SELF-SACRIFICE

The rapidly increasing northeast storm, that meant so little to Hal Briggs, thoroughly drenched and chilled the old captain long before he reached home.

By the time he had navigated back to Snug Haven, he was wet to the bone, and was shivering with the drive of the gale now piling gray lines of breakers along the shore. Dr. Filhiol, his face very hard, met the old captain at the front door; while Ezra—silent, dejected, with acute misery and fear—took the ancient horse away up the puddled lane.

“This is outrageous, captain!” the doctor expostulated. “The idea of your exposing yourself this way at your age!”

“Where’s Hal?” shivered the captain. “I’ve got to see Hal! G-g-got to tell him all his debts are paid, and he’s a free man again!”

“You’re hoarse as a frog, sir; you’ve got a thundering cold!” chided the doctor. “I order you to bed, sir, where I’ll give you a stiff glass of whisky and lemon, and sweat you properly.”

“Nonsense!” chattered the captain. “I’ll j-j-just change my clothes, and sit by the fire, and I’ll be all r-r-right. Where’s Hal? I want Hal!”

“Hal? How do I know?” demanded Filhiol. “He’s gone. Where’s he bound for? No good, I’ll warrant, in this storm. It shows how much he cares, what you do for him, the way he—”

“By the Judas priest, sir!” interrupted Briggs. “I’m not going to have anything said against Hal, now he’s free. I know you’re my guest, doctor, but don’t drive me too far!”

“Well, I’ll say no more. But now, into your bunk! There’s no argument about that, anyhow. Bathrobe and hot water-bottle now, and a good tot of rum!”

The captain had to yield. A quarter-hour later the doctor had him safely tucked into his berth in the cabin, with whisky and lemon aboard him. “There, that’s better,” approved Filhiol. “You’ll do now, unless you get up, and take another chill. I want you to stay right there till to-morrow at the very least. Understand me? Now, I prescribe a nap for you. And a good sweat, and by to-morrow you’ll be fine as silk.”

“All right, doctor,” agreed Briggs, though Hal’s absence troubled him sore. “There’s only one thing I want you to do. Put my receipts in the safe.”

“What receipts?”

“For the cash I paid Squire Bean and for the money-order I sent the college.”

“Where are they?”

“In my wallet, there, in that inside coat-pocket,” answered Briggs, pointing to the big blue coat hung over a chair by the fire. “The combination of the safe is in that top drawer, on a slip of paper. You can open the safe easy enough.”

“All right, anything to please you,” grumbled the old doctor. “Where shall I put the receipts, captain?”

“In the cash-drawer. Inner drawer, top, right.”

Filhiol located the drawer and dropped the precious receipts into it. His eyes, that could still see quite plainly by the fading, gray light of the stormy late afternoon, descried a few bills in the drawer.

“It’s been a terrible expense to you, captain,” said he with the license of long years of acquaintanceship. “Down a bit on the cash now, eh?”

“Yes, doctor, down a bit. Plims’l-mark’s under water this time. But I’m not foundering just yet. There’s still seven hundred and fifty or so.”

“Seven fifty?” asked the doctor, squinting. A sudden suspicion laid hold of him as he eyed the slender pile of bills. With crooked fingers he ran them over. “Why, there’s not—h-m! h-m!” he checked himself.

“Eh? What’s that, sir?” asked the captain, drowsy already.

“Nothing, sir,” answered Filhiol. “I was just going to say there’s not many as well fixed as you are, captain. Even though your cash is low, you’ve got a pretty comfortable place here.”

“Yes, yes, it’s pretty snug,” sleepily assented Briggs. “And now that Hal’s coming back, I’m happy. A few dollars—they don’t matter, eh?”

Hastily Filhiol counted the bills. Only a matter of about two hundred and twenty-five dollars remained. As in a flash the old doctor comprehended everything.

“Tss! Tss!” clucked the doctor, going a shade paler. But he said no more.

He closed the safe and put the combination back into the desk-drawer. For a moment he stood leaning on his cane, peering down at the captain, who was already going to sleep. Then he shook his head, grief and rage on his face.

“God!” he was thinking. “Robbery! On top of everything else, downright robbery! This will certainly kill the old man! What black devil is in that boy anyhow? What devil out of hell?”

He paused a moment, looking with profound compassion at the tired old captain. Then he limped out of the room, and made his way to the galley, bent on having speech with Ezra.

Down the walk from the barn Ezra was at this moment coming, shoulders bent against the storm, hat-brim trickling water. The rain was now slashing viciously, in pelting ribbons of gray water that drummed on the tin roof of the kitchen and danced in spatters on the walk.

Filhiol opened the door for Ezra, who peeled off his coat, and shook his wet hands.

“Great, creepin’ clams!” he puffed. “But this is some tidy wind, sir! These here Massachusetts storms can’t be beat, the way they pounce. An’ rain! Say! Must be a picnic somewhere nigh. Never rains like this unless there is one!”

The old man tried to smile, but joviality was lacking. He closed the door and came over to the stove. The doctor followed him.

“Ezra,” said he, “you don’t like me. No matter. You do like Captain Briggs, don’t you?”

“That ain’t a question as needs answerin’,” returned Ezra, with suspicious eyes.

“I like the captain, too,” continued Filhiol. “We’ve got to join hands to help him. And he’s in very, very serious trouble now.”

“Well, what is it?” The old servitor sensed what was in the wind, and braced himself to meet it.

“If it came to choosing between Hal and the captain, which would you stand by?”

“That’s another question that ain’t needed!” retorted Ezra defiantly.

“It’s got to be answered, though. Something critical has happened, Ezra, and we’ve got to take the bull by the horns.”

“Better take the bull by the tail, doctor. Then you can let go without hollerin’ fer help.”

“This is no time for joking, Ezra! Something has happened that, if the captain finds it out, will have terrible consequences. If he discovers what’s happened, I can’t answer for the consequences. It might even kill him, the shock might.”

“Wha—what d’ you mean, sir?” demanded Ezra, going white. “What are you gammin’ about, anyhow?”

“I might as well tell you, directly. Captain Briggs has just been robbed of more than five hundred dollars.”

“Robbed! No! Holy haddock! You—don’t—”

“Robbed,” asserted Filhiol. “More than five hundred dollars are gone from the safe, and—Hal’s gone, too.”

“Dr. Filhiol, sir!” exclaimed the old man passionately, but in a low voice that could not reach the cabin. “That wun’t go here. You’re company, I know, but there’s some things that goes too doggone fur. Ef you mean to let on that Master Hal—”

“The money’s gone, I tell you, and so is Hal. I know that!”

“Yes, an’ I know Master Hal, too!” asseverated Ezra, manfully standing by his guns, not through any fear of Hal’s vengeance, but only for the honor of the house and of the boy he worshipped. “Ef you mean to accuse him of bein’ a thief, well then, me an’ you has nothin’ more to say. We’re docked, an’ crew an’ cargo is discharged right now. All done!”

“Hold on, Ezra!” commanded Filhiol. “I’m not making any direct accusation. All I’m saying is that the money and Hal are both gone.”

“How d’ you know the money’s gone? How come you to be at the cap’n’s safe an’ money-drawer?”

“I—why—” stammered Filhiol, taken aback. “Why, the captain had me open it, to put in some receipts, and he told me how much he thought was there. I saw he was mistaken, by more than five hundred.”

“Oh, you counted the cap’n’s money, did ye?” Ezra demanded boldly. “Well, that’s some nerve! In case it comes to a showdown, where would you fit? Looks like your fingers might git burned, don’t it?”

“Mine? What do you mean, sir?”

“Well, you was there, wa’n’t ye? An’ Master Hal wa’n’t, that’s all!” Swiftly Ezra was thinking. The loss, he knew, could not be kept from Captain Briggs. And Hal must be protected. Sudden inspiration dawned on him.

“How much d’ you say is gone?” demanded he.

“Five hundred and some odd dollars.”

“Yes, that’s right,” said the old man, nodding. “Them’s the correct figgers, all right enough.”

“How do you know?” exclaimed the doctor, staring.

“Why hadn’t I ought to, when I took that there money myself?”

“You?”

“Me, sir! I’m the one as stole it, an’ what’s more, I got it now, up-stairs in my trunk!”

Silence a moment while the doctor peered at him with wrinkled brow.

“That’s not true, Ezra,” said he at last, meeting the old man’s defiant look. “You’re lying now to shield that boy!”

“Lyin’, am I?” And Ezra reddened dully. “Dr. Filhiol, sir, ef you wa’n’t an old man, an’ hobblin’ on a cane, them ain’t the words you’d use to me, an’ go clear!”

“I—I beg your pardon, Ezra,” stammered the doctor. “I’m not saying it in a derogatory sense.”

“Rogatory or hogatory, don’t make a damn’s odds! You called me a liar!”

“A noble liar. That kind of a lie is noble, Ezra, but very foolish. I understand you, all right. When I say you’re trying to shield Hal, I’ve hit the mark.”

“You ain’t half the shot you think you be, sir! There’s lots o’ marksmen in this world can’t even make a gun go off, an’ yet they can’t miss fire in the next world. You’re one of ’em. I took the money, I tell ye, an’ I can prove it by showin’ it to you, in two minutes!”

The old man, turning, started for the stairs.

“Where are you going now?” demanded Filhiol.

“To git that there money!”

“Your own savings, no doubt? To shield Hal with?”

“The money I stole, an’ don’t ye fergit it neither!” retorted Ezra with a look so menacing that the doctor ventured no reply. In silence he watched the old man, wet clothes still clinging to him, plod up the stairs and disappear.

“Lord, if this isn’t a tangled web,” thought Filhiol, “what is? I ought never to have come. And yet I’m needed every minute, if a terrible catastrophe is to be turned aside!”

His heart contracted at thought of the inevitable shock to Captain Briggs if he should discover the theft. Could Ezra conceal it, even with his savings? And, if he could, would it not be best to let him? Would not anything be preferable to having the captain’s soul wrung out of him? Sudden hate against the cause of all this misery flared up in him.

“Great God!” he muttered. “If I only had that Hal for a patient, just one hour!”

The footsteps of Ezra, descending again, roused him. In Ezra’s hand was gripped a roll of bills, old and tattered for the most part—a roll that counted up to some five hundred and thirty dollars, or to within about forty dollars of every cent Ezra had in the world. More than fifteen years of hard-earned savings lay in that roll. This money Ezra had hastily dug from under a lot of old clothes in his trunk. And now he shook it before the eyes of Filhiol, eager to sacrifice it.

“Is that proof enough fer you now, or ain’t it?” Ezra exultantly demanded. “Dollar fer dollar, about, what the cap’n said had oughta be in the safe, an’ ain’t? Well, does that satisfy ye now?”

Filhiol had no answer. His brain was whirling. Ezra laughed in his face.

“I got your goat all right, old feller!” gibed he.

“Ezra,” said the doctor slowly, “I don’t understand this at all. I’m no detective. This is too much for me. Either you’re a monumental fool or a sublime hero. Maybe both. I can’t judge. All I want to do is look out for Captain Briggs. I was his medical officer in the old days. Now I seem to be back on the job again. That’s all.”

“Yes, an’ I’m on the job, too, an’ you’d better keep out o’ what don’t consarn ye,” menaced Ezra. “Every man to his job, an’ yours ain’t ratin’ down Master Hal an’ makin’ a thief of him!”

“All right, Ezra. Put the money in the safe. Whether it’s yours or not, doesn’t matter now. It will protect the captain’s peace of mind a little longer, and that’s the main thing now.”

Ezra nodded. Together they went quietly into the cabin. Watchfully they observed the captain. Face to the wall, he was profoundly sleeping.

“It’s all right,” said Filhiol. “You can open the safe and put the money in.”

Ezra advanced to it, on tiptoe. But Ezra did not open the safe. Puzzled, he stopped and whispered:

“I—doggone it, I’ve fergot the combination now!”

“Have, eh?” asked Filhiol with a sharp look. “Well then, all you’ve got to do is look at the paper.”

“The—h-m!”

“Of course you know he keeps it on a paper?” said the doctor shrewdly.

“Oh, sure, sure! But just now I disremember where that paper is!”

Filhiol retreated to the dining-room, and beckoned Ezra to him.

“See here,” said he in a low tone, “this game of yours is pitifully thin. Why don’t you own up to the truth? Your loyalty to Hal is wonderful. The recording angel is writing it all down in his big book; but you can’t fool anybody. Why, not even a child would believe you, Ezra, and how can I—a hard-shelled old man who’s knocked up and down the seven seas? You know perfectly well Hal Briggs stole that money. Own up now!”

The old cook fixed a look of ire on him, and with clenched fist confronted Filhiol.

“Doctor,” said he, “there’s two things makes most o’ the trouble in this here world. One is evil tongues, to speak ill o’ folks, an’ the other is evil ears, to listen. There’s jest two things you can’t do here—speak ill o’ the cap’n, an’ talk ag’in’ Master Hal. Ef you do, doc—it don’t signify ef you be old, I’ll make it damn good an’ hot fer you! Now, then, I’ve warned you proper. That’s all—an’ that’s enough!”

“You don’t understand—” the doctor was just going to retort, when a trample of feet on the front porch brought him to silence.

“There’s Master Hal now!” exclaimed the old cook, with an expression of dismay. “An’ the money ain’t back in the safe yit—an’ Master Hal’s li’ble to wake the cap’n up!”

“He mustn’t wake him up!” said Filhiol. He turned, and, hobbling on his cane, started for the front door to head him off. Too late! Already Hal had flung off his cap and, stamping wet feet, had entered the cabin. The voice of the captain sounded:

“Oh, that you, Hal? God above! but I’m glad to see you! Come here, boy, come here. I’ve got news for you. Great, good news!”