"She was. She met me at the Coha.s.set Narrows depot. I was settin' in the car, lookin' out of the window at the sand and sniffin' the Cape air. By the everlastin'! there ain't any air or sand like 'em anywheres else.

I feel as if I never wanted to see a palm tree again as long as I live.

I'd swap the whole of the South Pacific for one Trumet sandhill with a huckleberry bush on it. Well, as I started to say, I was settin' there lookin' out of the window when somebody tapped me on the shoulder. I looked up and 'twas her.

"You could have blown me over with a fan. By the jumpin' Moses, you could! You see, I'd been thinkin' about her--that is, I was--"

He hesitated, turned red, coughed, and went on.

"I was surprised enough to see her, I tell you. Way up there at the Narrows! I couldn't have said a word, anyway, and she never gave me a chance. 'Nat,' she says, 'don't talk now. Come with me, quick, afore the train starts.'

"Still I didn't say anything, nothin' sane anyhow. 'Keziah!' I managed to stutter. 'KEZIAH!'

"'Come!' says she. 'Hurry! I want you to get off here. I've come here on purpose to meet you. I must talk with you; it's important. You can go to Trumet on the next train, to-night. But now I must talk with you. I MUST. Won't you please come, Nat?'

"Well, I went. The engine bell was beginnin' to ring and we had to move lively, I tell you. I swung her off the step just as the car begun to move. After the smoke had faded away around the next bend I realized that my hat had faded away along with it. Yes, sir! I'd left it on the seat. Ha! ha! ha!"

He laughed uproariously. Ellery laughed in sympathy.

"However, I wa'n't worryin' about hats, just then. All I wanted to do was stand still, like a frozen image, and stare at her. You see, John, I hadn't laid eyes on a friend, one of the real homemade kind, for more days than I wanted to count; and here was one of 'em, one of the best, pa.s.sed out to me unexpected and ahead of time, like a surprise party present. So I just pumped her hand up and down and stared. I didn't have any exclusive mortgage on the starin' by no means, for the depot master and a dozen or so loafers was lookin' at us with their mouths wide open.

"I guess she noticed it, for she says, 'Don't stay here, Nat. Come in the waitin' room or somewheres where we can talk.'

"So into the waitin' room we went and come to anchor on the settee. Six or eight of the loafers settled themselves handy to the door, so's they could peek in occasionally. I remember I told one of them not to stretch his neck that way 'cause he might never get it back into shape again and in the gunnin' season that would be dangerous. 'Some nearsighted feller might take you for a goose,' I says. Ho! ho!

"And then, John, we had our talk. Seems she left Trumet Wednesday afternoon. Got the livery stable man to drive her as fur as Bayport, hired another team there and come on to Sandwich. Stayed overnight there and took the mornin' train which got to Coha.s.set Narrows just ahead of the one I was comin' on. She'd been so afraid of bein' late, she said.

She must see me afore I got to Trumet.

"Well, she saw me and told me the whole yarn about you and Grace. She tried to break it to me gently, so I wouldn't feel too bad. She knew it would be a shock to me, she said. It was a shock, in a way, but as for feelin' bad, I didn't. I think the world of Grace. I'd do anything she wanted me to do; but most the way down on the train--yes, and long afore that--I'd been dreadin' my comin' home on one account. I dreaded tellin'

her that, unless she was real set on it, she'd better not marry me.

"You see, John, I've thought a lot sence I've been away. Had consider'ble time to do it in. And the more I thought the less that promise to dad seemed right. I'd have bet my sou-wester Gracie never cared for me in the way a girl ought to care for a chap she's goin' to ship as pilot for the rest of her days. And, as for me--well, I--I had my reasons for not wantin' to marry her."

He paused again, sighed, started to speak, and then sat silent, looking out of the window. Ellery laid a hand on his knee.

"Nat," said the minister, "you saved my life once, do you remember that?

I do, if you don't."

"Saved your life? What are you talkin' about? Oh! that time on the flats? That wasn't savin' your life, 'twas savin' your clothes from gettin' a wettin'."

"No, it was more than that. And now I guess you've saved it again, you and Grace between you. Yes, and Aunt Keziah. Bless her! to think of her going way up there to meet you and help us!"

"Yes. 'Twas like her, wasn't it? She said she knew I'd hear the yarn when I got to Trumet, but she wanted me to hear it just as it was, and n.o.body but she and Grace and you knew the whole truth about it. So she come. I'm glad she did; not that I shouldn't have done the same, whoever told me, but--"

"Nat, I want to tell you something. Something that only one other person knows. Grace doesn't know it yet. Neither does Aunt Keziah--the whole of it. And if she knew I told you even a part I'm afraid she would, as she would say, 'skin me alive.' But I owe her--and you--more than I could repay if I lived a thousand years. So I'm going to tell and take the consequences."

The captain looked at him. "Well!" he exclaimed. "What's comin' now?

More secrets? Blessed if this ain't gettin' more excitin' than the South Seas. I used to think excitement in Trumet was scurcer than cream in poorhouse coffee, but I'll have to change my mind."

"Nat, when--that morning after your father died and after you and Grace had agreed to--to--"

"To do somethin' neither of us wanted to do? Yes, I know. Go ahead."

"That morning Aunt Keziah came home to the parsonage and broke the news to me. She did it as only she could do such a thing, kindly and pityingly and--"

"Of course. That's Keziah."

"Yes. Well, as you can imagine, I was almost crazy. I made a fool of myself, I expect; refused to believe her, behaved disgracefully, and at last, when I had to believe it, threatened to run away and leave my work and Trumet forever, like a coward. She made me stay."

"Did, hey?"

"Yes. She showed me it was my duty to face the music. When I whimpered about my troubles she told me her own story. Then I learned what trouble was and what pluck was, too. She told me about her marriage and--excuse me for speaking of what isn't my business; yet it is mine, in a way--she told me about you."

Captain Hammond did not answer. His good natured face clouded and he shifted in his chair.

"She told me of you, Nat, all about you--and herself. And she told me something else, which explains why she felt she must send you away, why she thought your marriage to Grace would be a good thing."

"I know. She told you that that darn scamp Anse Coffin was alive."

The minister started violently. He gasped in surprise.

"You knew it? You KNEW it?" he stammered.

"I know it now. Have known it for over a year. My findin' it out was one of the special Providences that's been helpin' along this last voyage of mine. My second mate was a Hyannis man, name of Cahoon. One day, on that pesky island, when we was eatin' dinner together, he says to me, 'Cap'n,' he says, 'you're from Trumet, ain't you?' I owned up. 'Know anybody named Coffin there?' says he. I owned up to that, too. 'Well,'

he says, 'I met her husband last trip I was in the Glory of the Wave.'

I stared at him. 'Met his ghost, you mean,' I says. 'He's been dead for years, and a good thing, too. Fell overboard and, not bein' used to water, it killed him.'

"But he wouldn't have it so. 'I used to know Anse Coffin in New Bedford,' he says. 'Knew him well's I know you. And when we was in port at Havre I dropped in at a gin mill down by the water front and he come up and touched me on the arm. I thought same as you, that he was dead, but he wa'n't. He was three sheets in the wind and a reg'lar dock rat to look at, but 'twas him sure enough. We had a long talk. He said he was comin' back to Trumet some day. Had a wife there, he said. I told him, sarcastic, that she'd be glad to see him. He laughed and said maybe not, but that she knew he was alive and sent him money when he was hard up.

Wanted me to promise not to tell any Cape folks that I'd seen him, and I ain't till now.'

"Well, you can imagine how I felt when Cahoon spun me that yarn. First I wouldn't b'lieve it and then I did. It explained things, just as you say, John. I could see now why Keziah gave me my walkin' papers. I could see how she'd been sacrificin' her life for that sc.u.m."

"Yes. She wouldn't divorce him. She said she had taken him for better or worse, and must stand by him. I tried to show her she was wrong, but it was no use. She did say she would never live with him again."

"I should say not. LIVE with him! By the everlastin'! if he ever comes within reach of my hands then--there's times when good honest murder is justifiable and righteous, and it'll be done. It'll be done, you hear me!"

He looked as if he meant it. Ellery asked another question.

"Did you tell her--Aunt Keziah--when you met her at the Narrows?" he asked.

"No. But I shall tell her when I see her again. She shan't spoil her life--a woman like that! by the Lord! WHAT a woman!--for any such crazy notion. I swore it when I heard the story and I've sworn it every day since. That's what settled my mind about Grace. Keziah Coffin belongs to me. She always has belonged to me, even though my own pig-headedness lost her in the old days."

"She cares for you, Nat. I know that. She as much as told me so."

"Thank you, John. Thank you. Well, I can wait now. I can wait, for I've got something sure to wait for. I tell you, Ellery, I ain't a church-goin' man--not as dad was, anyway--but I truly believe that this thing is goin' to come out right. G.o.d won't let that cussed rascal live much longer. He won't! I know it. But if he does, if he lives a thousand years, I'll take her from him."

He was pacing the floor now, his face set like granite. Ellery rose, his own face beaming. Here was his chance. At last he could pay to this man and Keziah a part of the debt he owed.

Nat stopped in his stride. "Well!" he exclaimed. "I almost forgot, after all. Keziah sent a note to you. I've got it in my pocket. She gave it to me when she left me at Coha.s.set."