"But, young man," cried Newcombe, "where is she? Tell that without further delay. Where is she?"

"I don't care where she is!" interrupted Madam Bonnet. "It matters not to me whether she is in the town, or sitting waiting for her finery on the bridge. If she didn't go with her father (cowardly sneak that he is), that gives her less reason to stay away all night from her home, and send her orders to me in the morning. No, I will have none of that!

If my husband's daughter wants anything of me, let her come here and ask for it, first giving me the reason of her shameful conduct."

"Madam!" cried Newcombe, "I cannot listen to such speech, such--"

"Then stop your ears with your thumbs," she exclaimed, "and you will not hear it."

Then turning to d.i.c.kory: "Now, go you, and tell the young woman who sent you here she must come in sackcloth and ashes, if she can get them, and she must tell me her tale and her father's tale, without a lie mixed up in them; and when she has done this, and has humbly asked my pardon for the foul affront she has put upon me, then it will be time enough to talk of fine clothes and fripperies."

Newcombe now expostulated with much temper, but d.i.c.kory gave him little chance to speak.

"I carry no such message as that," he said. "Do you truly mean that you deny the young lady the apparel she needs, and that I am to tell her that?"

"Get away from here!" cried Madam Bonnet, with her face in a blaze. "I send her no message at all; and if she comes here on her knees, I shall spurn her, if it suit me."

If d.i.c.kory had waited a little he might have heard more, but he did not wait; he quickly turned, and away he went in his boat. And away went Martin Newcombe after him. But as the younger man was barefooted, the other one could not keep up with him, and the canoe was pushed off before he reached the water's edge.

"Stop, you young rascal!" cried Newcombe. "Where is Kate Bonnet? Stop!

and tell me where she is!"

Troubled as he was at the tale he was going to tell, d.i.c.kory laughed aloud, and he paddled down the river as few in that region had ever paddled before.

Madam Bonnet went into her house, and if she had met a maid-servant, it might have been bad for that poor woman. She was not troubled about Kate. She knew the young man to be d.i.c.kory Charter, and she was quite sure that her step-daughter was in his mother's cottage. Why she happened to be there, and what had become of the recreant Bonnet, the equally recreant young woman could come and tell her whenever she saw fit.

CHAPTER VI

A PAIR OF SHOES AND STOCKINGS

The tide was running down, and d.i.c.kory made a swift pa.s.sage to the town.

Seeing on the pier the man from whom he had borrowed the rope, he stopped to return him his property, and thinking that the good people of the town should know that, no matter what had befallen Major Bonnet, his daughter had not gone with him and was safe among friends, he mentioned these facts to the man, but with very few details, being in a hurry to return with his message.

Before he turned into the inlet, d.i.c.kory was called from the sh.o.r.e, and to his surprise he saw his mother standing on the bank in front of a ma.s.s of bushes, which concealed her from her house.

"Come here, d.i.c.kory," she said, "and tell me what you have heard?"

Her son told his doleful tale.

"I fear me, mother," he said, "that Major Bonnet's ship has gone on some secret and bad business, and that he is mixed up in it. Else why did he desert his daughter? And if he intended to take her with him, that was worse."

"I don't know, d.i.c.kory," said good Dame Charter reflectively; "we must not be too quick to believe harm of our fellow-beings. It does look bad, as the townspeople thought, that Major Bonnet should own such a ship with such a strange crew, but he is a man who knows his own business, and may have had good reason for what he has done. He might have been sailing out to some foreign part to bring back a rich cargo, and needed stout men to defend it from the pirates that he might meet with on the seas."

"But his daughter, mother," said d.i.c.kory; "how could he have left her as he did? That was shameful, and even you must admit it."

"Not so fast, d.i.c.kory," said she; "there are other ways of looking at things than the way in which we look at them. He had intended to take Mistress Kate on a little trip; she told me that herself. And most likely, having changed his mind on account of the suspicions in the town, he sent word to her to return to her home, which message she did not get."

d.i.c.kory considered.

"Yes, mother," he said, "it might have been that way, but I don't believe that he went of his own accord, and I don't believe that he would take Ben Greenway with him. I think, mother, that they were both stolen with the ship."

"That might be," said his mother, "but we have no right to take such a view of it, and to impart it to his daughter. If he went away of his own accord, everything will doubtless be made right, and we shall know his reasons for what he has done. It is not for us to make up our minds that Major Bonnet and good Ben Greenway have been carried off by wicked men, for this would be sad indeed for that fair girl to believe. So remember, d.i.c.kory, that it is our duty always to think the best of everything. And now I will go through the underbrush to the house, and when you get there yourself you must tell your story as if you had not told it to me."

Before d.i.c.kory had reached his mother's cottage Mistress Kate Bonnet came running to meet him, and she did not seem to be the same girl he had left that morning. Her clothes had been dried and smoothed; even her hat, which had been found in the boat, had been made shapely and wearable, and its ribbons floated in the breeze. d.i.c.kory glanced at her feet, and as he did so, a thrill of strange delight ran through him. He saw his own Sunday shoes, with silver buckles, and he caught a glimpse of a pair of brown stockings, which he knew went always with those shoes.

"I am quite myself again," she said, noticing his wide eyes, "and your mother has been good enough to lend me a pair of your shoes and stockings. Mine are so utterly ruined, and I could not walk barefooted."

d.i.c.kory was so filled with pride that this fair being could wear his shoes, and that she was wearing them, that he could only mumble some stupid words about being so glad to serve her. And she, wise girl, said nothing about the quant.i.ties of soft cotton-wool which Dame Charter had been obliged to stuff into the toes before they would stay upon the small feet they covered.

"But my father," cried Kate, "what of him? Where is he?"

Now Dame Charter was with them, her eyes hard fixed upon her son.

d.i.c.kory, mindful of those eyes, told her what he had to tell, saying as little as possible about Major Bonnet--because, of course, all that he knew about him was mere hearsay--but dilating with much vigour upon the shameful conduct of Madam Bonnet; for the young lady ought surely to know what sort of a woman her father's wife really was, and what she might expect if she should return to her house. He could have said even more about the interview with the angry woman, but his mother's eyes were upon him.

Kate heard everything without a word, and then she burst into tears.

"My father," she sobbed, "carried away, or gone away, and one is as bad as the other!"

"d.i.c.kory," said Dame Charter, "go cut some wood; there is none ready for the kitchen."

d.i.c.kory went away, not sorry, for he did not know how to deport himself with a young lady whose heart was so sorely tried. He might have discovered a way, if he had been allowed to do so; but that would not have been possible with his mother present. But, in spite of her sorrow, his heart sang to him that she was wearing his shoes and stockings! Then he cheerfully brought down his axe upon the wood for the dinner's cooking.

Dame Charter led the weeping girl to the bench, and they talked long together. There was no optimist in all the British colonies, nor for that matter in those belonging to France or Spain, or even to the Dutch, who was a more conscientious follower of her creed than Dame Charter.

She sat by Kate and she talked to her until the girl stopped sobbing and began to see for herself that her father knew his own business, and that he had most certainly sent her a message to go on sh.o.r.e, which had not been delivered.

As to poor Ben Greenway, the good woman was greatly relieved that her son had not mentioned him, and she took care not to do it herself. She did not wish to strain her optimism. Kate, having so much else upon her mind, never thought of this good man.

When d.i.c.kory came back, he first looked to see if Kate still wore his shoes and stockings, and then he began to ask what there was that he might now do. He would go again to the town if he might be of use. But Kate had no errand for him there. d.i.c.kory had told her how he had been with Mr. Newcombe at her home, and therefore there was no need of her sending him another message.

"I don't know where to go or where to send," she said simply; "I am lost, and that is all of it."

"Oh, no," cried Dame Charter, "not that! You are with good friends, and here you can stay just as long as you like."

"Indeed she can!" said d.i.c.kory, as if he were making a response in church.

His mother looked at him and said nothing. And then she took Kate out into a little grove behind the house to see if she could find some ripe oranges.

It was a fair property, although not large, which belonged to the Widow Charter. Her husband had been a thriving man, although a little inclined to speculations in trade which were entirely out of his line, and when he met his death in the sea he left her nothing but her home and some inconsiderable land about it. d.i.c.kory had been going to a grammar-school in the town, and was considered a fair scholar, but with his father's death all that stopped, and the boy was obliged to go to work to do what he could for his mother. And ever since he had been doing what he could, without regard to appearances, thinking only of the money.

But on Sunday, when he rowed his mother to church, he wore good clothes, being especially proud of his buckled shoes and his long brown hose, which were always of good quality.

They were eating dinner when oars were heard on the river, and in a moment a boat swung around into the inlet. In the stern sat Master Martin Newcombe, and two men were rowing.

Now d.i.c.kory Charter swore in his heart, although he was not accustomed to any sort of blasphemy; and as Miss Kate gazed eagerly through the open window, our young friend narrowly scrutinized her face to see if she were glad or not. She was glad, that was plain enough, and he went out sullenly to receive the arriving interloper.