Sally Dows and Other Stories

B >> Bret Harte >> Sally Dows and Other Stories


"Yes. Unfortunately, just after father's death it was put in the hands
of a local architect or builder, one of father's old friends, but not
a very skillful workman, who made changes while the family were away.
That's why your present bedroom, which was father's old study, had a
slice taken off it to make the corridor larger, and why the big chimney
and hearthstone are still there, although the fireplace is modernized.
That was Flint's stupidity."

"Whose stupidity?" asked Uncle Sylvester, trimming his nails.

"Flint's--the old architect."

"Why didn't you make him change it back again?"

"He left Lakeville shortly after, and I brought an architect from St.
Louis after I returned from Europe. But nothing could be done to your
room without taking down the chimney, so it remained as Flint left it."

"That reminds me, Gabriel, I'm afraid I spoke rather cavalierly to
Kitty, last night, about the arrangements of the room. The fact is, I've
taken a fancy to it, and should like to fit it up myself. Have I your
permission?"

"Certainly, my dear Sylvester."

"I've some knickknacks in my trunks, and I'll do it at once."

"As you like."

"And you'll see that I am not disturbed; and you'll explain it to Kitty,
with my apologies?"

"Yes."

"Then I'm off."

Gabriel glanced at his brother with a perplexed smile. Here was the
bored traveler, explorer, gold-seeker, soldier of fortune, actually as
pleased as a girl over the prospect of arranging his room! He called
after him, "Sylvester!"

"Yes."

"I say, if you could, you know, just try to interest these people
to-night with some of your adventures--something told SERIOUSLY, you
know, as if you really were in earnest--I'd be awfully obliged to you.
The fact is,--you'll excuse me,--but they think you don't come up to
your reputation."

"They want a story?"

"Yes,--one of your experiences."

"I'll give them one. Ta-ta!"

For the rest of the day Uncle Sylvester was invisible, although his
active presence in his room was betrayed by the sound of hammering and
moving of furniture. As the remainder of the party were skating on
the lake, this eccentricity was not remarked except by one,--Marie du
Page,--who on pretense of a slight cold had stayed at home. But with her
suspicions of the former night, she had determined to watch the singular
relative of her friend. Added to a natural loyalty to the Lanes, she
was moved by a certain curiosity and fascination towards this
incomprehensible man.

The house was very quiet when she stole out of her room and passed
softly along the corridor; she examined the wall carefully to discover
anything that might have excited the visitor's attention. There were a
few large engravings hanging there; could he have designed to replace
them by some others? Suddenly she was struck with the distinct
conviction that the wall of the corridor did not coincide with the wall
of his room as represented by the line of the door. There was certainly
a space between the two walls unaccounted for. This was undoubtedly what
had attracted HIS attention; but what BUSINESS was it of his?

She reflected that she had seen in the wall of the conservatory an old
closed staircase, now used as shelves for dried herbs and seeds, which
she had been told was the old-time communication between the garden
and Grandfather Lane's study,--the room now occupied by the stranger.
Perhaps it led still farther, and thus accounted for the space.
Determined to satisfy herself, she noiselessly descended to the
conservatory. There, surely, was the staircase,--a narrow flight of
wooden steps encumbered with packages of herbs,--losing itself in upper
darkness. By the aid of a candle she managed to grope and pick her way
up step by step. Then she paused. The staircase had abruptly ended on
the level of the study, now cut off from it by the new partition. She
was in a stifling inclosure, formed by the walls, scarcely eighteen
inches wide. It was made narrower by a singular excrescence on the old
wall, which seemed to have been a bricked closet, now half destroyed
and in ruins. She turned to descend, when a strange sound from Uncle
Sylvester's room struck her ear. It was the sound of tapping on the
floor close to the partition, within a foot of where she was standing.
At the same moment there was a decided movement of the plank of the
flooring beneath the partition: it began to slide slowly, and then was
gradually withdrawn into the room. With prompt presence of mind, she
instantly extinguished her candle and drew herself breathlessly against
the partition.

When the plank was entirely withdrawn, a ray of light slipped through
the opening, revealing the bare rafters of the floor, and a hand and arm
inserted under the partition, groping as if towards the bricked closet.
As the fingers of the exploring hand were widely extended, Marie had no
difficulty in recognizing on one of them a peculiar signet ring which
Uncle Sylvester wore. A swift impulse seized her. To the audacious Marie
impulse and action were the same thing. Bending stealthily over the
aperture, she suddenly snatched the ring from the extended finger. The
hand was quickly withdrawn with a start and uncontrolled exclamation,
and she availed herself of that instant to glide rapidly down the
stairs.

She regained her room stealthily, having the satisfaction a moment later
of hearing Uncle Sylvester's door open and the sound of his footsteps in
the corridor. But he was evidently unable to discover any outer ingress
to the inclosure, or believed the loss of his ring an accident, for he
presently returned. Meantime, what was she to do?

Tell Kitty of her discovery, and show the ring? No--not yet! Oddly
enough, now that she had the ring, taken from his wicked finger in
the very act, she found it as difficult as ever to believe in his
burglarious design. She must wait. The mischief--if there had been
mischief--was done; the breaking in of the bricked closet was, from the
appearance of the ruins, a bygone act. Could it have been some youthful
escapade of Uncle Sylvester's, the scene of which he was revisiting as
criminals are compelled to do? And had there been anything taken from
the closet--or was its destruction a part of the changes in the old
house? How could she find out without asking Kitty? There was one way.
She remembered that Mr. Gunn had once shown a great deal of interest
to Kitty about the old homestead, and even of old Mr. Lane's woodland
cabin. She would ask HIM. It was a friendly act, for Kitty had not of
late been very kind to him.

The opportunity presented itself at dusk, as Mr. Gunn, somewhat
abstracted, stood apart at the drawing-room window. Marie hoped he had
enjoyed himself while skating; her stupid cold had kept her indoors. She
had amused herself rambling about the old homestead; it was such a queer
place, so full of old nooks and corners and unaccountable spaces. Just
the place, she would think, where old treasures might have been stored.
Eh?

Mr. Gunn had not spoken--he had only coughed. But in the darkness his
eyes were fixed angrily on her face. Without observing it, she went on.
She knew he was interested in the old house; she had heard him talk
to Kitty about it: had Kitty ever said anything about some old secret
hoarding place?

No, certainly not! And she was mistaken, he never was interested in
the house! He could not understand what had put that idea in her head!
Unless it was this ridiculous, shady stranger in the guise of an uncle
whom they had got there. It was like his affectation!

"Oh, dear, no," said Marie, with unmistakable truthfulness, "HE did not
say anything. But," with sudden inconsistent aggression, "is THAT the
way you speak to Kitty of her uncle?"

Really he didn't know--he was joking only, and he was afraid he must
just now ask her to excuse him. He had received letters that made it
possible that he might be called suddenly to New York at any moment.
Marie stared. It was evident that he had proposed to Kitty and been
rejected! But she was no nearer her discovery.

Nor was there the least revelation in the calm, half-bored, yet
good-humored presence of the wicked uncle at dinner. So indifferent
did he seem, not only to his own villainy but even to the loss it had
entailed, that she had a wild impulse to take the ring from her pocket
and display it on her own finger before him then and there. But the
conviction that he would in some way be equal to the occasion prevented
her. The dinner passed off with some constraint, no doubt emanating from
the conscious Kitty and Gunn. Nevertheless, when they had returned to
the drawing-room, Gabriel rubbed his hands expectantly.

"I prevailed on Sylvester this morning to promise to tell us some of his
experiences--something COMPLETE and satisfactory this time. Eh?"

Uncle Sylvester, warming his cold blood before the fire, looked
momentarily forgetful and--disappointing. Cousins Jane and Emma shrugged
their shoulders.

"Eh," said Uncle Sylvester absently, "er--er--oh yes! Well" (more
cheerfully), "about what, eh?"

"Let it be," said Marie pointedly, fixing her black magnetic eyes on the
wicked stranger, "let it be something about the DISCOVERY of gold, or a
buried TREASURE HOARD, or a robbery."

To her intense disgust Uncle Sylvester, far from being discomfited or
confused, actually looked pleased, and his gray eyes thawed slightly.

"Certainly," he said. "Well, then! Down on the San Joaquin River there
was an old chap--one of the earliest settlers--in fact, he'd come on
from Oregon before the gold discovery. His name, dear me!"--continued
Uncle Sylvester, with an effort of memory and apparently beginning
already to lose his interest in the story--"was--er--Flint."

As Uncle Sylvester paused here, Cousin Jane broke in impatiently. "Well,
that's not an uncommon name. There was an old carpenter here in your
father's time who was called Flint."

"Yes," said Uncle Sylvester languidly. "But there is, or was, something
uncommon about it--and that's the point of the story, for in the old
time Flint and Gunn were of the same stock."

"Is this a Californian joke?" said Gunn, with a forced smile on his
flushed face. "If so, spare me, for it's an old one."

"It's much older HISTORY, Mr. Gunn," said Uncle Sylvester blandly,
"which I remember from a boy. When the first Flint traded near Sault
Sainte Marie, the Canadian voyageurs literally translated his name into
Pierre a Fusil, and he went by that name always. But when the English
superseded the French in numbers and language the name was literally
translated back again into 'Peter Gunn,' which his descendants bear."

"A labored form of the old joke," said Gunn, turning contemptuously
away.

"But the story," said Cousins Jane and Emma. "The story of the gold
discovery--never mind the names."

"Excuse me," said Uncle Sylvester, placing his hand in the breast of his
coat with a delightful exaggeration of offended dignity. "But, doubts
having been cast upon my preliminary statement, I fear I must decline
proceeding further." Nevertheless, he smiled unblushingly at Miss Du
Page as he followed Gunn from the room.

The next morning those who had noticed the strained relations of Miss
Kitty and Mr. Gunn were not surprised that the latter was recalled on
pressing business to New York by the first train; but it was a matter of
some astonishment to Gabriel Lane and Marie du Page that Uncle Sylvester
should have been up early, and actually accompanied that gentleman
as far as the station! Indeed, the languid explorer and gold-seeker
exhibited remarkable activity, and, clad in a rough tourist suit,
announced, over the breakfast-table, his intention of taking a long
tramp through the woods, which he had not revisited since a boy. To this
end he had even provided himself with a small knapsack, and for once
realized Kitty's ideal of his character.

"Don't go too far," said Gabriel, "for, although the cold has moderated,
the barometer is falling fast, and there is every appearance of snow.
Take care you are not caught in one of our blizzards."

"But YOU are all going on the lake to skate!" protested Uncle Sylvester.

"Yes; for the very reason that it may be our last chance; but should it
snow we shall be nearer home than you may be."

Nevertheless, when it came on to snow, as Gabriel had predicted, the
skating party was by no means so near home as he had imagined. A shrewd
keenness and some stimulating electric condition of the atmosphere had
tempted the young people far out on the lake, and they had ignored the
first fall of fine grayish granulations that swept along the icy surface
like little puffs of dust or smoke. Then the fall grew thicker, the gray
sky contracted, the hurrying flakes, dashed against them by a fierce
northwester, were larger, heavier, and seemed an almost palpable force
that held them back. Their skates, already clogged with drift, were
beginning to be useless. The bare wind-swept spaces were becoming rarer;
they could only stumble on blindly towards the nearest shore. Nor when
they reached it were they yet safe; they could scarcely stand against
the still increasing storm that was fast obliterating the banks and
stretch of meadow beyond. Their only hope of shelter was the range of
woods that joined the hill. Holding hands in single file, the
little party, consisting of Kitty, Marie, and Cousins Jane and
Emma--stout-hearted Gabriel leading and Cousin John bringing up the
rear--at last succeeded in reaching it, and were rejoiced to find
themselves near old Lane's half-ruined cabin. To their added joy and
astonishment, whiffs of whirling smoke were issuing from the crumbling
chimney. They ran to the crazy door, pushed aside its weak fastening,
and found--Uncle Sylvester calmly enjoying a pipe before a blazing fire.
A small pickaxe and crowbar were lying upon a mound of freshly turned
earth beside the chimney, where the rotten flooring had been torn up.

The tumultuous entrance of the skating party required no explanation;
but when congratulations had been exchanged, the wet snow shaken off,
and they had drawn round the fire, curious eyes were cast upon the
solitary occupant and the pile of earth and debris before him.

"I believe," said Gabriel laughingly, "that you have been so bored here
that you have actually played at gold-hunting for amusement."

Uncle Sylvester took the pipe from his mouth and nodded.

"It's a common diversion of yours," said Marie audaciously.

Uncle Sylvester smiled sweetly.

"And have you been successful THIS TIME?" asked Marie.

"I got the color."

"Eh?"

Uncle Sylvester rose and placed himself with his back to the fire,
gently surveying the assembled group.

"I was interrupted in a story of gold-digging last evening," he said
blandly. "How far had I got?"

"You were down on the San Joaquin River in the spring of '50, with a
chap named Flint," chorused Cousins Jane and Emma promptly.

"Ah! yes," said Uncle Sylvester. "Well, in those days there was a
scarcity of money in the diggings. Gold dust there was in plenty, but no
COIN. You can fancy it was a bother to weigh out a pinch of dust every
time you wanted a drink of whiskey or a pound of flour; but there was
no other legal tender. Pretty soon, however, a lot of gold and silver
pieces found their way into circulation in our camp and the camps around
us. They were foreign--old French and English coins. Here's one of
them that I kept." He took from his pocket a gold coin and handed it to
Gabriel.

Lane rose to his feet with an exclamation:

"Why, this is like the louis-d'or that grandfather saved through the war
and gave to father."

Uncle Sylvester took the coin back, placed it in his left eye, like a
monocle, and winked gravely at the company.

"It is the SAME!" he went on quietly. "I was interested, for I had a
good memory, and I remembered that, as a boy, grandfather had shown
me one of those coins and told me he was keeping them for old Jules du
Page, who didn't believe in banks and bank-notes. Well, I traced them to
a trader called Flint, who was shipping gold dust from Stockton to Peter
Gunn & Sons, in New York."

"To whom?" asked Gabriel quickly.

"Old Gunn--the father of your friend!" said Uncle Sylvester blandly. "We
talked the matter over on our way to the station this morning. Well, to
return. Flint only said that he had got them from a man called Thompson,
who had got them from somebody else in exchange for goods. A year or
two afterwards this same Thompson happened to be frozen up with me in
Starvation Camp. When he thought he was dying he confessed that he had
been bribed by Flint to say what he had said, but that he believed the
coins were stolen. Meantime, Flint had disappeared. Other things claimed
my attention. I had quite forgotten him, until one night, five years
afterwards, I blundered into a deserted mining-camp, by falling asleep
on my mule, who carried me across a broken flume, but--I think I told
you that story already."

"You never finished it," said Cousin Jane sharply.

"Let me do so now, then. I was really saved by some Indians, who took me
for a spirit up aloft there in the moonlight and spread the alarm. The
first white man they brought me was a wretched drunkard known to the
boys as 'Old Fusil,' or 'Fusel Oil,' who went into delirium tremens at
the sight of me. Well, who do you suppose he turned out to be? Flint!
Flint played out and ruined! Cast off and discarded by his relations in
New York--the foundation of whose fortunes he had laid by the villainy
they had accepted and condoned. For Flint, as the carpenter of the old
homestead, had discovered the existence of a bricked closet in the wall
of father's study, partitioned it off so that he could break into it
without detection and rifle it at his leisure, and who had thus carried
off that part of grandfather's hoard which father had concealed there.
He knew it could never be missed by the descendants. But, through haste
or ignorance, he DID NOT TOUCH THE PAPERS and documents also hidden
there. And THEY told of the existence of grandfather's second cache, or
hiding-place, beneath this hearth, and were left for me to discover."

He coolly relit his pipe, fixed his eyes on Marie without apparently
paying attention to the breathless scrutiny of the others, and went on:
"Flint, alias Pierre a Fusil, alias Gunn, died a maniac. I resolved to
test the truth of his story. I came here. I knew the old homestead, as
a boy who had wandered over every part of it, far better than you,
Gabriel, or any one. The elder Gunn had only heard of it through the
criminal disclosure of his relative, and only wished to absorb it
through his son in time, and thus obliterate all trace of Flint's
outrage. I recognized the room perfectly--thanks to our dear Kitty, who
had taken up the carpet, which thus disclosed the loose plank before the
closet that was hidden by the partition. Under pretext of rearranging
the room--for which Kitty will forgive me--I spent the day behind a
locked door, making my way through the partition. There I found the
rifled closet, but the papers intact. They contained a full description
of the sum taken by Flint, and also of a larger sum buried in a cask
beside this chimney. I had just finished unearthing it a few moments
before you came. I had at first hoped to offer it to the family as a
Christmas gift to-morrow, but"--He stopped and sucked slowly at his
pipe.

"We anticipated you," said Gabriel laughing.

"No," said Uncle Sylvester coolly. "But because it don't happen to
belong to YOU at all! According to the paper I have in my pocket, which
is about as legal a document as I ever saw, it is father's free gift to
Miss Marie du Page."

Kitty threw her arms around her white and breathless friend with
a joyful cry, and honest Gabriel's face shone with unselfish
gratification.

"For yourself, my dear Gabriel, you must be satisfied with the fact that
Messrs. Peter Gunn & Sons will take back your wildcat stock at the price
you paid for it. It is the price they pay for their share in this little
transaction, as I had the honor of pointing out to Mr. Gunn on our way
to the station this morning."

"Then you think that young Mr. Gunn knew that Flint was his relation,
and that he had stolen father's money," said Kitty, "and that Mr. Gunn
only wanted to"--She stopped, with flashing eyes.

"I think he would have liked to have made an arrangement, my dear,
that would keep the secret and the property in the family," said Uncle
Sylvester. "But I don't think he suspected the existence of the second
treasure here."

"And then, sir," said Cousin Jane, "it appears that all these wretched,
unsatisfactory scraps of stories you were telling us were nothing after
all but"--

"My way of telling THIS one," said Uncle Sylvester.

As the others were eagerly gathering around the unearthed treasure,
Marie approached him timidly, all her audacity gone, tears in her eyes,
and his ring held hesitatingly between her fingers. "How can I thank
you--and how CAN you ever forgive me?"

"Well," said Uncle Sylvester, gazing at her critically, "you might keep
the ring to think over it."