Roobetl

Roobetl CHAPTER 60. The Line. “They weren’t my parents, no fear. They told that soon enough. I’d been taken in by ’em ’cause they thought I might be useful—”,"Worse!" repeats his mother, in a withering tone. In this mood she is not nice, and a very little of her suffices.,Croaker considered this last statement a moment. Then he carefully raised one foot and twisted half way around on the bar.,The laugh with which the malicious old fellow accompanied this sally caused the sailor to gaze eagerly round the ground as though for a stone to heave at him.,Short was a large fat man with a pink face, merry little drunken eyes almost buried out of sight in hairy eyebrows and eyelashes; his pear-shaped nose was so purple at the end that it might have been supposed he had just been fighting his way through a hedge full of nettles. He treated his patrons as guests, and of those he knew, would ask familiarly after their relations, and how their businesses went and the like.，When they entered the Sheriff’s office again it was two o’clock. He was there, and gave Billy a private audience far more graciously than he would have done had not Doctor Carter’s presence been voucher for the importance of the matter. When the boy repeated his story, less confidently, less dramatically than before, yet not needing the Doctor’s comment to prove its value, the Sheriff drew a long breath and emphasized it with a blow of his fist on the table.，"Frank told Mr. Reddick, the preacher who came to bury old Scroggie, all that had passed between him an' the dead man but although they hunted high an' low fer the will, they never found it. Nor did they find any of the money the ol' miser must have left behind—not a solitary cent. That was over a year ago, an' they haven't found money or will yet. But this goes to show what a real feller Frank Stanhope is. He put a fine grave stone up for ol' Scroggie an' had his name engraved on it. Yes he done that, an' all he ever got from the dead man was his curses.，The Aurora's boat was swept alongside the brig, and Captain Acton and the Admiral clambered over the side up a short flight of steps, and in an instant Lucy was clasped in the devouring embrace of her father. Such an old-world scene taxes the highest gifts of the pen or the brush. This Louisa Ann was about fifty years old; she was nearly as broad as she was long. Her fore-mast was stepped far in the bows; her decks were stained and grimy; the paint had faded out of the inside of her bulwarks. Her sails were patched and so dingy that they might have been coloured as a smack's. Her rusty sides were lined with yawning seams amid which three little circular windows were merged with no accentuation from the dirt-shrouded glass which prevented the sea from entering the blistered, worn, mani-coloured hull. Her sailors looked as though[Pg 359] they were shipwrecked: long-haired, bearded, sallow, in clothes considerably tattered, in aspect melancholy and dejected with lack of nourishment, dullness of sailing and ceaseless motion: for here was the tub wallowing like a buoy in a popple upon a smooth sea, and the frightful weather she would make off Cape Horn or in a gale of wind the imagination of a sailor could readily picture by witnessing her motions now.For a maid whom love happy would render.

Edith came in dressed for church.,Gradually the great rooms were filled, the park overflowed with children, and the band in the walnut tree avenue sent everywhere its strong, rich tones. On a bench near the bandstand sat Katrina the dwarf in a bright red dress. When Johnny Blossom saw her he ran to the garden and picked as many plums as he could carry and put them in her lap. “I promised you these, you know,” he said.,"Hate you!" replies he, with a smile of ineffable fondness, "my preserver and my love!",Billy sat looking away. His grey eyes had grown somber. "See here," he said suddenly, "do you know that old man Scroggie left a will?","Glory be! It's find ye alone I do," he spoke in rich Irish brogue. "It's trill ye a chune I did from the copse, yonder, so's to soften the hard heart of ye, Caleb. It's dhry I am as a last-year's chip, an' me little jug do be pinin' fer a refillin'.",In the deep silence following his answer Billy sat down. Then a murmur of gasps, whispers and giggles grew up, which died suddenly to silence again, as Mr. Keeler's voice rang out.,There was a stir in the room. His mother stood—May Nell, too—and the cat stretched lazily on the couch. Sister Edith followed the guests to the porch, as did his mother and the little girl—the room was empty! He opened the kitchen door, tried to hasten noiselessly, yet thought he clattered like a threshing machine. Into the living-room he crept, and lumbered softly up the stairs that seemed a mile long.,Maurice's white face slowly expanded in a grin. He glanced in the direction of his mother, then held out his hand to the crow with a lowspoken, "Come Croaker, ol' feller.","Exactly. And, Benjamin, kin you imagine the old deacon's face in the mornin' when he sees what we've done?" And the two cronies went off laughing over their prospective raid.,"I cannot tell you that, sir, but this morning at about a quarter before eight o'clock, I was about ten minutes' walk this side Old Harbour Bridge. I was going up the road and met your daughter, who was alone, coming down. A few minutes after I had passed her, I happened to look round and perceived that[Pg 184] she had been stopped by a young man, humpbacked and otherwise deformed, well known to me as a fellow who used to hang about Old Town, and called by the single word Paul. As your daughter was alone I slackened my pace and continued to look to see what the man wanted with her, and observed that he gave her a letter which she read, and I heard her exclaim on reading it: 'Oh dear! I hope it is not serious,' and she immediately walked swiftly on followed by the fellow called Paul. She turned the bend of the road, and I pursued my way.",Scarcely had he approached the wood, when all those great trees, all those brambles and thorns, made way for him to pass of their own accord. He walked towards the castle, which he saw at the end of a long avenue he had entered, and he was somewhat surprised to find that none of his people had been able to follow him, the trees having closed up again as soon as he had passed. Nevertheless, he continued to advance; a young prince, inspired by love, is always courageous. He came to a large fore-court, where everything he saw might well have frozen his blood with terror. A frightful silence reigned around; death seemed everywhere present; on every side, nothing to be seen but the bodies of men and animals stretched out, apparently lifeless. He soon discovered, however, by the shining noses and red faces of the porters, that they were only asleep; and their goblets, in which still remained a few drops of wine, sufficiently proved that they had dozed off whilst drinking.,"Can we force her by threats to give evidence?" said Jen, angrily..