim, put
on a smile and tell me something interesting,' Well,
there it was. They'd been so scared to tell him and he
knew it all the time. Strange how nature looks out for
us, ain't it, and lets us know what we should know when
the time comes? Did I never tell you the yarn about
Henry getting the fish hook in his nose, Mistress
Blythe?"
"No."
"Well, him and me had a laugh over it today. It
happened nigh unto thirty years ago. Him and me and
several more was out mackerel fishing one day. It was
a great day--never saw such a school of mackerel in
the gulf--and in the general excitement Henry got quite
wild and contrived to stick a fish hook clean through
one side of his nose. Well, there he was; there was
barb on one end and a big piece of lead on the other,
so it couldn't be pulled out. We wanted to take him
ashore at once, but Henry was game; he said he'd be
jiggered if he'd leave a school like that for anything
short of lockjaw; then he kept fishing away, hauling in
hand over fist and groaning between times. Fin'lly the
school passed and we come in with a load; I got a file
and begun to try to file through that hook. I tried to
be as easy as I could, but you should have heard
Henry--no, you shouldn't either. It was well no ladies
were around. Henry wasn't a swearing man, but he'd
heard some few matters of that sort along shore in his
time, and he fished 'em all out of his recollection and
hurled 'em at me. Fin'lly he declared he couldn't
stand it and I had no bowels of compassion. So we
hitched up and I drove him to a doctor in
Charlottetown, thirty-five miles--there weren't none
nearer in them days--with that blessed hook still
hanging from his nose. When we got there old Dr. Crabb
jest took a file and filed that hook jest the same as
I'd tried to do, only he weren't a mite particular
about doing it easy!"
Captain Jim's visit to his old friend had revived many
recollections and he was now in the full tide of
reminiscences.
"Henry was asking me today if I remembered the time old
Father Chiniquy blessed Alexander MacAllister's boat.
Another odd yarn--and true as gospel. I was in the
boat myself. We went out, him and me, in Alexander
MacAllister's boat one morning at sunrise. Besides,
there was a French boy in the boat--Catholic of course.
You know old Father Chiniquy had turned Protestant, so
the Catholics hadn't much use for him. Well, we sat
out in the gulf in the broiling sun till noon, and not
a bite did we get. When we went ashore old Father
Chiniquy had to go, so he said in that polite way of
his, `I'm very sorry I cannot go out with you dis
afternoon, Mr. MacAllister, but I leave you my
blessing. You will catch a t'ousand dis afternoon.
`Well, we did not catch a thousand, but we caught
exactly nine hundred and ninety-nine--the biggest catch
for a small boat on the whole north shore that summer.
Curious, wasn't it? Alexander MacAllister, he says to
Andrew Peters, `Well, and what do you think of Father
Chiniquy now?' `Vell,' growled Andrew, `I t'ink de old
devil has got a blessing left yet.' Laws, how Henry
did laugh over that today!"
"Do you know who Mr. Ford is, Captain Jim?" asked
Anne, seeing that Captain Jim's fountain of
reminiscence had run out for the present. "I want you
to guess."
Captain Jim shook his head.
"I never was any hand at guessing, Mistress Blythe, and
yet somehow when I come in I thought, `Where have I
seen them eyes before?'--for I HAVE seen 'em."
"Think of a September morning many years ago," said
Anne, softly. "Think of a ship sailing up the
harbor--a ship long waited for and despaired of. Think
of the day the Royal William came in and the first
look you had at the schoolmaster's bride."
Captain Jim sprang up.
"They're Persis Selwyn's eyes," he almost shouted.
"You can't be her son--you must be her--"
"Grandson; yes, I am Alice Selwyn's son."
Captain Jim swooped down on Owen Ford and shook his
hand over again.
"Alice Selwyn's son! Lord, but you're welcome! Many's
the time I've wondered where the descendants of the
schoolmaster were living. I knew there was none on the
Island. Alice--Alice--the first baby ever born in that
little house. No baby ever brought more joy! I've
dandled her a hundred times. It was from my knee she
took her first steps alone. Can't I see her mother's
face watching her--and it was near sixty years ago. Is
she living yet?"
"No, she died when I was only a boy."
"Oh, it doesn't seem right that I should be living to
hear that," sighed Captain Jim. "But I'm heart-glad
to see you. It's brought back my youth for a little
while. You don't know yet what a boon THAT is.
Mistress Blythe here has the trick--she does it quite
often for me."
Captain Jim was still more excited when he discovered
that Owen Ford was what he called a "real writing
man." He gazed at him as at a superior being.
Captain Jim knew that Anne wrote, but he had never
taken that fact very seriously. Captain Jim thought
women were delightful creatures, who ought to have the
vote, and everything else they wanted, bless their
hearts; but he did not believe they could write.
"Jest look at A Mad Love," he would protest. "A woman
wrote that and jest look at it--one hundred and three
chapters when it could all have been told in ten. A
writing woman never knows when to stop; that's the
trouble. The p'int of good writing is to know when to
stop."
"Mr. Ford wants to hear some of your stories, Captain
Jim" said Anne. "Tell him the one about the captain
who went crazy and imagined he was the Flying
Dutchman."
This was Captain Jim's best story. It was a compound
of horror and humor, and though Anne had heard it
several times she laughed as heartily and shivered as
fearsomely over it as Mr. Ford did. Other tales
followed, for Captain Jim had an audience after his own
heart. He told how his vessel had been run down by a
steamer; how he had been boarded by Malay pirates; how
his ship had caught fire; how he helped a political
prisoner escape from a South African republic; how he
had been wrecked one fall on the Magdalens and stranded
there for the winter; how a tiger had broken loose on
board ship; how his crew had mutinied and marooned him
on a barren island--these and many other tales, tragic
or humorous or grotesque, did Captain Jim relate. The
mystery of the sea, the fascination of far lands, the
lure of adventure, the laughter of the world--his
hearers felt and realised them all. Owen Ford
listened, with his head on his hand, and the First
Mate purring on his knee, his brilliant eyes fastened
on Captain Jim's rugged, eloquent face.
"Won't you let Mr. Ford see your life-book, Captain
Jim?" asked Anne, when Captain Jim finally declared
that yarn-spinning must end for the time.
"Oh, he don't want to be bothered with THAT,"
protested Captain Jim, who was secretly dying to show
it.
"I should like nothing better than to see it, Captain
Boyd," said Owen. "If it is half as wonderful as your
tales it will be worth seeing."
With pretended reluctance Captain Jim dug his life-book
out of his old chest and handed it to Owen.
"I reckon you won't care to wrastle long with my old
hand o' write. I never had much schooling," he
observed carelessly. "Just wrote that there to amuse
my nephew Joe. He's always wanting stories. Comes
here yesterday and says to me, reproachful-like, as I
was lifting a twenty-pound codfish out of my boat,
`Uncle Jim, ain't a codfish a dumb animal?' I'd been
a-telling him, you see, that he must be real kind to
dumb animals, and never hurt 'em in any way. I got out
of the scrape by saying a codfish was dumb enough but
it wasn't an animal, but Joe didn't look satisfied, and
I wasn't satisfied myself. You've got to be mighty
careful what you tell them little critters. THEY can
see through you."
While talking, Captain Jim watched Owen Ford from the
corner of his eye as the latter examined the life-book;
and presently observing that his guest was lost in its
pages, he turned smilingly to his cupboard and
proceeded to make a pot of tea. Owen Ford separated
himself from the life-book, with as much reluctance as
a miser wrenches himself from his gold, long enough to
drink his tea, and then returned to it hungrily.
"Oh, you can take that thing home with you if you want
to," said Captain Jim, as if the "thing" were not his
most treasured possession. "I must go down and pull my
boat up a bit on the skids. There's a wind coming.
Did you notice the sky tonight?
Mackerel skies and mares' tails Make tall ships
carry short sails."
Owen Ford accepted the offer of the life-book gladly.
On their way home Anne told him the story of lost
Margaret.
"That old captain is a wonderful old fellow," he said.
"What a life he has led! Why, the man had more
adventures in one week of his life than most of us have
in a lifetime. Do you really think his tales are all
true?"
"I certainly do. I am sure Captain Jim could not tell
a lie; and besides, all the people about here say that
everything happened as he relates it. There used to be
plenty of his old shipmates alive to corroborate him.
He's one of the last of the old type of P.E. Island
sea-captains. They are almost extinct now."
